Anyone else here find it difficult to trust people?

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I try not to let myself get too close to people because I'm so afraid of them hurting me. As has happened so many times before.

When someone I have opened up to hurts me (e.g I hear from someone else that they'd said something negative about me) its like I experience an intense rejection and really struggle to move on from it. As a result, Ive lost alot of friends.

I never trust people that talk negatively of others.

Does anyone else experience this? Have you had to just forgive and forget sometimes? How do you do it??

I feel if I try to trust people then I become to trusting and open myself to heartbreak or betrayal. I actually have very few friends due to this and I don't even try to make new friends. When they find out that I'm an aspie they might turn their back on me and I don't want to stick around to find out. I can't even stay in a healthy relationship with a girl. When it comes to the opposite sex I want a night of fulfilled lust and then never have to see them again. In the past, if they ever got attached to me then I did try to keep a relationship going, but it is not easy, so I don't do it anymore.

I was just thinking about this yesterday. One of the few joys of getting older is that we get enough hard experiences with people that we learn to limit what we expect. And this isn't a negative or bad thing, just realistic. So now I look for areas that I have in common with each person I'm in regular contact with. We have, through some shared interest or other, an overlap of contact, prductivity, enjoyment, whatever. But I know now not to expect this to extend to other areas.

For example (and why I was thinking about this), I volunteer in an organization and a new volunteer is hardworking and fun to be around, but also seems to be impulsive and a bit greedy/needy. So this is who he is, I can't wish it away. So I will limit his opportunities to be greedy/needy but also encourage his hard work.

Another example-I used to work at a horse farm with someone who was hilarious, wild, made us all laugh with stories of her escapades, but didn't work very hard (too hung over). At first I started building up my usual resentment, but then I though, you know, it's 5 a.m., we're out here in the barn, it's 10 degrees, we'll be working for 12 hours-let her entertain us! She's worth her salary for that.

Of course, sometimes when we get to know people better, we find they're too destructive to be around at all-but we learn not to open up too fast, so we limit the damage they ever had the opportunity to do.

My life is a burning cinders of emotional conflagration. I have trusted and been hurt. But the rewards of trust make it necessary to engage in. I have a notebook from when I was 23. I read parts of it recently. I remember identifying an irrational component of my thought which was trust. So at that moment I noted that I could prove the existence of emotion in my thought, and I wrote down how it was the only solution to how I could trust was that at some level I had an emotional component to my belief. It was very interesting.

Trust has helped me to gain acceptance within a small community who loves and forgives me for my peculiar behavior. This has allowed me to learn to accept and love myself. This is priceless. So in spite of considerable risk. and a theory of relations that says they all inevitably end badly. I have chosen, based on some inferred emotional criteria, to continue to trust. I cannot fail to give others the opportunity to shine in their personal behavior, even if it gives them the opportunity to fail, and hurt me.

I trust no one.


Sometimes not even myself.

Can only trust my children. No one else.

I have been "burned" so many times that it is hard to trust anybody.

Yes, precisely. I've been really taken advantage of by those whom *should* be trustworthy. Intellectually, I know it's not my fault and I should not blame myself for another's really bad behaviour, but that's not easy advice to take, is it?

I know this means that I oftentimes shut-out others. On the other hand, we all need a safety mechanism to protect ourselves, especially us Aspies. In actuality, I have few friends and acquaintances. I know that I've sometimes jumped at the chance to quickly make friends with someone, entrusting them too quickly. Then I get hurt. I guess the lesson is to take it slowly......really slowly.

From my observations, those who are outwardly charming and/or gregarious can be dicey. I am leery of gossips and (hate to say it) but women are the worst. I tend to gravitate to men because they are 'safer.'

I do not have a bubbly personality and I am really shy by nature. I try to not act defensive, but I have good reason to do so as well. If someone really wants to get to know us, then maybe they'll need to take the time to do so.

My experience is similar to the OP's. By default I don't trust people. It's very true that people who talk negatively of others are doing the same about you behind your back, too.

I don't trust anyone except my parents.

I have been burned throughout my life. As I get older, rather than develop better judgement, I find that I still get burned, just in different ways that are not the same as the ones I think I "learned a lesson" about previously. I don't find increasing age helping me in this one little bit.

So I tend to trust nobody these days. It's the only solution. Nothing ever ends well so I've closed the doors. I neither need nor deserve continued shocks and kicks in the teeth, and since I have a naturally trusting nature and can't find my "discernment button" to press, I just have to shut down now and that's the way I'm staying.

.

Ahhhhh........this is SO true and how I feel precisely. I will admit to having to look up the word conflagration! !! I LOVE the word and will start using it more. You hit the nail on the head! Thank you for this post because it is a gentle reminder of the importance of remaining vulnerable. It is important to trust ourselves first and foremost and to be confident in who we are. Not sure what you do for a career, but you should consider writing. You have a way with words.

Just wondering.......what a person who wants to be your friend could do to earn your trust?

I am asking because I have run into someone like this. I truly love and accept her for who she is but she won't even give me an inch and I think it is for the reasons you stated here. Everything was fine until I reached out and tried to form a friendship with her. She seemed upset by it and asked me not to try to form a friendship that is just not possible for her. This made me very sad. A) Because no one should have to feel that way B) because selfishly I love being around her and no one wants to be rejected by someone they care about. She never came out and told me she has AS, but it certainly explain a lot as far as her behavior is concerned. I know she is eccentric and socially awkward but that doesn't bother me. I love eccentric people.

Anyway....not sure if you can shed some light.

Betrayal is part of being alive, everyone gets stabbed in the back or his/her heart broken. This is not exclusive to the neurologically atypical. Greek tragedies are all about betrayal, Shakespeare's works are classic because they touch on universal themes of difficulties created by personal interaction.

Buck up, s**t happens, and part of that s**t is that trust will result in betrayal at some point in everyone's lives, sometimes many many times.

I think it's important to embrace the fact that each person is responsible for his or her own behavior, that all betrayal is the choice of the the betrayer, and not the result of the trusting.

If you were walking down the sidewalk, and a car, (driven by someone highly intoxicated) jumped the curb and ran over the person ahead of you on the sidewalk, would you think the pedestrian was at fault for being there? No, it is the driver's choices that lead to the tragedy. While it's true that at some point the only thing that may seem to matter is that some person got run over, it's a mistake to lose perspective because that can lead to limited thinking. s**t happens, people get run over (literally and figuratively), but that doesn't mean we should never again walk down that sidewalk.

Hi Therese04 -- your description of your friend and her trust issues made me so sad! And I realize that she, and I, and others who have been hurt enough that we see staying closed as the only solution to blocking further hurt, are missing out. I know that. For me, personally, I just feel that I have been so, so, very, very very viciously hurt by people I allowed closer that there is no value in staying open anymore, it's too much of a risk.

It seems that your friend is in a similar place. It's a sad place but it does come from genuine hurt and a whole rocky road of it too, likely.

About how to earn her trust......I think, for me, someone would just have to show a very steady, unwavering maintenance of whatever good stuff is there, as you seem to be doing. For me, someone being kind and understanding instead of harsh and critical or not "getting" me and saying so. Someone staying friendly and warm even when I show the awkwardness or "off"-ness I can't help showing even when I'm trying to be more normal. I happen to read faces well rather than lack the "reading" thing, and it's a burden of a skill because I can always see something in someone face that I know is them thinking "Woah I thought you were normal and now suddenly I think you're a bit odd." I hate to see that "look" fall across someone's face and it always signals the end of their "approval" of me as a person, somehow.

But that's just one tiny thing that I get a lot --- as for your friend, just keep all the good things going, all the ways that you are warm, friendly, supportive, non-judgmental, there for her, etc.

I do realize that we who have shut down are sad cases who will be missing out on genuinely decent potential friends in our lives. But it's so hard, SO hard, to let the risk of hurt in again.

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Thanks SO much for your post!! !! It is so helpful. You seem like a kind and caring person. I am very sorry about your past experiences. I don't know of them but can relate to being deeply wounded by people I let in and became attached to but who later walked away. Maybe that is why I feel connected to this person. There is something inside of me that is able to see into the soul of certain people. She is one of them. I know that sounds like a crazy thing to say, but it is true. She is pure goodness, but carries the burden of a heavy heart. I think she caught on that I saw through her portrayed happiness and maybe that is why she became upset. It's ok. I will just keep doing what you said. Thanks so much. It's nice to run into honest yet very helpful and positive people on this site.