Trust Issues -
Apr. 23rd, 2007 02:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyburgAlec Baldwin Sorry For Being A Total ASSHOLE.
God, I wish I had a Reuters link for this story - and in all truth, it's useless information outside of being a good example of Behavior I Won't Tolerate. I could go all snarky on the issues this guys brings to the table in living color - the displacement of blame, the lack of boundaries for appropriate expression of anger - but why. The only thing he's sorry about is that someone else heard what an ass he was to his own kid - and he got caught doing it. Oh, I trust him. BAH.
He's just given me a nice seque into what I really want to discuss about it.
Let's talk about trust issues.
What makes you lose trust with me, and can you ever get it back?
I had to stop and think about this one a bit this morning - because while I'll rate the average Joe on the street as a 7 in terms of trust, walking in the door (on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being myself and Jim and y'all fall behind us) - you do something to tweak my bullshit meter (and it doesn't take all that much, I'm finding), and it drops below 3 very quickly.
Does it ever come back?
I had to think for a moment if I could name one instance when it did. Because, well - the list has grown some over the past couple of years - and in such a fashion that borders on alarming. Am I getting pickier in my old age? More prickly? More experienced? Or am I just picking up where Cliff left off - he didn't trust anyone. Me, most of the time - and remembering, I should have been scared at how much he trusted me. I earned it, sure - but he forced it to the nth degree.
The rest of the world only got the game face. And never knew the difference.
For me, there are two ways to really blow it. Make me mad, or lie to me. Do the two always go together? Actually, no. Compulsive, habitual liars don't anger me much - you can't get mad at a dog for being a dog, as they say. You just don't get much more than the game face from me - and you don't get more than a burger when you're hungry and show up on my doorstep. "Make me mad" covers so much more ground, it defies description. I don't have much of an appreciation for anger for its own sake; get me truly angry, and you're not likely going to hear anything. And in all honesty, I can deal with anyone on a 'game face' basis - but I probably won't let you get too close again. I really hate getting angry, too - does that make sense? I might even hold a grudge - I'll admit it - for that reason alone. Rational? Not very.
Do I ever get over being lied to? Most of the time - no. I had to think about this one for a while, because I couldn't remember the last time I did. Not at once.
Oops and make a mistake, okay. But if I find a pattern of dishonesty that goes over decades, deals with subjects that are very intensely personal, emotionally attached - and worse, when the liar has used someone's innate trust and good nature to make it all work - not okay. REALLY not okay.
You make a habit of being late to everything - I'll just factor it in and "lie" back to you about start times. Watch for it.
But does trust ever come back, even when it's been over decades, yadda ya?
I have this younger brother. The one who dropped out of high school, moved out of the house when he was 16 - and stole every space bit of change left around, forged checks, bobbled in an out of Mom's house, lost jobs and ended up in jail about ten years ago on a felony shoplifting charge. He's 45 now, I think. He's also the one who lives with my mother and is her primary caregiver.
And I'm totally fine with it.
He's also the one who was using from age 11 - and went into recovery 10 years ago. (Drugs of choice were pot and meth.)
How long did it take me to trust him again?
When he was incarcerated, I didn't take calls from him. I did not visit him when he moved to a recovery program after release. I sent things that everyone in the program could use - but I didn't send letters, make phone calls or have much contact at all.
It took years. Without him asking once for my trust back. He knew that whether he ever got it again was up to me - not him proving a damn thing to me to earn it. On my part, I wanted to see what he was going to do.
He had to be - just BE - someone I could trust. He had to work his program, stay clean and take care of himself. Without blaming anyone else, grandstanding or meeting any kind of expectations I would put to him. What I wanted didn't matter much - he had to take care of himself first, and anything after that was gravy. I was good with that.
And he took responsibility for everything he had done - he knows what he did, he'll very clearly tell you about it and tell you just what he thinks of it. He'll also tell you what he can't do - up front. The list has gotten shorter over the years, but I have to admire him for having the self-knowledge to know what his limits are. That confidence has grown over the past few years - to the point these days, if you bop around NA very long, you'll likely run into him.
He just keeps getting better.
But it's been ten years. Mom's been compromised since the heart attack, oh - six years ago now? He really stuck the landing with the cancer surgery and recovery, I have to admit. That's a little over two years ago now.
Today, I could likely tell him anything and not worry about it.
Jim brought a number of people into my life - family, friends and since then, people he works with and friends we've both made. Jim, for all his grinching? He's the easy one. He also brought an older brother, a father and a step-mother I won't allow in the house anymore. Oh, I could do the family things, if necessary. Outside my home. Smile and nod and all that. Family 'ties' require that sort of thing - very rarely do you have as much in common with family you barely deal with than your friends, after all. Friction is something you just take on as a given.
Jim would likely let them in before I would, and I've said as much. Mess with me is one thing - mess with my eternal optimist, my White Hatted Good Guy - where he least expects it. Slid under the door, wheedled with promises of what he really wants the most - I've seen it. Lied, bald-faced, to get what they wanted out him. Hello, make me mad and lie to me in one neat, tidy package.
And I don't see the changes happening I did with brother - not even the beginnings of it. Boy, it would be nice if I did.
But even then, it would take years - and it might happen. It might not - even then.
Because the history is there - and if they were capable of it once, they could be capable of it again. The bar has been set.
This warrants further pondering.
God, I wish I had a Reuters link for this story - and in all truth, it's useless information outside of being a good example of Behavior I Won't Tolerate. I could go all snarky on the issues this guys brings to the table in living color - the displacement of blame, the lack of boundaries for appropriate expression of anger - but why. The only thing he's sorry about is that someone else heard what an ass he was to his own kid - and he got caught doing it. Oh, I trust him. BAH.
He's just given me a nice seque into what I really want to discuss about it.
Let's talk about trust issues.
What makes you lose trust with me, and can you ever get it back?
I had to stop and think about this one a bit this morning - because while I'll rate the average Joe on the street as a 7 in terms of trust, walking in the door (on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being myself and Jim and y'all fall behind us) - you do something to tweak my bullshit meter (and it doesn't take all that much, I'm finding), and it drops below 3 very quickly.
Does it ever come back?
I had to think for a moment if I could name one instance when it did. Because, well - the list has grown some over the past couple of years - and in such a fashion that borders on alarming. Am I getting pickier in my old age? More prickly? More experienced? Or am I just picking up where Cliff left off - he didn't trust anyone. Me, most of the time - and remembering, I should have been scared at how much he trusted me. I earned it, sure - but he forced it to the nth degree.
The rest of the world only got the game face. And never knew the difference.
For me, there are two ways to really blow it. Make me mad, or lie to me. Do the two always go together? Actually, no. Compulsive, habitual liars don't anger me much - you can't get mad at a dog for being a dog, as they say. You just don't get much more than the game face from me - and you don't get more than a burger when you're hungry and show up on my doorstep. "Make me mad" covers so much more ground, it defies description. I don't have much of an appreciation for anger for its own sake; get me truly angry, and you're not likely going to hear anything. And in all honesty, I can deal with anyone on a 'game face' basis - but I probably won't let you get too close again. I really hate getting angry, too - does that make sense? I might even hold a grudge - I'll admit it - for that reason alone. Rational? Not very.
Do I ever get over being lied to? Most of the time - no. I had to think about this one for a while, because I couldn't remember the last time I did. Not at once.
Oops and make a mistake, okay. But if I find a pattern of dishonesty that goes over decades, deals with subjects that are very intensely personal, emotionally attached - and worse, when the liar has used someone's innate trust and good nature to make it all work - not okay. REALLY not okay.
You make a habit of being late to everything - I'll just factor it in and "lie" back to you about start times. Watch for it.
But does trust ever come back, even when it's been over decades, yadda ya?
I have this younger brother. The one who dropped out of high school, moved out of the house when he was 16 - and stole every space bit of change left around, forged checks, bobbled in an out of Mom's house, lost jobs and ended up in jail about ten years ago on a felony shoplifting charge. He's 45 now, I think. He's also the one who lives with my mother and is her primary caregiver.
And I'm totally fine with it.
He's also the one who was using from age 11 - and went into recovery 10 years ago. (Drugs of choice were pot and meth.)
How long did it take me to trust him again?
When he was incarcerated, I didn't take calls from him. I did not visit him when he moved to a recovery program after release. I sent things that everyone in the program could use - but I didn't send letters, make phone calls or have much contact at all.
It took years. Without him asking once for my trust back. He knew that whether he ever got it again was up to me - not him proving a damn thing to me to earn it. On my part, I wanted to see what he was going to do.
He had to be - just BE - someone I could trust. He had to work his program, stay clean and take care of himself. Without blaming anyone else, grandstanding or meeting any kind of expectations I would put to him. What I wanted didn't matter much - he had to take care of himself first, and anything after that was gravy. I was good with that.
And he took responsibility for everything he had done - he knows what he did, he'll very clearly tell you about it and tell you just what he thinks of it. He'll also tell you what he can't do - up front. The list has gotten shorter over the years, but I have to admire him for having the self-knowledge to know what his limits are. That confidence has grown over the past few years - to the point these days, if you bop around NA very long, you'll likely run into him.
He just keeps getting better.
But it's been ten years. Mom's been compromised since the heart attack, oh - six years ago now? He really stuck the landing with the cancer surgery and recovery, I have to admit. That's a little over two years ago now.
Today, I could likely tell him anything and not worry about it.
Jim brought a number of people into my life - family, friends and since then, people he works with and friends we've both made. Jim, for all his grinching? He's the easy one. He also brought an older brother, a father and a step-mother I won't allow in the house anymore. Oh, I could do the family things, if necessary. Outside my home. Smile and nod and all that. Family 'ties' require that sort of thing - very rarely do you have as much in common with family you barely deal with than your friends, after all. Friction is something you just take on as a given.
Jim would likely let them in before I would, and I've said as much. Mess with me is one thing - mess with my eternal optimist, my White Hatted Good Guy - where he least expects it. Slid under the door, wheedled with promises of what he really wants the most - I've seen it. Lied, bald-faced, to get what they wanted out him. Hello, make me mad and lie to me in one neat, tidy package.
And I don't see the changes happening I did with brother - not even the beginnings of it. Boy, it would be nice if I did.
But even then, it would take years - and it might happen. It might not - even then.
Because the history is there - and if they were capable of it once, they could be capable of it again. The bar has been set.
This warrants further pondering.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-04-23 11:42 pm (UTC)9 times out of 10, I'm dead right.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 12:29 am (UTC)"Look what you made me do."
Again.
It's becoming a theme song.
Re: Trust?
I don't know if I'm less trusting than I used to be, but I think I might be warier about sharing everything. And, to be truthful, that says less about everybody else than it says about me.
I don't like the idea of blaming anyone else for being who they are and doing what they do--I think I'd rather take responsibility for my own responses to those things. As you say, people can rarely help being who they are.
But yeah--mess with PAUL?
Ursa Freakin' Major.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:43 pm (UTC)Me? My element is earth (yuck, but there you go) - my temper takes a long time to get moving, but when it does - it's volcanic.
And far more likely to be triggered when someone messes with him - than me. What.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-25 01:46 am (UTC)But there is a sweetness and a kindness in both that triggers this thing in me that just wants to tear the face off anyone or anything that tries to hurt or take advantage of that. It's so special and so rare and so precious that it makes me furious to see anyone try to shit on it.
And I get real protective of that quality, because it means the world to me. There are enough male assholes in the world that we don't need any of the sweet ones threatened by the kind of bitterness that can come from being abused.
Me? Hell, I can take it--there may even be times when I even deserve it, cranky bitch that I can be.
But Paul? Oh, never.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 01:50 am (UTC)And like you, lying to me drops you down below 5 in a heartbeat. Pissing me off, however, isn't enough to break my trust. Backstabbing is, though. Which, I suppose, is related to dishonesty.
About the only thing I can think of that would cause me to completely drop any chance of forgiveness is repeat behavior and unrepentance. So, I guess you could say it depends a lot on how severe the crime was in the first place, and what sort of behavior follows it.
Dave was my best friend for several years. He stuck by me, was loyal, always supportive, just about everything I could ask for. Still not a 10, for various reasons. But at least a strong 8 bordering on low 9. Pretty high for me. When he moved in, made several promises to both me and my father to pay his debts to us, kept his girlfriend here and used our utilities, and then failed to make good on his promises to me entirely, and made only a half-hearted attempt to do so with my father...
He's now the only person in my life with a 1.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 04:52 am (UTC)I hear you on that, though I've made an effort not to stay angry after it has been pointed out to me that most of the people I never talk to anymore are not talked to because they got on my last nerve. I've marked off friendships as kaput once the realization dawns that the person in question just likes to make me angry, and they're not willing to stop or own up to it (hell, the reason my brother and I have somewhat of a rapport these days is that he's owned up to not being able to help making me angry over the years several times over- so yeah, I don't expect much, but if you can't spare an "I'm sorry, I just have a talent for getting on your last nerve, and I just don't know how to turn that off, honest", then you just don't give a damn, and to me that's the ultimate sin). I just basically resolve to carry on as if that person no longer exists, and they're just not a factor like that in my life anymore (which might arguably be colder and meaner that staying mad at them, but it works wonders on my overall mental health).
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 12:48 pm (UTC)While he was milking the system for his back injury, he carried a box that weighed 40 pounds around the corner where I had to park, into the house and up the stairs for me. He didn't work much at all for about 10 years. Then he got a job that paid 40K and still lived with mommy and daddy. He'll be 42 in a couple months. He just got word that the computer network company that he works for lost the contract at the school where he's been located. He doesn't know yet if they will shuttle him somewhere else or lay him off, but he's still living with mommy. He makes me so mad. He hasn't paid rent in 15 years, drives a car he bought with the accident money, and he's been making 40K for the last 5 years. Nobody knows what he does with it. He's prolly got a gazillion bucks in the bank and will live there rent free until mom dies. She's got a rambling Victorian house and doesn't want to be lonely, so she puts up with him leeching off her. He tells people it's his house and he is supporting her.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:38 pm (UTC)Sympathies with you about your Mom - life just ain't fair.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:21 pm (UTC)The strategy that works best for me is just not giving anyone any ammo. Disarm your own bombs before they can be used against you. Maybe that's also where the self-deprecation comes from.
I've been lied to and backstabbed but I think that's just part of life. It sucks, but it happens to everyone. The only way to completely obliterate my trust is to pretend that you love me.
no subject
Date: 2007-04-24 02:47 pm (UTC)Part of life, sure. That's why the number of incidences rising as is has is concerning - am I getting to be an intolerant, mean old lady as I just get older? Or am I getting better at detecting bullshit and heading it off at the pass? I'm not sure - the only thing I can absolutely certain of is that I can be wrong.
This needs more chocolate and contemplation. *nodsnods*
Regain my trust?
Date: 2007-04-24 03:57 pm (UTC)Most of the people who have lost it will never get it
back again. I try to avoid them if at all possible.
Not always able to do it, but I don't have to talk to
them. They get looked through, they aren't there.
If someone is important enough in my life they might get
a second chance, but you gotta already be up in the top
ten or so for me to even consider it. Even then it's
going to take a looooong time. There have been just too
many times in the past that I've given second chances
or even thirds) and gotten lied to or used again.
Yes, I'm insane, but I've learned to not be quite that insane anymore.
It's too damned hard on what sanity I have left.
Re: Regain my trust?
Date: 2007-04-24 09:35 pm (UTC)Oh wait. Brother. Yeaaaaaaah.
Guess there's always a chance, neh?
no subject
Date: 2007-04-25 01:59 am (UTC)Sometimes, with counseling, the cycle can be broken. Often not.