trusting your gut vs. being paranoid
 

If you've read any of my posts then you are familiar with my story so I hope you can help me with this. I am 39 and have only had 2 boyfriends! I was with my second bf for about 1years. Another 2 were spent doing this disgusting "dance."

I am almost convinced that I do not even know how to have a normal relationship. At my age there aren't too many guys who are even half decent. It seems that most have X wives and/or children. I have never wanted children. I just do not have what it takes in that department.

My gut has ALWAYS told me when there was something wrong but as many of you know when you grow up in a dysfunctional home and spend almost half your life with an AB...things get kind of twisted.

I was told I was crazy...I thought I MUST be crazy because there is no way that all of these fears I have could be rational. Well...guess what...they all were. As I found out much too late.

I have severe trust issues and at this point, even if I DID meet a decent guy I wouldn't even know how to act. I would have a hard time believing anything and would always have a knot in my stomach.

Has anyone else ever felt like this?

Meant to say 13 years

I think "listening to your gut" is really about giving yourself credit for recognizing familiar negative patterns. You've heard the lies before - you saw what happened. Do you want to stick around and see if this time it will be different, or do you want to follow your gut instinct and avoid the drama?

If you start feeling the "gut instinct" in regards to someone who hasn't proven themselves untrustworthy in the past, it seems beneficial to keep in mind that, because of your former experiences with untrustworthy people, you may have a tendency to overreact.

A certain amount of paranoia is to be expected after living through trauma.

Knowing that you are probably prone to paranoia (understandably) is an important step in beginning to distinguish healthy from unhealthy behavior.

You sound like you are on the right track.
Wishing you the best.
-TC

I must say that the most valuable lesson I learned in therapy is that it's not about trusting someone else, it's about trusting yourself. I think she told me that in our third session. It was nearly a year later when I finally got it! AHA!

Have you considered individual therapy?

L

If you are involved in the insanity long enough you start to question yourself, buying into the others' insanity. Black becomes white. Up becomes down. You might not know how to learn to have a normal relationship now, but if you stay away from the unhealthy ones and start working a program, after a period of time you will no longer be attracted to unhealthy people, and healthy people will be attracted to you. That's what they tell me, and I have to believe them. I can't keep taking the same lessons over and over again. My thought go out to you.

My therapist calls it "getting my picker fixed". You are not alone in this concern. I agree with La...you need to focus on learning to trust yourself. That may seem impossible right now because you're second guessing everything. If you can, getting into a program or talking with a therapist can really help you work through these issues. You're not crazy.

When I failed to recognize my worth and the majority of my thoughts were negative and I'd convinced myself that I didn't deserve a healthy relationship, it was a self-fulfilling proficy and all I attracted was unavailable or unhealthy partners.

When I began to recognize my worth and the majority of my thoughts were positive and I'd convinced myself that I deserved a healthy relationship, it, too, was a self-fulfilling proficy.

In short, my thoughts become things, so positive thoughts lead to a positive outcome and negative thoughts lead to a negative outcome. I always have choices. I can wallow in self-defeating thoughts or I can banish them from my life.