When trust is broken...

Being able to trust someone in either a personal or professional capacity is truly at the core of whether our relationship will grow, deteriorate or simply stop to exist. Trust among individuals is built by repeated demonstrated actions, and not simply by the words you say to one another, although those have an impact as well. It is a continuous process in which you demonstrate to the other person that you show up for them as you said you would; however, breaking trust can happen in one instant over one incident and will unfortunately take time and a lot of effort on the person who has broken the trust to rebuild the relationship. Whether you are a person who tends to trust others easily or not, the impact that ensues when that fundamental piece of your relationship is broken is very hard to swallow, to process, and to repair.

I know when trust is broken with someone because I can feel an instant reaction, as if I had just been punched in my gut; And I do mean PUNCHED! It truly makes me sick, literally and figuratively, because it is a soul-crushing experience. I don't know how it feels to you or if you have noticed an instant reaction within your body as I have in mine, but it has quite an impact on my physical, mental and emotional states. Upon reflection on what lies within that powerful blow to the gut, I have realized that there are many emotions at play. One of those is definitely disbelief: "I can't believe this has happened, or "I can't believe this person has done this action/displayed this behaviour/etc. "I though we were friends or we understood one another". There is self-loathing: "Well done Nadine, you could have prevented this". The other is sadness: "I am deeply hurt by the actions displayed here or by the behaviour displayed by....". There are times when anger accompanies the lot: "this situation/incident/behaviour makes my skin boil" , which is often in response to the self-loathing voice speaking. Finally, there is shame about the situation and that emotion is sometimes buried so deep behind the others that it is not always detectable, but yes, it is there: "I am deeply ashamed to even admit that I am finding myself in this situation". This cocktail of emotions now generate anxiety, because the mind has associated the individual (with whom the trust has been broken) with a perceived sense of danger to our well-being and it triggers our instincts to fight-flight-freeze. The impact of it all is being left with a profound sense of betrayal.

It is not a nice sensation to say the least, and I certainly do not wish it upon anyone else, even though I realize that is not reality. We all have relationships in our lives that can be broken in the blink of an eye. The important question is: what can we do about it or better yet, what do we want to do about it?

I have been reflecting about that latter part lately.

The answer that comes from deep within me is the need to stand up for myself and to relay to the individuals that these incidents, behaviours or actions have indeed broken trust between us. There is skepticism at play within me because it is accompanied by self-doubt: "Have I seen other signs or triggers throughout our relationship that has warned me and I have decided to ignore them or not act on them"? If or when the answer to that question is "yes", it also makes me feel tremendous guilt because it implies I have not listened to my inner voice. I think there are times when we may have seen red flags, but because a sense of trust was established, I was looking at the person through other lenses at the time when these warning signs were glaring at me. I honour that fact and those times when I have chosen to ignore them, because it simply means that I have a good heart. My heart always chooses to believe in the good of people and therefore, provides many opportunities for that premise to lay and rebuild the foundation of our relationship. That is a personal trait that I have come to appreciate about myself and would not trade it for anything in the world, even though it gives me great pain at times.

You know, I have been guilty in my life of breaking trust with others, and I must confess that I have not done anything meaningful to truly attempt to repair those relationships. I had too much shame and needed to forgive myself first before attempting to ask forgiveness of others. As a survivor of sexual harassment and assault, as well as mental abuse, I can say that I have definitely experienced the feeling of broken trust more often times than I care to remember. As a result, there was a time in my life where I have needed to protect myself in order to simply push forward. Unfortunately, my coping mechanisms were not always the healthiest, nor the best for people in my life. Truly understanding that deep hurt and sense of betrayal that can be felt when trust is broken makes me feel terrible about how I have broken trust with others in the past. I am working on mustering the courage to circle back to some of those relationships in the future.

Personally speaking, having a relationship broken over trust is akin to grieving the loss of someone. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I feel like the relationship is completely over, which may be attributed to more coping mechanisms, but there it is regardless. In the past, it would have taken many strikes to achieve the point of no-return with someone, but that is not the case anymore. At this conjuncture in my life, I have made the conscious decision to exercise vulnerability and transparency in my daily dealings. I am at times criticized for that transparency, with the argument being made that I cannot expect others to reciprocate in the same light or that it is necessary. That is very true, because every human being has their own lived experiences that are a mystery to us; as a result, we never know how a word, an action, or behaviour can unconsciously trigger something that is foreign to us, but deeply hurtful or unsettling to someone else. Nevertheless, I still choose to live by that transparency and vulnerability, because they are core values of my being....even when those two values are infringed upon or not respected by others.