Decision Not to Trust  − September, 1970

My dad was going to marry again after institutionalizing and divorcing my mother when I was three.  I had lived apart from him with four different families after he'd had my mother taken away.  The first two families had been close friends of my dad’s.  The third and fourth families had been those of my new mom and father’s brothers, respectively.

I would turn five several months after my dad remarried.  Before the wedding, I went to live with my new mom in her apartment (forever after, we called it “The Old Apartment”).  At night I’d sleep in a rollaway bed.  In the early morning, I’d creep into bed with her to snuggle up.  I don’t know how much I understood about her becoming my new mother. I’d probably at least gotten the idea that she was going to be around a lot. 

I had many reasons not to trust.  My mother had abused me during the formative years of my life.  But I must have yearned to trust my new mom.  I needed a mom.  My dad loved me and was good to me, but I needed a mother’s love, too.  I needed someone to take over for my biological mother and show me how a good mother could be.

I recall the moment when I made the decision not to trust my stepmother.  She and my dad had married, and we had all moved into a new house.  We had a new dog.  One afternoon, I had been allowed to walk the dog right outside our house.  Something went awry (maybe the dog got loose), and when my stepmother asked me about it, I told her the truth.   She didn’t believe me.  She didn’t even seem to listen to me.  She had her own belief about what had happened, and she stuck with it.

At that moment, I knew I could not trust her.  I must have stopped even trying to trust her.  Although my memory of that moment is fuzzy, I know that throughout my childhood, I never felt that I could trust her.  I was very sensitive; my feelings could be easily hurt.  Me feelings were like the bit of skin that grows over a wound.  If touched too roughly, the wound re-opens and begins to bleed again.  She would re-open my wound over and over, never letting it heal.

Strangely enough, although she was a therapist and had an excellent background in psychology, she did not figure out until I was 38 that she needed to be much gentler with me. 

An unfortunate side effect of having two abusive mothers is that it was difficult for me to trust women.  In high school and college, I wasn’t very interested in having female friends.  I identified better with men.  As I grew older, I became more open to having female friends.  Now, I have several female friends.  Although I am very open with some of them, I have not allowed myself to grow too close to any of them.

I wonder what it would be like to be as close to a woman as I’ve been to my male friends.  When I see women being close in the movies or in public, it’s hard for me to imagine what it would be like.  I would like to have that experience some day.  I would like to feel close enough to a woman friend to want to hug her for a long time.

Comments:

Bazookah 5 (March 25, 2008. 04:26pm)

I think I understand. I felt a similar untrust for women. I had few female friends growing up, never getting too close. As I got older I stopped even trying being friends with girls and became friends with guys instead. I recently tried being more open having female friends but I find it's difficult to trust them. Maybe it's because of my mom and My Sister. My dad's ex-girlfriends didn't make it easy either...I try but it's really difficult.