E094 - Will I Ever Trust Again? Why We Stop Trusting Ourselves & Others After Narcissistic Betrayal

===

[00:00:00] In this episode, I'm going to answer the question that you are worrying about will I ever be able to trust again?

​

Speaker: Welcome to Heartbreak to Wholeness, the podcast helping you heal from the mindfuck of narcissistic relationships and move towards the secure, peaceful woman you want to become. I am your host, Bre Wolta, Relationship Clarity Coach and EFT Certified Practitioner. Let's dive in.

​

Welcome back to Heartbreak to Wholeness. If you have ever said, I just don't know if I'll be able to trust anyone ever again. , this episode is for you, because trusting again, after you've been cheated on or lied to or betrayed, is a really tough ask is especially when first and foremost, you don't trust yourself.. So in this episode, you are going to discover. The reason that we overlook red flags instead of acting on them what you actually need in order to rebuild that trust with yourself.

And the steps that will allow you to [00:01:00] date again without hypervigilance and fear when you are ready to date again. And remember to stick around to the end of the episode where I will pull an Oracle card that will offer you a message that you can use this week to stay more conscious in your healing.

​

I wanna share with you a client story because it is like so many of our stories. This client of mine, found out after five years of being together with her partner that he had been cheating on her for the last three years.

And as we started working together and she was reflecting back on how long she started feeling like something was off in the relationship, like how long they had been out of the honeymoon phase, out of the love bombing phase. She could really pin down that for at least the last three to four years, she had been living in this constant kind of place of anxiety that.

In every interaction she had a part of her that was bracing, bracing for how he was gonna react, for what he was gonna say, for how he was going to make her [00:02:00] wrong. They were fighting every day about the smallest things.

The coffee pot not being cleaned, the dishwasher not being taken care of, the laundry not being folded, him not taking the dog out when he said he would. And she just felt like no matter the tools that she tried to use to bring the conversation up, that they, that she was always doing it wrong, that she just couldn't say the right thing.

And it ended in them always talking in circles. It always ended in that. Specific thing that she was trying to bring to his attention, turning into the massive fight that would end in how she always felt like everything was her fault, and ultimately her apologizing and she'd walk away from those fights being so confused with herself on what just happened and why did I take responsibility again when I was trying to ask him for help emptying the damn dishwasher.

So that was, those little things were just happening every day, and it was just sort of like, just constantly dunking under water. Like she just couldn't get her head [00:03:00] above water on just the day-to-day basis. And then the bigger things were happening as well. So he. He would go out late at night with his friends and he would ignore her messages and he would say he was gonna be home at a certain time, and often come home really late, 2, 3, 4 in the morning with no letting her know with no heads up. And of course, as somebody who is expecting their partner home at a certain time, she was worried. She would try to go to sleep, worried and often not be able to sleep because she was so worried.

And in the morning when she would try to bring this up to him, he would tell her that she was overreacting,

that she was being too overbearing, that she was treating him like a child and just trying to mother him,

Another bigger thing that was happening was that he was spending a lot of time on his phone when they were together, and this had historically been something that she brought up of like, Hey, when we're chilling watching tv, I love spending just that time with you.

But when you're on your phone, it feels like you're checked out. It feels like we're not actually spending quality time. And she knew [00:04:00] her love language was quality time, and she knew that that was the reason why she felt so dismissed when he was on his phone next to her.

So this was a conversation that they had already brought up and that he had already agreed to trying to make some changes on early on in the relationship. And so when she was recognizing that he was doing this again, she tried to gently bring it up again with all of these tools that she thought she had and trying to say it the right way and using the I feel language, and it was met over and over and over again with, him telling her that she was too clingy, that she was just being codependent,

that she doesn't know how to have independence in a relationship, that she was making problems out of nothing, that they wouldn't actually have problems in the relationship if she would just stop making everything a problem if she would just stop being so dramatic and emotional about everything.

And my client is very introspective, right? She values self-growth. So of course when he started telling her these things, part of her was questioning like, is this me? Is this, [00:05:00] am I causing the problems? So she started wondering, am I overbearing? Am I being too clingy? Is my anxious attachment really coming into play right now?

Am I being dramatic?

And so she dove into therapy trying to really piece out what's going on, what can I do different, taking on a lot of responsibility and feeling really alone in trying to find the solution to what was happening in the relationship.

She was trying to beg him to go to couples therapy and his own therapy so that he could be doing his work while she was doing her work and then they could come together and have a more healthy relationship. She really felt like she was trying everything, that she was putting in so much effort, 110% to try to figure this out and to make it work. So what happened was they did end up going to couples therapy and he would show up in the therapy sessions.

He would say all the right things. The therapist was really working with them on different tools and all of this homework that they could take and try to implement between sessions. So she thought that he [00:06:00] was trying.

And he said that he had a really traumatic past, that he was really trying to work on his trauma and that he knew he had a lot to unpack from that.

He also said that he was just going through a really rough patch at work and needed her to be more understanding about the capacity that he had. So she was hearing these things from him, hearing that he wanted to try seeing him actually show up in the session.

He, that he wanted to unpack his trauma but no action was really being taken. So outside of him, actually in the therapy session, there was no further progression of what he was doing. There was no implementation of the skills.

There was none of him finding his own therapist to work on his trauma work. And so she could argue this, like he's kind of trying, and I want to stick with this 'cause I know he's got potential and I am hopeful that he will do the things that he says he's going to do. But then there was no action, there was no follow through.

And I know in my experience I can relate to that and how confusing that is. And I'm wondering if [00:07:00] you can relate to that scenario too.

On one hand feeling like something's not right. His actions are not matching his words. I'm not seeing improvement. But on the other hand, you're really wanting to help. You're really wanting to give him space and time to try, and you're really feeling that empathy.

You're really feeling like I know what it's like to do the work. I know it takes time, and maybe I just need to love him through this.

So she's in this frustrating place and as she's sitting in that place and things are continuing and the relationship as they are, she finds that he's cheating. And not just once, but she

finds emails from several women and from several different relationships over three years that they had been together, along with paying for sex chats and OnlyFans accounts and as I'm sure you can imagine, her world toppled over. She was gutted seeing this evidence, seeing this proof, that this person was not actually doing anything that he said he was doing. And if you have been [00:08:00] betrayed, you know that gut wrenching feeling, the immediate disgust, the immediate panic of what am I gonna do? Am I gonna break up with this person? Where am I gonna live? Where is he gonna go?

What is gonna happen? And the anger. There's so much that floods us all at one time. When we have that awareness moment, when we have that discovery moment of, fuck, this is real. All of my intuition that I had been feeling like something was off. All the things that didn't match his words and his actions, everything coalesces and we can't run from the truth.

So this was the time that she found my work, and she came to me really wanting to unpack this relationship, really wanting to find clarity about what happened, why she ignored the red flags, and how to never do it again because she never wanted to be in an unhealthy relationship again and feel this pain, this betrayal ever again.

She really, really wanted a help healthy relationship. She wanted to do everything that she could on her side of the [00:09:00] street to set her up, to show up in healthy relationships, to attract healthy relationships.

And at the same time, she came to me fully convinced that she was never gonna be able to love again. That even though she wanted a healthy relationship on some level, she believed that there was no good men out there

and if there was a good man, how was she gonna be able to let him in? Because she couldn't imagine being able to trust another person with their word again. And the biggest pain point that she had in my opinion, was that she couldn't trust herself.

As she looked back on this relationship that in hindsight, she could see all the places where she ignored her intuition, where she never listened, and she had this narrative of, I should have left. I should have seen it coming. I should have held the boundary. This is my mistake. This is my issue. This is my problem. There was this very deep rooted self-doubt and shame, and beating herself up.

She was fixated on this fear of dating again, and this fear of making the mistakes, this fear of not being able to see it and trust [00:10:00] herself to leave so her question was, how am I going to ensure that they're never going to hurt me? I wish that I could 1000% ensure that she was never going to come across somebody who was going to lie to her again. But I can't do that. One of the best metaphors I ever heard from this is like, we have to learn how to swim in the ocean knowing that there are sharks among us. So we did five specific things to help her move from this hypervigilance to self-protection, to feeling trust with herself.

The first thing we did was that we processed the pain of what happened. The part of her that was judging her was on full volume. So we met that part of her with a lot of compassion

and we were able to really normalize why she was on high alert, why she was so concerned about getting hurt again, and see that as an entry point to do the deeper healing around how hurt she was, how hurt she was because of this betrayal,

instead of getting stuck in that judgment loop that will keep you on the surface level of your [00:11:00] healing. We have to meet judgment with compassion in order to get curious and to really untangle that pain.

So we spent a lot of time in sessions trying to process how she felt because of what happened, giving her that safe space to be in those really uncomfortable emotions, namely anger, and let it move through her.

The second thing that we did was to help her find proof that her intuition was working all along. So this is kind of flipping the script around what she was already doing and looking back in hindsight on all of these opportunities that she had of, I should have seen this. I, I saw that. Why didn't I leave?

And we looked at those things from a different lens. A lens of your intuition was working. Look, you knew. Now what we need to work on was your follow through. What happened? What was the junction? Where was the split? Where you, you heard your intuition, but you didn't make the follow through.

So we worked through what really her deeper fears were around acknowledging the [00:12:00] red flag. If I acknowledge this flag, then I'm actually gonna have to leave this person and no one else is gonna want me, and I'm actually gonna be alone forever.

We worked on the fear that was actually preventing her from hearing her intuition out of like a self preservation, self survival place. And on top of that, we did work to find what her specific red flags were in relationships.

So what were her non-negotiables in relationships and how can she use all of that data moving forward to know like, Hey, when something's butting up against this, it's time for me to pay attention. It's time for me to seek outside support, to help me reflect back what I'm feeling. Giving her that awareness, that backstop that she could use as she meets future people.

The third thing that we did was really worked on rebuilding the trust that she had in herself. So she had this part of her that was really needing and wanting a partner in order to feel safe, in order to feel validated, in order to feel like she was doing life right and that she was [00:13:00] okay.

And so what we did was help to strengthen her trust in herself, that she was gonna be okay no matter if she had a partner or not. So that she wasn't seeking a partner from that transactional place of, if I'm with you, then you make me feel okay.

And instead in future dating situations, she could show up saying, this is what I bring to the table instead of this is what I need from you in order to feel okay. I, the fourth thing that we did was really. Give her the tools to be able to handle if something goes wrong in the future, right?

If she feels heartbreak or betrayal again, or even anger or anxiety, give her the tools to be able to sit with these harder feelings so that she could find resilience. Part of the work that I do with clients is helping them learn how to be with themselves, how to trust themselves. So that no matter if it's anxiety in a romantic relationship or anger with your boss, or frustration with your mom or whatever, you're able to sit with those emotions to regulate [00:14:00] yourself, to know that you're safe, to then be able to advocate for your needs and open up that healthy communication. So the tools that she learned by working with me help her to build resilience in all aspects of her life. And then the fifth thing that we did, which is so important, is talk about what a healthy relationship dynamic looks like. She had never been in a healthy relationship and she wasn't modeled a healthy relationship when she was younger, and so she didn't even know what to expect.

She didn't know what was too much to ask for. She didn't know what she should settle for. So we really talked about what is it like to be met with respect in a relationship? What is it like to have somebody give and take and not fall into the giving role where you build resentment?

And what does healthy conflict look like?

She also learned what boundaries were. She learned how to actually set boundaries, not just ask for something to be different. And in doing all this processing work, she really built up her confidence to believe that she deserved to have her needs met, to believe that she deserved to be treated [00:15:00] well in a relationship.

That she actually was lovable and was worthy and was the first person to see that and believe.

Because as much as we want to, we cannot control other people. We cannot take all the sharks out of the ocean,

but you can trust your ability to be resilient, to handle anything that comes your way.

So if that shark is to swim towards you, you trust yourself to be able to get away from him, if we spend our whole life post betrayal in a state of fear, in a state of protection, having these walls up around our heart, we're really letting the other person win. Right. They are robbing us of the future ability to really feel love, to experience love from a healthy person. And to me that feels like the ultimate form of control.

So when I moved through my healing from my toxic relationship, I was like, I'm gonna do whatever I need to do in order to get this [00:16:00] person out of my brain and out of my body, so that they're no longer dictating the way that I operate in my life. Finding that independence, finding that freedom to me was more than just wanting a healthy relationship.

It was like finally detaching fully from the energy that, like the residual muck that came from my narcissistic ex,

because you deserve healthy love and healthy love. Should make your nervous system exhale, not brace.

And so if you're in this place of having just been betrayed and believing that you're never gonna trust anybody again, starting with yourself, I wanna just say that I understand. I understand that fierce. Like, go into your inner fortress, put up all the walls, cement it, lock it, bolt it, shut it down. It's safer in here.

There's a place to be in that inner fortress temporarily, while we're finding the right tools in order to build the strength to eventually come out of that [00:17:00] protection. But my hope for you is that you do eventually come out of that protection, I know it feels like you're never gonna move on from this and that you're never gonna trust again.

But the healing really just requires a very delicate unpacking, processing and relearning. And just like my client, this is possible for you too.

So as I say, in every episode, if you are trying to do this alone, it is taking longer and it is feeling harder than it has to. If you are feeling lost and hopeless, that it will ever change. You just need the right guidance, the right support, the right person to hold your hand through the journey and show you which step to take.

I know I did.

So I got you and I have a link in the show notes for a free intro session where we can just get to know each other. I can see where you are and I can share how I can help you. Please take that step if you are feeling ready, if you're feeling like I, I can't be in this pain any longer, I'm here for you. Let's pull a card to see what [00:18:00] message wants to come through. It is flow.

Flow says, listen to Mother Ocean. She has a story to tell you. It's a story of movement, of motion of flow. Allow yourself to rest in the gentle rise and fall of the tides. Now. Life's natural rhythms. Even if you find yourself lost in the raging sea or swept into the riptide, relax into it. Fighting the tides only puts you at risk of drowning.

Trust. The universe is holding you afloat like the sweet, gentle waves of the ocean. Notice where you feel stuck. Move your body. Drink water, soak in a tub. Water is your teacher. Learn from her all that you need to know about finding your flow. Expand contract, swirl, fill, ripple, gurgle.

Ebb and flow. Love that. So, so, so much. So to recap our main takeaways from today, now you have a better understanding of just like my client, why we overlook red flags instead of acting [00:19:00] on them. You have an idea of what you actually need in order to rebuild that trust in yourself after betrayal, and you have a good idea of the steps that I walk my clients through and that you two can take to move from that hypervigilance and that fear around dating again, helping to process what actually happened so that you can move forward in your life, free of your ex, trusting yourself with the confidence to know that you are okay no matter what.

Because you are. Remember, remember, remember, you are not alone as you are moving through this and I'll see you in the next episode.