Loss of trust

After experiencing sexual assault or rape we may feel a sense of fear or hesitation to be close to someone. Sexual assault or abuse itself is the act of breaking a boundary. This experience can damage the trust we place in ourselves and others.

We might feel like we cannot trust ourselves if we internalise guilt and blame, thinking our actions made us vulnerable to this. Let us make this clear: only the rapist and harasser(s) are responsible for their actions.

We can feel guilty that if we get close to someone, they might want more from us than we feel able to give. We can also be scared that we might not be able to stop someone crossing a boundary and that can make us feel unsafe. This can be true for our family members, our friends, as well as our romantic relationships. You can read the experience of a survivor here.

This can lead to us avoiding situations where we need to trust people: if we ignore it, we don’t have to negotiate those boundaries. To trust someone, we need our body and mind to both feel safe. There might be times where our mind knows that we can trust someone but our body is not relaxed and gives us signals that we need to back away.

Experiencing a traumatic event such as assault or abuse can affect our ability to form strong emotional bonds and caring, enjoyable relationships. In psychological terms this is called attachment. It is important to know that this is a normal reaction. Even though it might feel like our perception of life and experiences will never be normal again, knowing why we experience this can help us to to overcome these feelings.

It’s important that we take care of our mind and body so that we can first develop trust in ourselves before we reach out to others. Here are some tips:

• Make sure the focus of building trust is for yourself, not someone else. You deserve to feel and be safe.

• Think about the progress you have made in your mind and body to build trust with people you care about, and say thank you to yourself for that progress.

• Speak to someone you know and trust about what a healthy relationship looks like, so that you can describe what your boundaries are.

• Speak to someone you know and trust about what your fears and reactions look like so that you can start to understand them. This may help you to have an emotional release.

• Write down what you need to communicate to the person you want to be close to. Explain what you need to feel safe, your boundaries, and develop a close bond. Boundaries are values, rules and principles that you need to live by. Communicating boundaries or enforcing them (telling people when they cross them) can feel uneasy at first but will strengthen your relationship in the long-term. Mutual respect is essential.

• You might feel that when you open up about your experiences, your levels of trust decrease because of adverse reactions. You may feel like people will or have let you down. This does not mean that your trust will never come back but that you are on a journey and will need to work through your experiences.

• If you feel that someone in your life cannot meet the things that you need to truly trust them, know that it’s okay to walk away from that relationship. We know that this might be easier for friends than family, so take a decision that is best for you. This distancing does not need to happen right away and you could do it gradually.

Depending on your experience with institutions such as government, police, courts or our workplaces, you may feel that reporting assault and using more official channels will not go your way and that the system is rigged. It’s a sad fact that often the systems put in place to help us, continue to fail survivors and can further traumatize us. Whilst that is often the case, it is also true that there are some great people challenging the systems and effecting change.

• Rise in the US is changing law across the US to ensure survivors don’t have to pay to have rape kits collected and that they do not go untested.

• Spain’s “only yes means yes” law about consent.

• Ingrid law in Mexico that sanctions public servants who leak images from open police investigations.

• Olimpia Law Mexico that provides legal protection against revenge porn.

Only you can decide what will work best for you. Give yourself time to rebuild your confidence in people and most importantly, yourself.