Ignored Bids and Fading Affection: The Gottman Build-Up in Your Messages

Ignored Bids and Fading Affection: The Gottman Build-Up That Wears a Couple Down Through Messages

You reread your old messages. Two years ago, she used to write "Love you so much" at the end of the day. Today it is "OK", or worse: silence. He, once generous with little hearts and tender emojis, now sends factual, almost administrative messages. No major crisis has erupted. No spectacular betrayal. Just slow erosion, invisible in speech, but crystallised in writing.

In the article that follows, I look at communication within couples. On this theme, I have designed a couple communication test that helps you take stock of your communication patterns as a couple, with a guide to carry the reflection further. And if you have actual messages to decode, ScanMyLove analyses your conversations with your partner from a simple export and reveals their real dynamics. I also wrote a book on this subject, Saving Your Relationship: Communication, Crises, and Renewal, if you would like to go further.

This phenomenon is not psychological chance. It follows a precise mechanism that John Gottman, a researcher in couple psychology, documented over decades: the accumulation of ignored bids — those tiny attempts at connection — creates a measurable decline in affection. And contrary to what people believe, that decline is not irreversible. But you first have to see it.

What is a bid for connection, and why do messages make them visible?

A bid is an attempt at connection. It can be a look, a question, a smile. In written conversation it is clearer still: "Did you have a good day?", "Look what I found", "I was thinking about you".

Gottman showed that each bid receives one of three possible responses:

• Turning towards: responding with engagement ("Yes, tell me!")
• Turning against: responding with criticism or rejection ("Not now")
• Turning away: ignoring, not responding

In a healthy couple, partners turn towards 80% of bids. In a struggling couple, that rate collapses. And here is the key point: in messages, every bid and its response are time-stamped and archived. You can count them. You can see the exact moment when the "turning towards" rate tipped over.

Rereading a hundred messages is draining and often painful. The ScanMyLove analysis highlights these patterns automatically, revealing the real curve of the decline — the one that speech makes impossible to grasp.

The fatal crossover: ignored bids + anxious/avoidant attachment patterns

Here a second mechanism comes in, described by John Bowlby and developed by attachment theorists. When a person has an anxious attachment style, they send more bids — they seek closeness. When the other has an avoidant style, they ignore more of them — they seek autonomy.

The result: the anxious partner multiplies attempts ("Are you free tonight?", "Are you OK?", "Can we talk?"). The avoidant partner responds less and less. Each act of ignoring reinforces the anxiety of one and justifies the distance of the other.

A concrete example: Day 1:

• Anxious: "I'll be home late, will you wait up?"
• Avoidant: "OK"

Day 3:

• Anxious: "I missed you today"
• Avoidant: (no reply for four hours)

Day 7:

• Anxious: "We don't really talk any more..."
• Avoidant: "We're seeing each other at the weekend, it's fine"

Day 14:

• Anxious: (silence — they have stopped sending bids)

This exchange, spread over two weeks, shows a pattern that speech would have blurred. In writing, it is a measurable curve of disconnection.

Affection declines, but not at random

The decline of tender words follows a CBT logic: it is negative reinforcement. Every ignored bid creates a mental prediction: "If I send an affectionate message, they won't reply. So I won't send it." The absence of reward (a warm response) gradually extinguishes the behaviour (sending affectionate messages).

After a few weeks or months, the messages become transactional:

• "Can you buy some milk?"
• "What time are you home?"
• "The electrician is coming tomorrow"

Affection does not always disappear from the heart. It disappears from written communication — which, for a modern couple, amounts to the same thing. Messages are the daily interface of love.

Gottman, Young and the rejection schema

Albert Ellis and Jeffrey Young described an early schema called rejection/abandonment. People who carry this schema interpret every ignored bid as a confirmation: "I am not lovable enough." They then stop sending bids, not from lack of love, but as protection against pain.

In parallel, Gottman identified contempt as one of the four horsemen of Gottman — the four most destructive communication patterns. Contempt is the absence of a response combined with an attitude of superiority. In messages, it looks like:

• Replying hours later to an urgent message
• Using cynical humour to devalue an attempt at connection
• Sending short, monosyllabic messages in response to long, engaged ones

How to spot the pattern in your history

Here is what to look for in your messages:

Indicators of accumulating ignored bids:

Increasing latency: replies take longer and longer

Decreasing length: messages become shorter

No emojis or punctuation: "OK" instead of "OK! 😊"

No questions in return: the other stops asking about your life

No bids initiated: the other stops sending the first message

An example of accumulation over three months: Week 1:

• You: "I've had a horrible day..."
• Partner: "Oh no, tell me everything! I'm here."

Week 4:

• You: "I've had a horrible day..."
• Partner: "Sorry... It'll be OK."

Week 8:

• You: "I've had a horrible day..."
• Partner: (reply six hours later) "OK"

Week 12:

• You: (you no longer send this kind of message)

This is not a drama, it is a slow behavioural extinction.

Why it wears a couple down: the angle of emotional rupture

A break-up does not begin with infidelity or a major argument. It begins with this: the gradual absence of accepted bids creates an anticipated emotional grief. You start mourning a relationship that is still alive.

Psychologically, this is a form of ambiguous loss — the partner is physically present but emotionally absent. You go on living together, but you are alone. That ambiguity is particularly destructive: you cannot truly detach (they are there), nor truly draw closer (they do not respond).

In CBT, we call this a negative automatic thought on a loop: "They don't love me any more" becomes a self-fulfilling prediction. You stop making bids. They stop receiving them. You read that silence as confirmation. This is precisely what I analyse in Understanding Your Attachment Style.

Can the pattern be reversed?

Yes, but you have to act before the point of no return. Gottman's research shows that a couple can recover if:

One of the partners restarts the bids — consistently, without waiting for a perfect response

The other turns towards them, even clumsily at first

The cycle reinforces itself positively: more bids accepted = more bids sent

In messages, that means:

• Sending affectionate messages again, without reproaching the past silence
• Replying with engagement, even when it is difficult
• Initiating conversations, not just transactions

An example of restarting:

• You: "I was thinking about our first trip. Do you remember that sunset?"
• Partner: (instead of "OK") "Yes! And you took my hand..."

That single exchange redraws the pattern.

Attachment and rebuilding: the role of safety

For this restart to work, you have to understand that each partner has different attachment needs — as we explored in Young's schemas and emotional wounds. The anxious partner needs closeness and reassurance. The avoidant partner needs space and freedom from judgement.

Reversing the decline in bids means creating an environment where each person can express their needs without fear. That requires:

• Empathy (understanding why the other ignores bids)
• Patience (change is slow)
• Consistency (responding to bids every day, not just once)

The unique angle of the written word: evidence and rebuilding

What makes the analysis of written conversations so powerful is that it provides objective evidence. You do not have to wonder "Am I imagining this?" or "Am I exaggerating?". The figures speak: X bids in January, Y bids in April. The curve is there.

That evidence is also a lever for rebuilding. When you show your partner (gently, without accusation) that the pattern exists, it creates a shared reality. You stop arguing about your interpretations. You can finally work on the real problem: the gradual disconnection.

That is precisely what psychological analysis of messages allows: turning a painful intuition into visible data, and that data into a starting point for rebuilding.

When to seek help, when to rebuild alone

If the ignored bids go back a few weeks, you can restart on your own. If it has been going on for months, or if the decline comes with passive-aggressive communication or contempt, professional help becomes valuable. In CBT, we work on the automatic thoughts ("They don't love me any more") and on the behaviours (restarting the bids).

To explore your communication style and your relational patterns more deeply, you can visit psychologieetserenite.com or explore your messages through ScanMyLove for an analysis based on 14 clinical models.

Conclusion: emotional grief is not inevitable

The decline of affection through accumulated ignored bids is a gradual, measurable and reversible process. Unlike spectacular crises, it does not shout. It settles in quietly, crystallises in messages, and ends up wearing the couple down from the inside.

But because it is measurable, it is also visible. And because it is visible, it can be reversed. That requires recognising the pattern, understanding each person's attachment needs, and deliberately restarting the connection.

The messages you send today draw the couple of tomorrow. Every accepted bid lays a stone. Every ignored bid removes one. The question is not "Is it too late?" but "What am I building from now on?"

Gildas Garrec, CBT psychotherapist