Suburban Goddess

I have trust issues.

Those who know me, know why.  And there’s really nothing I can do to change that; I’ve been burned so many times by people that I care deeply about.  It’s not that I don’t want to trust them; I do. In fact, I think I trust them a little too much, and they take advantage of that trust, doing things they should not do, until eventually I catch them and all my trust is shattered.

After years of this kind of disaster, I’m a little weary.  Actually, I’m VERY weary.  I want to be blissfully naive again; I want to think that the person I care about will never hurt me.  I want to be able to truly believe in someone’s word… I want to have trust that is unshakable.

I look at others in relationships, people that seem to have it all together.  But even they have trust issues at times.  With the popularity of social networking, everyone’s talking to an old girlfriend/boyfriend, an ex-flame, a  sexy co-worker…. and when you start to share interests with new people, that threatens the fragile balance of trust as well.

I’m sure my social networking is pretty intimidating to people I date; I belong to so many services that I had to subscribe to a new service that updates them all simultaneously. But I never went into networking with dating in mind; it just seemed to be a natural by-product. I’ve met people, I go out and share a common interest, and before I knew it, I fell in love.

And that scares me, because that’s how the phrase, “it just happened” becomes a frightening reality. I’ve been the victim of “it just happened,” when the person I was committed to “accidentally” fell in love with someone else they met online. It doesn’t hurt any less than any other kind of betrayal.

How do I keep “it just happened,” from happening to ME again?

Why do people allow themselves to be in that position to begin with? I mean, I think I know the answer to that one; we get lonely, the people in our lives are just used to us and don’t give us special attention anymore, we get bored, etc., etc., etc….. until a harmless conversation turns into something deeper, and then that blossoms into feelings you can no longer deny. But that doesn’t make it okay. There are things, subjects, topics that should be OFF-LIMITS if you’re in a relationship.  But the Internet makes us all brave, and just like the anonymous trolls that have endless courage hiding behind their keyboards, spewing hatred and bigotry, there are also the keyboard romantics who have no accountability for their actions.  I’m guilty myself; I can express my deepest fears and darkest desires behind a keyboard… and that makes people think they know me. Then they cross the line, because I’ve opened myself up for it. With the Internet, you don’t have boundaries…

… but if you’re in a relationship,  you should.

This entry was posted on November 6, 2008 at 7:48 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.