Starting Over
I very distinctly remember the morning I woke up after leaving my husband. I was in my old bed back under my parent’s roof, with my daughter and 2 duffle bags on the other side of the room. Serving as a reminder that I really had left. How would I start again? How could I ever get through this? All questions circling in my head. So much had been lost besides the relationship, and I did not know how I would ever move on. After the lies and abuse how would I ever get past this? It is like a wave rushed over me and it felt all encompassing. When you have come out of one of the most traumatic experiences of your life, you realize “Oh gosh, I have to start over”. I also realized there were many things I’d lost, my husband, my marriage, parts of my identity and my trust.
Tackling Trust
Many things bubbled to the surface of my life, and I felt paralyzed. Even with all the therapy and healing work I was doing, I just could not let people back in. It felt scary and unsafe, and I wanted to be alone. Until I learned healing was in the community. So, I knew I had to tackle trust if I wanted to slowly start to participate in my life again. It was not easy but the effort and lessons that I learned forever changed me and how I was able to show up for myself and others. Let me share what I learned.
Tackling Old Wounds
I learned I never really knew what trust was, where it came from and how it was gained in relationships. I would just believe it because we were in some sort of relationship. Which meant every time someone let me down, I was devastated and took it as an attack on my worth and value. Here is the thing I figured out… no one else holds my worth and value but me. I had given over my power to everyone else to decide what was and was not ok for me. Then when it did not tend to my real need (which it almost never did) I took it personally, and it further opened past wounds. I had lived out of the wounds so much by the time I got married, my trust was fragile and frail. I discovered it was not all of what he did, I played a role too. Was the treatment I received from him fair? Absolutely not, but because of my “hands off” approach I handed over my power. I had to learn how to stop operating out of that woundedness and tend to my own needs. As I did, I learned I could trust myself. When a need arose, I trusted that I would go investigate it. I stopped looking for everyone else to have my back and I learned how to have my own.
Grief
We all know once trust is broken it is hard to get it back. First, usually within ourselves and then from others. It is painful to relive or even think about what happened. However, there is a process that helps us both realize and accept that pain we feel. Grief. Grieving allows us to realize the aftermath of emotions and feelings we now carry because of what happened, while also providing space to carry on despite it. Grieving does not fix it; it gives us permission to allow it to be what it is going to be. The pain we feel is because something we had (or thought we had) was broken. Allowing ourselves to grieve gives us the opportunity to acknowledge all that we have lost. But it also repositions us to face upright and forward to journey on. It is hard, but it is worth it. It takes time, but it heals. It is intense, but it will free you.
Goodbye Past
Sometimes we carry the past with us as a safety blanket. To “remember” what happened, so it does not happen again. But that does not protect us, it just weighs us down. The past serves as evidence of patterns and things we can learn from and although we will not forget it, we can leave it. Rebuilding trust takes grit and determination and if we let it, our past can help us have courage for our present. That courage gives us the fresh wind we need to pursue our lives again and to trust we are going to be ok.
Keep On Going
Wherever you are in your process of rebuilding trust I hope you are proud of yourself because it is not easy. Let me be a witness that you can do this, and not because you will never get hurt again but because you are laying a foundation that will sustain you despite the hurt. So, keep going even when it is hard, you are learning and expanding to rebuild trust for what is ahead for you.
