C’s parents are aging, and she’s had a bad relationship with them for years: physical abuse, shaming, unjust accusations, and a general indifference to any of her feelings or (real) successes. It’s been horrible. Part of her knows there’s no hope for improving relations before they die, because they are so emotionally limited. Another part of her has to keep trying, or, at least, hoping.
It’s one of the worst binds: the person(s) you love the most, with an open heart and no reservation (like your parent) is the same person who hurts you. The person whose approval will give you safety and the feeling you’re entitled to live is the same person who endangers you, beats you, shames and betrays you. There’s no way out. (Therapeutically, there is, but it always feels impossible in the moment, because it is.) Either you brutalize your own feelings by trying not to care for them (even though they’ll always matter), or you keep putting yourself in emotional or physical harm’s way by staying in the game. Terrible, un-resolvable choice.
There’s so much human indifference and cruelty in the world — girls being sold into sexual slavery, tribal or other group atrocities, murders, etc. — I have to admit that humans can be dangerous. Not just in theory, and not always, and I won’t stop having friends or enjoying good experiences, but I think I should stop being surprised when awful things happen.
Like C, I had an unsafe family, so I flop back and forth between utter distrust (lots of solitude, thank you!) and trusting without discernment, wandering cheerfully through life like a naive child. I’ve been fairly lucky that not too many bad things happened to me.
Childhood should be the exception to having to think about trust. Children should be protected from horrible things, because they truly have no defense against them. They can’t leave, they can’t fight back, they can’t even know how bad something is because they have nothing to compare it to. As children grow, they should be taught to protect themselves, but without anxiety. You don’t have to be afraid if you’re sensible and careful. In fact, much of life functions pretty well for us lucky ones.
I was taught to be trusting and stay child-like, because it suited my emotionally exploitive family (they were limited, unable to do better, despite some good intentions). Compliance was rewarded. So I came up backwards: believing I had to trust, even while I hid emotionally behind good cheer, collaboration, and whatever charm I could muster.
Given the evidence, today I think I should not trust the world until whatever or whoever it is proves trustworthy. There are a lot of trustworthy people, activities, etc., and I’m not withdrawing from life But I want to stop being surprised when something bad happens. I’m tired of it.
This doesn’t feel like a defeat, or even a moral judgment. It just is. Why would I bemoan the sun’s coming up in the east? It just does. I’m reminded of the story about the scorpion who cajoled a frog into giving him a ride across the river. Despite the frog’s reservations, the scorpion persuaded him he wouldn’t bite the frog on the way across. “Why would I do that? I’d drown, too.” Half-way across the river, he bit the frog. “But you said…” spluttered the frog. The scorpion shrugged: “I’m a scorpion….”
Humans can be dangerous. Children aren’t able to digest that reality and should be protected. C doesn’t need her parents now. She does need to respect how scary it was for her to cope with the danger and emotional abandonment in childhood — not just what they did, which she’s clear about, but how she felt, which she’s afraid to approach.
Once she accepts the emotional truth of her experience, she’ll be able to stop generalizing about trust. I’m trying to do the same.