Learning to Trust

I grew up in a strict household. I wouldn't call it overbearing, exactly, but growing up in a small town with much older siblings -- well the rules chafed on me. I wanted, more than anything, freedom. Freedom to express myself in my dress, my body, my art, and that was just not allowed in my house. Rules were made to be followed and as a self-conscience, awkward teenager, I did my best to follow them even as I chafed under them. Then I turned sixteen and my world changed.

I met three people when I turned sixteen who would become fundamental in shaping my life and who I would become. The first two - the twins - were my closest companions that year. I could look at them and, without uttering a word, have a full conversation with them. Finding a connection like that would only happen once more in my entire life. We were inseparable until the third person who would change my life came along.

He was smart, funny, and charismatic. In no time he had me wrapped around his finger and I would do anything for him. I didn't even notice it as my friends were slowly replaced with his friends. Our friends he would call them. My focus was so set on him that I didn't notice as the twins slowly drifted away until I looked up one day and realized I couldn't have wordless conversations anymore.

I didn't know at the time how fiercely they were fighting for me in the background. What I knew was they were gone. I had been abandoned by the two people who I had cared about more than anyone else in the world. The pain I felt was swift and brutal but I pushed it down, refusing to acknowledge it for anything more than another minor betrayal. He smiled at me over lunch and my pain slowly lessened, even though my eyes would occasionally stray toward the twins, wondering what they were doing now. What they were talking about now.

Two years of isolation later the luster had faded and all the shine was gone, I was starting to see through the cracks in his armor and was realizing that things were wrong in our relationship. By then I had also realized that all of my friends were actually his friends. I had no friends of my own that were just mine; not anymore. I had spent the last two years listening to the poison that he had spewed in my ears.

Themes of 'no one else could ever love you' or 'you're lucky you found me' were commonly found to be whispered in my ears as we lay cuddling on his couch. I never thought to question it. I never wondered why he would tell me such horrible things.

Finally things exploded a year later. One push too many and I couldn't take it anymore. I left him and somehow that became my greatest sin in his eyes. Yet, to my luck, the friends he had forced on my over the last three years had actually become true friends. They listened to my words and followed me out the door. Only two saw the depths of my trauma though. Only they sat with me as I struggled through following relationships, struggling to trust anyone.

The twins came back. Though our relationship will neve be as strong as it once was, something that even now I deeply regret. My truest friends have slowly rebuilt friendships with me and I have made new friends since then. Strong friendships that won't be abandoned as easily as the flimsy ones that you form in high school.

It's been more than ten years since then and I still struggle - with my self image, with my confidence, with my anxiety, and with my trust. Some days are good and some days I feel like I'm falling into a void. Still, I'm learning to push on and trust - in others and in myself.