Detrimental Doubt

Something happened yesterday that really struck me, though admittedly it's an old trigger... doubt and mistrust borne of illogic, and it really helped me remember just how stuck I get when I'm faced with making a decision about what [or whom] to believe when it’s between Heart and Head… knowing something intuitivly versus believing something intellectually, a subtle difference. F*%# it actually feels quite painful if I’m honest. My husband does shit that is in no way logical, may even defy the very laws of logic in fact! Haha. But then I get it in my head... doubt... thinking he’s lied in some way or is doing something shady based on the gap between my objective observations and the most logical conclusion… and thus the battle begins; the fear palpable. 🐇🐇🐇

Interestingly, I realised that I honestly don’t know what terrifies me more;

1. He’s lying and won’t tell me the truth no matter what I do, or how I ask (promising amnesty, etc.)… I have NO CONTROL over whether or not he’s lying, and I've tethered myself to yet another person who doesn't think I deserve the truth... which is all I've ever asked for
2. I’m being duped by someone I love, but also someone who may well turn out to be some kind of duplicitous mastermind that never really loved me (though he said himself he’s not smart enough for that, haha)

When I was young I was lied to by those around me enough to understand it could threaten my survival. Lies perceived largely because I’m an empath, their words did not align with either their own inner emotions nor their actions. My family was entropy so I over-corrected by clinging to orderliness and linear logic to counteract the chaos around me. Now I’m an adult with severe trust issues because I must have subconciously come to believe that everyone I love lies to me... and this sat deeper than I could have ever realised really. As I heal, these deeper more engrained issues become exposed, giving me the opportunity to process them. If I can’t learn to trust, if I keep doubting and mistrusting my husband because his brain doesn’t operate the same way that mine does… then my marriage could be in big trouble over time; a different form of the same threat to my survival. Who wants to be berated with questions all the time like that? I can understand why it hurts him, but f*$@, I’m not having a joy ride in myself either!

Hmmm, ok, maybe I'm not the only wife with this issues 😅

If I trust him I feel like I’m placing my very survival in his hands, someone who I know to make well meaning yet logically flawed decisions. My sense of self preservation, to say nothing of my need for optimisation, fights against that heart-felt inclination to trust him tooth and nail based on those grounds. It is so very bleak to admit to myself, but there’s an extremely toxic false, or at least semi-false, belief there… “If I believe him, I’m a f*%#ing fool who deserves what’s coming”… and ‘what’s coming’ is the inevitable end of not only my relationship, but also life as I know currently know it. It puts everything I have in jeopardy (like half of the shit I own), so it’s increasingly less surprising how terrified I feel with those niggly little brain spiders traipsing about, performing their eight-legged tap dance on my neurons and conducting an analysis where I THINK one way but FEEL another... the outcome is an experience akin to being ripped in two.

It’s not nice to feel this way, nor is it nice to think my husband is stupid, or to blame my family for these entrenched trust issues… These are indeed unhealthy thoughts, but I won’t deny them their right to be there because ignoring them will only serve to perpetuate the torture I experience. As I reflect, pause, and become more aware of them, I can work with them and heal them. At the very least I’m being honest with myself, and daring to hope these things inside me will shift… If that is the best I can do then I’ll do it, even if the mistrust never goes away at least I know the basis of these doubts, then believing them becomes a choice… just like the choice I made to marry a man so very unlike myself intellectually, whose logic is wired completely backwards from my own, but who I know would never intentionally hurt or deceive me. That knowing serves as the foundation for the future trust to which I aspire.

Original Publication Date 12 June 2022, Revised TBD