Trust

As I delve deeper into the lifestyle, I am slowly realizing I have major trust issues. I have a problem with letting go of control. I do to a certain degree but I noticed I never fully hand over my trust. Not to say that's a bad thing. I'm not looking to become co dependant and I am a strong woman with a mind and life of my own. But recently I have noticed a trend of people telling me "ask for help", "let me take care of you", "I'm here for you". Are you really? Am I just that much of a control freak? No, I think I do it out of self preservation. I do it to still maintain my Independence and show I am strong and able to take care of myself. I have spent my whole life trying to prove to others that I am capable and strong enough to take care of myself. I also promised myself after my divorce that I would never ever let a man feel like I depend on them, I CAN and WILL take care of myself whether they are in my life or not.



Maybe part of it has to do with the way I grew up. Everyone Coddled me and felt they needed to protect me and do everything for me. So much so I think I am over the top now and am forever trying to "prove" to my family and myself that I am capable of taking care of myself. In doing so I set myself up to be hurt. I may be 28, but I will admit I am still quite naive when it comes to reading people and knowing their true intentions. I have a tendency to see only the good in others. My life experiences prove that time and time again lol. Due to past experiences and putting my trust in the wrong hands I've found I have become quite jaded. Now instead of trusting someone I am very skeptical of anyone that is nice to me. I immediately think "well, what is it you want in return? What's your ulterior motive? No one is simply nice to me because that's their personality. They always want something in return from me."


When I entered the lifestyle every Dom I talked to of course mentioned trust. "You have to build trust", "you have to open yourself up and trust me", "you can't have a D/s dynamic without trust". Obviously! Damn straight I'm not letting anyone near me with the potential to harm me physically that I don't trust! I may enjoy pain to a certain extent but I am no masochist. I have had too many times in my life when pain was administered against my will. Some say I take it too seriously. Well, due to my past experiences I can't help but take it seriously. Also, for some reason wherever I go in life, I always run across people that literally tell me "I'm here to protect you. I have your back", I feel protective of you". Why? Am I really in that much need of help? Am I truly that incapable of taking care of myself that without knowing it something about me screams HELP ME?


To this day I have people in the lifestyle that I start to converse with and even without meeting me they tell me "I feel protective of you". Is that just a ploy of yours to be the "knight in shining armor" that saves the helpless princess? Or am I really in that much need of help? Because I tell ya, I don't believe in fairy tales and I don't like them. They are a bunch of bull. Essentially that was what made my relationship with my mentor go sour. He was always saying he was there for me and looking out for me. I finally got tired of it and said enough! Plus after he would do things for me I would get the guilt trips "see all I do for you?!" I never asked for any of it so why make me feel guilty? That's your bad! Finally I told him I am a grown ass woman and can take care of myself. It's suffocating! My whole life everyone has felt this need to protect me.


Growing up I was the baby of the family and the only girl in my immediate family. I have two older brothers- 6 and 7 years older than me. Before my parents had me they lost a son at 2 and a half to Meningitis. I'm sure the loss of a young child had a lot to do with the overprotective nature as a child. Also being not only the youngest girl in my immediate family, but the youngest in my extended family as well on both sides- you get the idea. My entire family- Aunts, Uncles, Grandparents and cousins coddled me. I admit I am so used to others doing everything for me that sometimes I find it difficult to do things alone. I've had to teach myself a lot of things and how to survive on my own. I was never taught, everything was handed to me or done for me. But in the end it makes me upset when I have a tough time doing things on my own, I am upset I was not allowed to learn these things at an earlier age.


When I was born my Grandma said "My God! It's Jo Jo reincarnated!" That was my older brother, who died from Meningitis. So I don't know if that has been in the backs of my family's minds my whole life, that I am Jo Jo reincarnated. I heard it enough growing up that's for sure. I admit it is creepy though. When I look at baby pictures honestly the only way I can tell if it is me or not is if the baby has a dress on. We look like identical twins and also from what I've heard our personalities are very similar. So growing up the youngest and the only girl and the stigma that I'm Jo Jo reincarnated- it's no wonder they were so protective of me. That and the fact that my Mom and I nearly died while she was giving birth to me. Now that I'm writing this all down, I'm amazed I was let out of the house lol. Due to my divorce, at the moment I am back living with my parents. Still at the age of 28 and a Mother myself, who has been on her own and held a job for 8 years and bought a house and got married, raising a child on my own- I'm still treated like a child that can't handle anything on her own. Like I'm a delicate piece of china that they have to handle with care or I'll break.


When I was 16 I began to fight back. I was tired of being coddled, so I ended up dating the bad boy just to get to my parents. I just assumed the world was like my family, caring and loving. I was very naive. That boy ended up being one of the biggest mistakes of my life. It was a very mentally abusive relationship. I was with him for nearly 5 years. He turned my friends against me, made me distance myself from my family until all I had in my life was him. I was told I was worthless and ugly and disgusting and no one would ever want me and I was lucky he still put up with me. Turns out he just wanted a female he could manipulate and break. He didn't really love me. He just saw an easy target, a naive little girl. Fast forward a year later. I wanted a relationship but figured instead of finding a bad boy I needed to find a kind man. In walks mistake number 2- my ex husband. He does have a gentle soul, but he also has a lack of drive and back bone to go with that gentle soul. He is what I now know as passive aggressive. That didn't so much start until after we were married. First came the little jabs during arguments to keep me going and make me even more upset than if he were screaming at me at the top of his lungs. He would lie straight to my face even about the smallest thing.


That passive aggressive personality slowly turned into a physically abusive relationship. At first I didn't fight back. But one day I got so angry and I hated him so much I fought back. I thought "No one will ever break me mentally again! You think you are tough, want to push me around? Well I'm done being the victim so if you hit me expect a hit back you bastard!" If there was one thing I learned from my first relationship it was that I would never ever let another man break me mentally. So I fought back the only way I knew, physically. There were many fights that turned into an all out brawl between us and it always ended with him walking away more hurt than myself. My determination drove me to never give up. I saw it as if I gave up on fighting, I would lose a part of me. He would start the fight and end up giving up. That is why to this day when anyone says "you have a sadistic streak in you"- no I don't. I will never ever raise my hand to anyone no matter what. I don't want to cause anyone pain even if they insist on it. It reminds me too much of the fights I willingly engaged in, even though I never started it- I did fight back and I feel terrible for that. I refuse to do any harm to anyone. So I am not a sadist and never will be. I may joke around and have a mental sadistic streak, but I will never use it to harm another.


My family seems to think that I have not learned from my mistakes. They all tell me that I need to be careful about entering into another relationship and warn me of all the things men are capable of. Do you forget who you are talking to? Honestly no one knows all that I have truly been through in my life. No one will ever know because there are things I will never tell. But let me tell you this, I took my experiences and instead of repeating history over and over again like so many women tend to do- I learned from them. I learned not to settle and that I don't have to put up with disrespect nor do I deserve to be disrespected. I'm not running back to abusive men; I am wise and know exactly what to watch for in personalities. So no family, I have learned. I have learned more than you will ever know about life. The year after my divorce when I was completely alone, I grew so much as a person. I grew into the strong woman that I am today that is happy with life.


So now you see why I have such an issue with trust. People that I opened up to and trusted crushed me. Not in the beginning either. They waited until I was vulnerable and open and then took what they wanted from me. So why wouldn't I be leery of others? So when someone says "I feel protective of you. I'm here for you" I think, why? What's in it for you? I am more likely to let my guard down physically than I am mentally. Mentally it takes a lot of effort. Even with Sir I still fight. I do trust him more than I have anyone else in my life. He has helped me so much with my trust issues, but still I find myself thinking sometimes "if I open up all the way to him and I let him help me with things then I'll become dependant on him and that's when he'll strike! What's to stop him from doing it? Everyone else has." But I know Sir is different and for the first time in my life I actually want someones help and am happy he is protective of me when it comes to people. Especially now that we are focusing more on the mental side of D/s, I feel I need to trust in him more.


But I find myself fighting it with even the smallest things. Like the other night I put a desk together myself. Me being the girly girl that I am I complained about manual labor to Sir. He of course said I should have asked for help. Immediately I thought "what?! I'm that helpless that I can't put a desk together myself?" Honestly he could have done a much better job with it but I was too stubborn to ask for help due to my pride and trust issues. I mean come on! It starts with him helping me out with putting a desk together- what next? If I depend on him for something as simple as that, that opens me up to handing over more and more trust/control. I feel like if I hand over that much trust, I lose a part of myself. That is the only way to describe it. Because every time I trusted in the past, they took a little piece of me that I can never get back and it essentially changed me, who I am and how I think forever. As I said I trust Sir like no other and I want nothing more than to hand over that last bit of trust- but I still struggle with it.


Ever since my mentor and I parted ways I have found myself even more closed off to society in general. I feel I'm moving backwards instead of forwards. I trusted him and his knowledge of this lifestyle- but in the end I feel all he did was for himself and for him to gain something- not just because he felt he needed to "protect and teach" me. So I find myself pulling away from everyone. Someone at an event just comes up and smiles and shakes my hand and I think "what do you want from me?" I hate it! I feel every time I have feelings like that I am letting my exes still get to me. They win every time I distance myself from anyone and second guess their intentions. I still let them control me! No more.


There is so much I have yet to try in terms of BDSM, yet I can't bring myself to trust anyone. A while back I started to open up to the idea of a possible play partner, but I couldn't do it. That is why I insist on getting to know and trust a play partner so much. I don't even trust a stranger walking down the street! Not because I am looking for another relationship, but because I need to know you're not going to kick my ass! I know I need to open up a little more and trust at least somewhat- but how the hell do you even start? Normally a play partner is not someone who you put a lot of work into your dynamic, it's casual. But for me at this time I feel in order to trust a person I NEED more work put into it than "hey lets play! Alright that was fun, see ya next time". Honestly who wants a play partner that takes so much work?


So at this point I insist on only talking to others I already know and only converse with people I get a good vibe from. I'm having trouble trusting Sir! I need to work on trusting people in general as well. Especially if I want to gain more experience and see what this life has to offer. Lately one of the groups I was hanging out with kinda pushed me over the edge. I am no longer in contact with any of them. I am only going to talk to others I feel are genuine, caring people. And if I am even thinking of playing with another- it will be someone I know without a doubt I can trust and is truly in the lifestyle for the right reasons. I've come across too many men that are just looking for one night stands and that is not me!


So here's to my ongoing trust issues and hoping to overcome them. The question is- where do I even begin? One thing I do know; I'm a fighter and I never give up. I take lemons and make lemonade. I have in the past and I will again. I just have to figure out the recipe.