The Paradox of Avoidance: Why You Push Away the Help You Need

A SCARS Institute Scam Victim Recovery Insight

You know you need help, but trauma has a way of shrinking your world.

It does not happen all at once, but slowly, insidiously, like a tide going out, leaving behind a barren shoreline where life once flourished.

You pull back. You avoid. And perhaps most of all, you disconnect from others, from yourself, and from the things you once enjoyed. The vibrant, colorful landscape of your life begins to fade, replaced by a small, muted room where you feel a fragile sense of control. The very resources and relationships you need for healing become harder to access, not because they are gone, but because your trauma has convinced you they are unsafe or simply not worth the effort.

This disconnection is a core feature of the trauma response. It is a protective mechanism, a brilliant but flawed survival strategy your brain employs to shield you from further pain.

When you experience a profound betrayal or a terrifying event, your nervous system is thrown into a state of high alert. The world, which once felt predictable and safe, is now perceived as a minefield of potential threats. To navigate this new reality, your brain begins to draw a map, but it is a map of danger, not possibility. It draws circles around the people, places, and activities that remind you of the trauma, and then it draws even larger circles around anything new or unknown, because the unknown is now inherently unpredictable and therefore risky and a potential threat.

One of the most painful and paradoxical circles your brain draws is the one that encloses the very support providers who are essential to your healing. Therapists, support groups and providers, and trauma specialists are, by necessity, going to talk about the scam that brought you to them. Their job is to help you process the event and its aftermath, understand its impact, and work through the complex emotions it created. However, for your traumatized brain, which is wired to avoid anything associated with the pain, this professional focus can feel like a direct threat.

Discussing the details of the scam, the feelings of shame, or the reality of the financial loss can trigger the same intense fear and distress you felt when the trauma was fresh. In that moment, your nervous system cannot distinguish between the original danger and the therapeutic conversation. It simply registers “scam” and “pain” and activates the same powerful avoidance instincts. As a result, you may find yourself resisting therapy, distrusting your counselor, or dropping out or remaining silent in a support group, not because the help is ineffective, but because your brain is desperately trying to protect you from revisiting the source of the wound. This creates a devastating cycle where the very thing you need to heal is perceived as the thing you must avoid, trapping you in isolation and prolonging your recovery.

This is why you pull back from friends too. A simple invitation for coffee can feel like a monumental request. The social energy required to perform “normalcy” is exhausting. You fear they will not understand, or worse, that they will ask questions you cannot or do not want to answer. So you decline. You isolate yourself, believing you are safer alone. You disconnect from yourself as well. You might feel numb, detached from your own emotions, as if you are watching your life from a distance. This is known as dissociation, a state where your mind separates itself from the overwhelming experience to protect you. The things you once enjoyed, your hobbies, your passions, your sense of purpose, even your sense of who you are, lose their color and meaning. Why would you paint, or garden, or play music when the internal world feels so gray and heavy?

This is where an approach grounded in attachment science can be such a game-changer in your journey with trauma. Attachment science is the study of the deep, emotional bonds we form with others, beginning in infancy. It explores how these bonds shape our sense of safety, our ability to regulate our emotions, and our capacity to navigate the world. Most trauma is fundamentally an attachment injury, though betrayal is its own kind separately, but they interact. It is a profound violation of trust that shatters your core belief in the safety of connection with others and with the world.

An attachment-based approach to healing does not just focus on managing symptoms; it focuses on rebuilding the very bonds that were broken. It recognizes that you cannot heal in isolation because the wound itself is one of disconnection. The therapeutic relationship becomes the primary vehicle for change. A therapist grounded in attachment science, trauma-informed care, and dissociation provides a safe, predictable, and empathetic connection. They become a secure base from which you can begin to explore your trauma without being overwhelmed. Through this relationship, you learn, perhaps for the first time since the trauma, what it feels like to be truly seen, heard, and understood without judgment.

The same is true of your support provider. You need to show up for the support calls to connect with those trying to help you. It will be hard, but there are really no other pathways to recovery. Being on the calls helps you to reconnect with others, both those supporting you and with other survivors. No one will bite, no one will judge, they are just there to help you learn and understand, and form new trusted connections.

This safe connection allows your nervous system to slowly come out of its defensive crouch. It begins to rewrite the map in your brain, adding new data points that show connection can be safe, vulnerability can lead to support, and the world is not entirely a threat. As you build this secure attachment with your therapist and support community, you start to rebuild the broken attachment with yourself. You learn to reconnect with your own emotions, to trust your own instincts again, and to reclaim the parts of yourself that were lost to the trauma.

This approach does not promise a quick fix, but it offers a path back to a world that is not just survivable, but rich, connected, and full of possibility once more.

Prof. Tim McGuinness, Ph.D.
January 2026