Trust in friendships

As I discussed in my last post, trust is an essential and difficult aspect of relationships. Trust can be especially difficult for individuals who have been through abuse or trauma.

I know this because I grew up in an abusive household. It wasn't until I went to college that I began to learn the importance of trust in relationships. Whether you are trying to develop a friendship or romantic relationship with another person, trust is the basis on which a relationship is built.

So, how do you know when or even if you can trust a potential friend or partner?

Through my experiences, relationships, and my own therapeutic work, I have learned a great deal about trust in friendships.

First, it is important to realize that trust is built over time. Trust shouldn't be given all at once. Oftentimes survivors of abuse or trauma may let down their guard too easily, allowing others to cross their boundaries too early in a developing friendship.

Don't disclose all of your personal information, background, and/or secrets at once. In fact, you may want to start with "small talk". When first meeting someone, get to know them by asking them what I call surface questions. Examples of these might include:
What is your favorite...?
Where are you from?
What are you studying / what do you do in your current job?
Do you have any siblings?

And so forth. Getting to know someone gradually will allow you to develop a greater sense of trust over time.

Do things you both enjoy. Spending time together will allow you to develop a solid friendship. When you spend time with one another, you also have the opportunity to learn more about each other. When you see a movie, for instance, the movie may inspire you to talk about mutual interests or to bring up things you have not discussed before such as your opinions, thoughts, feelings, or experiences.

Consistency is another factor in trust in my opinion. If your potential friend agrees to meet you at Starbucks at 10AM and she runs into traffic, causing her to arrive late, does she call to let you know she'll be late? Does she offer an apology or explanation for her lateness?

Likewise, does your potential friend call to cancel ahead of time if she can't make your meeting? Are her actions consistent with her words? If she tells you she really wants to get to know you, but then doesn't call, e-mail, or make plans with you for the next three months, her words and actions are not consistent with one another.

There are times when we are ALL late, unable to cancel ahead of time, break someone's confidence accidentally, or neglect to keep good contact with our friends. However if these things are happening consistently, the person in question may or may not be trustworthy.

I believe trust is earned, built over time. If you have concerns about potential friends, talk to the people you trust (long-time friends, counselors, a pastor, etc) to get their take on the situation. Then, you may want to consider talking with your potential friend about your concerns regarding him or her.

The most important thing to remember is to take relationships slowly; don't let new or potential friends cross all your boundaries initially and listen to your instincts!

Trust

Trust is one of those abstract concepts everyone seems to hold a different opinion about. It appears to be hard to define in any definite terms. But I'd like to share the insights I've gained about trust through my work as a student social worker.

In my first internship in my master's program in social work, I worked in a safe house and transitional housing unit. Not only had many of these women been abused by their former partners, but they had also been abused by family members and friends, people they thought they could trust.

And yet, here I was asking them to trust me, a total stranger. While I have suffered my own significant traumas, I couldn't ethically blurt this out to all the women in the safe house. While the statement might have shown them that I could relate to them, the statement might also make them warier of trusting me. They might feel as if I were too fragile to help them or that they needed to listen to me rather than my doing my job as their counselor.

Thus, I had to figure out different ways of earning their trust, and I did. I built rapport with the mothers and their children by spending a lot of time with them, eating dinner with them, attending their group sessions with them, talking about how their day was, and about their children. I also got to know each child by spending time with them - playing and talking with them, and just allowing them to be the carefree children they deserved to be.

It took two or three months before one mom, which the staff had a particularly hard time connecting with, began to trust me. We took things in baby steps. I got to know her - her likes and dislikes, what she did during the day, her ambitions, and so forth. Eventually, I let her know that if she ever needed to talk that I was available to help her. Opening the therapeutic door for her was an enormous step, one she wasn't ready to take before my internship ended. However, being able to really connect with this woman showed her that there are people out here to support her. I really think the trust she and I built together was monumental considering all that she had been through, and I was truly amazed at how much she accomplished in the short time we had spent together.

So, what is trust exactly? As I said earlier, trust is really difficult to define, but here is what I believe trust is. Trust is being able to count on someone, to know that you can confide in someone and that that someone won't defy your confidence. Trust is being able to share your innermost throughts, feelings, dreams, and ambitions with someone and that same someone should be able to share theirs with you. When you trust someone, you know that person will not judge you based merely on situational circumstances, but rather, they will look past situations and behaviors to seeing your core being.

I believe trust has to built over a period of time. If you have never been through significant trauma, trust might come more easily to you whereas those who have been abused or traumatized might need to take more time to get to know someone before they begin to place any trust in that person.

I believe trust is earned. And when it is broken, you have to re-earn the trust you lost.

If you're having trouble trusting or struggling with the fact that a friend or family member doesn't trust you, tune in later this week to learn how you can cope with these issues.