#inability to trust

[ellicexox]

What have I done for you not to trust me?

[boredaqua]

Trust, or the lack thereof

A friend was telling me about this one time, when he was over a lady friend's house to help her fix her floor at 2 am (they both work the night shift), and woke up some neighbour with all the drilling, at which point said neighbour proceeded to bang on the door to tell them to quiet down.

But all I could think was, how amazing that trust between him and his wife was, when she trusts him enough to not cause a fuss as he came over to a lady coworker's after midnight, after work, and helped out in said coworker's bedroom.

And I wonder if I'll ever arrive at that degree of trust.

I still don't understand why humans trust so much in so few, and pour almost every ounce of their soul into that bond.

All I could think was, what if that bond is destroyed by betrayal? Then... you, who have trusted so much and loved so much, so fully, would be destroyed too.

[boredaqua]

?

I want to cry.

I do, but my eyes are dry.

It's always been like this, and no, that's not a bad poem.

I feel terrible when I'm not productive, out and about, accomplishing something.

I feel like a slob when I take one untimely nap.

It seems to me that the only way I can feel productive is being a perfectionist workaholic and actually seeing the fruit of my labour, eg. an essay well-done, a dish well-cooked.

It seems to me I don't understand the concept of lazy lounging about, or a happy sleep-in day.

It seems to me I still don't understand the concept of believing in a happy ending.

It seems to me that my brain actively works against me at times, conjuring up worst-case scenarios and disaster scenes that even I can't tell if they were my intuition working overtime to tell me something's wrong, or paranoia overload.

It seems to me that the only time I feel I'm happy is when I actually am out and about and do something, accomplish something.

Was I this paranoid and jealous before?

I don't know any more.

Was I thinking everyone is out to get me and hurt me before?

I've never really recognized how fragile my trust is, and how it even gets more fragile when it comes time for me to believe in another human being more than the superficial, street-smart, tough-girl level of trust I usually hold between friends.

I've never really recognized how I'm unable to trust anyone when it comes time to take down all the walls around me and let another person in, when it comes time to let go of all the barriers and trust that person not to hurt me.

I don't know. I really don't know. What does trust feel like? What does fully trusting another feel like? What does a sense of full security feel like when you're not enveloped in the arms of the person you trust the most? How do you trust someone? How do you push aside all the doubt, all the paranoia, all the fear of abandonment, all the negative feelings and actually open your heart up to someone who has spent a great amount of time proving himself worthy? How do you tell your brain to stop working against you and start helping you, step by step, to heal from all the hurt, all the wounds you didn't know you have had inflicted upon you since childhood until it comes time to take down all the walls?

I was taught to put my feelings aside, that I as a person am inferior to others and should always give ways to their feelings and prioritize their needs. I always feel like I'm always there for others, but when I need someone, no one's there for me. I always feel like everyone's out to get me, and no one fully needs me after I run out of my usefulness. I always feel like it wasn't safe to feel, and when I look in the mirror, I see this girl who's struggling to smile everyday, and sometimes I wonder how long it takes for me to fully deceive myself that I'm happy. There are a number of times I am really happy. But for one reason or another, I always feel like they're not meant to last. I thought happiness is like a tease, it dances around you only to fly away and leave you filled with longing and what ifs. I always feel like I'm not supposed to be sad, that I have to be strong for everyone, that I have to be there for everyone and my needs come last.

Maybe it's a good thing I'm actually crying. As in, right now.

I don't think I'm pathetic. But I do feel this pain in my chest when I cry. I guess it's a good thing I don't feel like slitting my wrist to get out of it any more.

But sometimes I'm not even sure what it is I'm feeling any more. I laugh, and there's this hollowness inside me, this emptiness inside me that reminds me maybe I'm just faking my laughter. When I look in the mirror and try to find the confident woman, all I see is this insecure woman playing dress up and trying to look pretty and confident. I see a cover because all those years I've worked on a cover to deceive others and get them off my case, and now it's the time I can't even fully trust myself or what I'm feeling any more.

We all wear masks, and there comes a time when we can't remove them without removing our own skin.

(Andre Berthiaume, as quoted by SSA Emily Prentiss in Criminal Minds)

I'm not sure if I'm just a really good actress at deceiving others, telling them I'm okay and digging my wounds deeper in the process, or I'm just so good at faking it I'm believing the lies I've told myself any more.

[boredaqua]

I don't understand.

I was in a good mood earlier. Really, I was.

I slept till near noon, woke up and really didn't feel bad about it.

Usually I'd get mad at myself for sleeping in, and I'm hesitant to blame that on my family's legacies, but perhaps I was remembering those times mother/father/both berated me for sleeping in?

But today I woke up feeling a bit groggy, but not upset.

I set about eating chips for breakfast, I played Contract Killer (and losing grr), I updated my stuff and in general wasn't feeling down.

That is, up until now, when I suddenly thought of my boyfriend being surrounded by loads of girls when he returns to school.

It dampened my mood so suddenly it's scary.

I don't understand why I don't feel like I'm worthy.

I don't understand why I don't feel I'm good enough.

I don't understand why it's so hard for me to trust another.

I don't understand why even though I've seen the roots of the problems, I'm still feeling like I'm not getting any better.

I don't understand why after all that he has done for me, I still struggle to believe that he just won't pack up and abandon me someday.

Abandon.

That word has a scarier ring to it than I'm ever willing to admit.

I've never really thought about it.

I mean, I know the cause for my fear of abandonment now, but I've never really thought about it.

Sure, my parents never threatened to abandon me somewhere - in fact, they relentlessly enforce the opposite, that I will still have a roof over my head and funds in my account by virtue of being born to the family, and I understand how that will suffice for some people. But it doesn't change the fact that I grew up thinking there's no one there for me. Gran was there for the majority of my childhood, but other than that, I had no one. And even then... I knew I was drifting apart from gran during my adolescent phase, and it wasn't very long before I turned into her caretaker, taking care of her like she did for me when I was a kid, fetching her water when she's thirsty, wishing her goodnights when nobody did, talking her out of a love-hate resentment for her son when she's angry (that last one is a long story saved for another day). I didn't mind taking care of her, but that did leave me with the feeling of emptiness, as if my needs, my dreams, my desires came secondary to all that of others.

(Note: I fell asleep midway through this and now I feel terrible about myself because I have an assignment to finish by Tuesday).

And because I was unable to find someone to lean on inside the homestead, I turned to making friends outside.

Not that I've ever been outgoing all my life. I'm an introvert. So instead of becoming the queen bee I know I can never be, I focus my trust and friendship onto a selected few that I thought I knew. Including my former best friend, who ended the friendship after two years in high school because she thought my dreams, my hope, my aspirations were no longer practical enough for us to continue to be friends; that she had evolved beyond that (for lack of a better word), and that we had grown apart. I was devastated, to say the least. I've invested a lot into that friendship, and needless to say, my ever-so-sharpened instincts had told me something was wrong in the sense that we were drifting apart, and I had been showering her with birthday presents and encouragement to follow her dreams... to no avail. All the efforts just served to tell her we had grown so apart it was undeniable.

She had abandoned me, to sound pathetic, the most pathetic I ever was. But what baffled me was that last summer she had returned to me trying to make amends, and I saw in her the highschool girl I used to be, trying to salvage whatever was left of the friendship. I was burned, and suffices to say I was no longer interested in being her friend, let alone her best friend. And... she changed. She had changed from an enthusiastic, if not cynical young woman bent on making her dream come true to a jaded party girl that I could no longer recognize. And that was not who I initially became friends with.

And now... my current best friends. What to say... they are also people I thought I knew. It's terrifying to me how they changed, or I changed, but what was far spookier is what if that was the way they had always been in the past? That I never really knew them at all? I thought I knew my parents... and turns out, the only way I knew them was how to deal with them to make them happy, or rather, not tempted to snap at me. I thought I had a good relationship with my sister... and turns out, it wasn't good enough (goddammit I hate that phrase) for her to actually see from my point of view for a change when it comes to life-changing decisions. I thought one of the two best friends were on par with me when it came to toxic, overly controlling parents... and turns out, she's on their team, too, yet another golden girl. I thought the other best friend would at least listen, and turns out, the advice was for me to reconcile with my parents. For what? They had admitted to parenting mistakes just to placate me, they had no intention of nor made any attempt to change and grow along with me, perhaps they had drawn themselves a glass ceiling, or they simply thought it's my job to adapt to them as it always has been. And guess what... there's nothing wrong with me wanting independence, something I haven't had 17 first years of my life. I'm in my 20s for f*ck's sake, and my mistakes are my own, I'm willing to bear responsibilities for it. Why can't they just let me be?

I don't understand lots of things, and that's why this post increasingly derailed.

Maybe it's better I stop rambling and go do my assignments. Or something.