Vulnerable

Last year, spider solitaire was my drug of choice. When I was tired, upset, didn't want to do work, wanted to cry...I'd play it. It was the solution to everything. Then this year I switched over to minesweeper. And again, whenever I needed to think or avoid work, I'd play it. Then a couple of days ago, I went back to playing spider solitaire. It brought back a minor wave of memories, the way the smell of a certain perfume sometimes does, or the crisp winter air. So here I was, five minutes ago, playing spider solitaire when I figured something out:

I have trust issues.

I don't trust people anymore. I've been hurt too many times to allow anyone to really see my vulnerability. I've become a closed shell to the world. The few things I do allow to slip out are always minor and never reflect the true significance of my thoughts or emotions. I've kept secrets and the trust of anybody who has ever asked me to, and even those who didn't when I felt it wisest to keep my peace. And every single time I opened up to someone, my confidence has been shattered. Everyone I ever trusted broke that trust, shared with the world things that they had promised to keep locked away.

That's why nobody has seen me break down, nobody has seen me cry in years. It's happened enough, but I refuse to let anybody into that. I've been hurt too many times before...I've been thrown down and trampled over more times than I could or care to recall. never once have I been able to unconditionally trust someone and be sure that that trust holds, even though I hold every single secret that I have been entrusted with, no exceptions. Even people I don't talk to anymore, don't get along with...all of the secrets they told me, all of the "blackmail material" I have on them, I'm not going to share it with the world, although enough of them have done just that to me and spread the messes of my life, which I had trusted them to keep secret, with absolutely no regards for me.

So I've learned my lesson from that, and I just don't open up to the world anymore. Even when it seems like I do and I am vulnerable, that's not the half of my emotion. I've learned to live with an iron fence around the truth. And I'm not willing to let anybody get beyond it. Nobody will have so much as a glance. Because getting hurt as badly as I have been isn't worth it. I've spent months recovering and I'm still not okay. I don't know when I will be okay again, if ever. I know how to function in life just fine, I know how to get through things in my current state, but that's not the same thing as really being alright. But too much has happened, too many things have gone wrong, for me to trust anybody the same way ever again. I keep secrets from everybody and even the small things I'm oftentimes not willing to say.

Sometimes I just wish that somebody would respect me enough, as a human being, to keep my secrets, to not toss my trust carelessly over their shoulder. And I assume that there are people who are good enough to do that, but at this point, I'm not willing to risk it. That is one chance I refuse to take, because I never want to be hurt that badly again. If I do get hurt, then I do, but I will do everything I can to avoid it. I don't know if it's comprehensible just how affected I have been by this, and I don't know if it's at all clear just how vulnerable I am or how strong the barrier I have put up is, but I'm not writing this lightly, and I don't feel lightly about it at all. I've realized just how many problems I have right now, and not being able to trust people is one of them. I'm trying to work thought it, I'm trying to get back to my life...but it's a slow process, and it's not easy, and I'm still not willing to trust anybody enough to really get close enough to help.