Podcast Summary: The Hot & Cold Fearful Avoidant Cycle Explained & the Secret to Healthily Bond

The Thais Gibson Podcast
Host: Thais Gibson
Date: December 29, 2025

Main Theme & Purpose

In this episode, Thais Gibson delves into the complex behaviors associated with the fearful avoidant (also known as disorganized or anxious-avoidant) attachment style. She explains the recurring "hot and cold" cycles—where individuals oscillate between pursuing closeness and withdrawing distance—and offers insight into how these patterns develop, why they persist, and what steps can be taken to break free from them and foster healthy relationships. The episode is aimed at both people who identify with this attachment style and those who may be in relationships with them.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

Understanding the Fearful Avoidant Cycle

• Duality of Needs and Fears

  • Fearful avoidants enjoy closeness until it feels overwhelming, prompting withdrawal.
  • When faced with distance, they may become anxious and seek connection.
  • This duality is summed up as: “You might like [being pursued] at first, only to eventually feel like it’s overwhelming and find yourself needing to retreat...if somebody’s distant, you suddenly get triggered into this anxiety loop wanting to pursue them or chase them.” (00:06)

• Confusion for Both Partners

  • This unpredictable pattern confuses both the fearful avoidant and their partners, leading to mixed signals.

• Source of the Pattern

  • The cycle is rooted in childhood environments—such as chaotic, inconsistent, or enmeshed family dynamics—that shape core wounds (e.g., fear of abandonment and fear of engulfment).
  • “A lot of those core wounds that you have are actually from past experiences, but when they get triggered in real time, you think they're happening specifically because of the person in front of you.” (03:00)

Emotional and Psychological Dynamics

• Subconscious Protective Strategies

  • When triggered, fearful avoidants may push others away not because they want to end things, but to distance themselves from difficult emotions rooted in unresolved trauma.
  • “Fearful avoidants often push people away as a subconscious strategy to push away the negative feelings that they are associating with people, which at their root are actually about unresolved trauma from their past experiences.” (04:10)

• Inability to Problem Solve in Relationships

  • A lack of modeled emotional literacy during formative years leaves fearful avoidants without the skills to advocate for their needs or set boundaries—leading to flight or avoidance rather than collaboration.
  • “When you don't have emotional literacy modeled to you growing up... it just feels so overwhelming. And then as a subconscious strategy... you push the person away.” (08:40)

The Makeup-Breakup Cycle

• Recurring Push-Pull Dynamics

  • The perpetual cycle of breaking up and making up is tied to unresolved internal wounds, not necessarily the actions of the partner.
  • “It's almost like the part of themselves when they're really triggered and the part of themselves when they're not triggered are like two different aspects of self.” (13:38)

• Difficulty with Accountability and Repair

  • After emotional regulation, the fearful avoidant may regret their actions, but returning to repair the relationship is difficult due to lingering shame, guilt, or continued lack of emotional tools.

• Core Wounds Identified

  • Key wounds include feeling trapped, helpless, powerless, unsafe, fear of betrayal or abandonment, and unworthiness (“I am bad”).
  • “Until those core wounds…are moved through, then often the fearful avoidant will keep going through this breakup and then makeup cycle.” (14:15)

Pathways to Healing & Healthier Bonds

• Role of Subconscious Reprogramming

  • Healing comes from addressing and “reprogramming” these subconscious wounds—not from changing partners or circumstances.

• Tools for Change

  • Thais highlights the importance of learning emotional literacy, boundary-setting, and communicating needs as pathways to healthier bonding.
  • “What you would be looking to have from a healthy perspective instead would be to identify what feels uncomfortable for you, to convert that into words. Using emotional literacy…” (07:15)

• Potential for Growth and Freedom

  • Once these patterns are healed and new skills are learned, individuals can build more reliable, trust-based relationships without reactive patterns of suspicion or fear.
  • “When fearful avoidants have the ability to really move through these wounds, they can become more free. They aren’t breaking up and getting back together over and over again.” (17:33)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Why mixed signals happen:
  • “You can’t really settle in. It feels really difficult to just be yourself, be open, share what your needs are, open up, communicate, have boundaries.” (01:30)
• On the impact of unresolved trauma:
  • “A flight response is essentially just a trauma response at its core.” (06:29)
• On healing:
  • “Only the fearful avoidant is the one that can heal those wounds in relationship to themselves. And that comes through subconscious reprogramming techniques and tools.” (15:40)
• Exhaustion of the FA dynamic:
  • “You won’t be coming from this constant place of fear and suspicion, which quite honestly can just be exhausting to live in that dynamic all the time.” (18:45)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• (00:00) — Introduction to the hot/cold pattern in FA relationships
• (01:30) — The experience of fear and longing for both closeness and distance
• (03:00) — How early environments create core wounds
• (06:29) — The trauma response that underpins withdrawal
• (07:15) — Emotional literacy and healthy alternatives
• (13:38) — Why FAs regret pushing people away
• (14:15) — The core wounds that perpetuate the cycle
• (17:33) — The experience of healing and freedom from the cycle
• (18:45) — The toll of living with FA dynamics

Conclusion

Thais Gibson’s thorough breakdown offers both understanding and hope for those entangled in the fearful avoidant cycle. By compassionately unpacking the origins and manifestations of this attachment style, she empowers listeners to pursue healing through awareness, emotional skill-building, and self-led reprogramming—encouraging more stable, fulfilling relationships going forward.