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Signs You May Be Struggling With Trust!

Trust has got to be one of the central core requirements of all good relationships and without this relationship can fall apart to say the least. Trust is essential in friendship’s, family connections, romantic partnerships and even professional business relationships as trust helps people simply feel safe and understood with each other.

For some people trusting others can be very difficult to just impossible. Do you know that someone, that one person who just seems to be always guarded or suspicious and no matter how warm you cozy up to them they never seem to open up. You may think it’s got something to do with you or perhaps they don’t like you but it’s more often to do with their trust levels due to their past experiences.

Childhood development stages

Many trust issues begin in early life in or around our childhood as our first experience with caregivers help to shape our expectations in later life. When our caregivers are consistent along with being emotionally stable or available, children develop views that other people can be trusted.

But when problems arose from early experiences like inconsistency, unpredictability, critical, neglectful experiences along with abuse or emotionally unavailable carers, a child may learn a difficult lesson, that moving forward into adulthood shows people can’t be trusted!

Without even realising it they may begin to view relationships as uncertain or unsafe and that develops as a new default base level view. This does not mean that everyone who struggles with trust has experienced trauma as it can be caused by repeated disappointments, broken promises or even emotional invalidation over many years and can alter a person’s expectations of others.

Past experiences shape our present

The mind has an uncanny knack of putting together incremental doses of experiences in developing beliefs such as fears and insecurities. No one experience is the core problem but lots of little incremental experiences can shape a view and experience or a belief in later adult life that often starts in childhood. And yes, there may be one or two anchor memories which compound and reinforce the development of trust issues.

All of our past shapes our present and future views of the world and view of relationships. It’s not just experiences in early childhood that play a role in the positive and negative outcome in how we view life and our experiences with others. Betrayal of a partner or a loved one, a dishonest close friend, workplace issues or just repeated adult experiences that let us down can leave emotional effects.

Even when we go into a new relationship, old experiences can seep in and makes it difficult for us to lower our emotional wall. In most cases the baseline of distrust is not a conscious one and it becomes more like a protective strategy from past experiences. The mind learns that trusting others carries too high a risk, so it becomes too vigilant and looks out for signs of risk in scenarios where trust is required and unfortunately this protection then creates new negative repellent type problems.

Healthy trust

It’s important to understand that trust is not an all or nothing thing as healthy trust develops slowly and gradually over time, it’s built through repeated experiences of honesty, reliability, consistency and respect especially when you have found that one new person who ticks all the boxes. Most strong relationships aren’t based on just a blind ignorant trust but verifiable evidence of trust gathered over time.

Therapy can help people explore the origin of distrust issues and identify patterns that may be affecting your current relationships and through greater self-awareness individuals can begin to distinguish between current genuine warning signs and past subconscious fears rooted in early life hurt and pain.

Therapy exploration

Therapy can sometimes help people explore the origins of trust difficulties and identify patterns that may be affecting current relationships. Through greater self-awareness, individuals can begin to distinguish between genuine warning signs and fears rooted in past experiences. Learning to trust someone certainly does not mean ignoring the risks or becoming naïve instead it means developing the ability to assess relationships realistically rather than hiding behind the defences of your old wounds.

The goal is not to trust everyone, (it’s OK to not trust some people) the goal is to become better at recognising who is worthy and deserving of your trust and allow a healthy relationship to grow and build, instead of carrying around the unmet expectations and disappointments of others behaviour from your past.

Disclaimer
This article is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical, psychological, or therapeutic advice, diagnosis, or treatment.

Do not make any changes to medication, treatment, or care based on this information without first consulting your GP, doctor, or qualified healthcare professional.

The content is intended as general information and may not be suitable for every individual or situation.

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