Trust

Trusting people is hard for me. It didn't used to be hard. I used to trust people until they gave me a reason not to trust them. Now, I don't trust until they prove to me that they are trustworthy. This wasn't some overnight change that I decided to make. Through the last 5 years I have been lied to, hurt, manipulated, and emotionally burned. I graduated from high school in June of 2003. I had a clear path in front of me. I was going off to college, I was excited, nervous, and ready to go. I moved into my dorm room at the end of August 2003. It was small, but it was mine. All mine.

Freshman Year: I was sexually assaulted by a man who I thought was a friend. He blocked me from leaving my dorm room after the incident. I felt unsafe, I cried, stopped eating, barely slept, and my grades slipped. 2 weeks after the incident I met Brian. A month later we were officially a couple. As an official couple, we decided we could sleep in the same bed-(up until that point I had been sleeping in his bed while he slept in the living room). Cues were severely misread & it became painfully clear that he wanted sex. I stopped him and then went to the bathroom and threw up. The next day was...awkward. Fast forward to the end of freshman year, April of 2004. 5 of my friends and I signed on to live in an on-campus apartment. One of the girls, we'll call her A, somehow convinced us to live on the top floor. 3 flights of stairs and no elevators.

Sophomore Year: August 2004 we all moved into our new abode. Well, almost all of us, A had flunked out. She knew she wasn't coming back, yet signed on to live with us anyways. We felt betrayed. We had to scramble for money. And while moving in, we realized that 3 flights of stairs and no elevators was a bad choice. I started my year long internship at the campus child development center this year. I learned quickly that parents lie, especially when their children are little hellions.

July 4th, 2005 I had immense pain in my abdomen & threw up in the bathroom at a Wendy's restaurant. The vomiting continued, and got worse. I was diagnosed with bulimia.

Junior Year: August 2005 I moved into my own 1 bedroom on campus apartment. Thus began what I like to call the semester from hell. I was still being treated for bulimia. When that treatment didn't work, I was diagnosed with anorexia, and treated for that. The illness continued & nobody knew what was going on. All tests came back with no abnormalities. My grades began slipping. I was vomiting 10-15 times a day. My teeth were eroding away from the constant vomiting. I could barely make it to class. I had been in the ER 3 times by the end of September. In October I was forced to leave school because my grades had fallen so badly and I had missed so much classes. I cried the entire 3 hour drive to my parents house. I was devastated, I had failed. By the end of October I was seeing 4 separate doctors and had been admitted to the hospital another 2 times. After the last admittance I sat in my Dr's office while she told me that the pain was all in my head & there was nothing more they could do. I had 2 choices, be admitted to the psych ward at the local hospital, or go home until I either got better or worse, then be admitted to the psych ward. My parents thought it best that I be admitted immediately. It then became clear that nobody believed me. I was convinced I was crazy. My gallbladder was removed 3 weeks later, the vomiting and pain stopped almost immediately.

Senior Year: Brian and I moved in together. Obviously it didn't work out. I had friends turn on me. Questioning me, badgering me, calling me, and e-mailing me. I'm not sure why it was any of their business, but many of these people had told me--when we first split up--that I was a friend regardless of who I was dating. Many of these people I had met through Brian. Most of those 'friends' have turned on me. No longer talking to me because I 'destroyed' his life by leaving him.

Super Senior Year: No majorly big events. Just trying to find myself.

Now: Part of me wants to be able to trust like I did before. Not be so suspicious of everybody. But life experiences have tainted my view of people. I don't know if it's that I can't trust people, or if I won't trust people. I pray nightly for God to open my heart and my mind, but these feelings that if I trust, I will get hurt, still plague me. It has affected my working relationship with my boss, and I successfully pushed away 2 men I was dating-(at separate times)-because I couldn't tell if they were being truthful with me. In hindsight they probably were, but I don't want to get hurt again. I said at the beginning of this post that I don't trust people until they prove to me that they are trustworthy. Problem is, I don't allow people adequate time to prove to me that they are trustworthy. I push them away, avoid them, whatever before they get to that point.

Trust, what is it to you?