Trust & Coping mechanisms

[bittersweets]

I'd like to start a thread asking for your own coping mechanisms for trust/jelousy, etc. After the whole ex-girlfriend named porn picture incident (thread somewhere in here)..... I find my self at very heightened alert about everything he does.

I find my self watching what he does carefully..... feeling uncomfortable when he is on the computer.... in my head questioning stupid things ALL the time.

I don't know where my trust went.. but it's hard for me to go back to "normal" mode.

I use his computer sometimes, and I find my self checking the history to see what he is up to....... and this morning I saw that last night he went to a girl's journal site at Live Journal while I was at night school. I checked the user info and she is from the same city as us.... I am guessing a "friend" from work or a girl he met at a show he went to last week....

 

So I am just really paranoid right now thinking "who is that ? why was he reading her journal ?" ......... we spent the evening together last night.. and he was telling me how special I was and how much he loves me.. and how he is a lucky man.

It's hard for me to be receptive when in the back of my mind I have all these dis-trustful thoughts going through my head. Constantly, it seems. When I say "I love you".. it feels like I half ass mean it, because I am too busy being paranoid in my head.

 

I love him to death.. and I know he loves me to death...... but why can't I trust everything he does ? Or rather.. how can I ?

 

I have to admit I have a few mental disorders which make my paranoia worse (I am like this will all my friends, as well..).... but I've always trusted my boyfriend to be devoted.

 

What are some coping mechanisms and things I can do to help me stop being so on edge and jelous ? I know I'll be thinking of why he was looking at that girls journal site ALL day.. and it could just be a friend....... but I wonder how he got it.. if he's e-mailing her.. and why...... and all this crap.... it could just be nothing.. but I get so worked up now.

It's bad enough I have to think about him fantasizing about his ex-girlfriend from that picture..... so I am feeling very insecure and sad lately.

 

Any advice ?

 

Thanks,

bittersweets

[Benedict]

Hi Bittersweets...

 

I hate to tell you this, but it will take a long time for that trust to come back. There is nothing that will hurry it along either.

 

It really comes down to a specific, pointed, conscious decision that you have to make: to keep him or to leave him.

 

Leaving is relatively simple: if you leave, you do not need to worry about regaining trust.

 

If you decide to stay with him, it is a lot more work - with no guarantee of success. When you make the decision to stay, it is up to both of you to get past the trust issue. His part is to be trustworthy; your's is to be trusting. I get days when I feel like I can't trust my wife at all. Not from any concrete "evidence", but rather because I was hurt in the past. For me, it may ultimately prove that my trust is mis-placed - it also may not. I have decided to make it work; I have decided to try and trust. In my view, even though my wife gave me plenty of good reasons to not trust her, if I am sincere about wanting it to work, I can't make her pay for every bad feeling I get. Now, if I have good reason for suspicion - or hard evidence - that is a different story. And yes, I keep my eyes and ears open.

 

As far as coping mechanisms, I remind myself that I want it to work, and I know that for every "bad day" I have, the next will be better, and it always is. The only specific coping mechanism I have for dealing with it is to go for a long run. That always helps me.

[myrias]

Gee... Dear you do have to calm down a bit.

 

He saw a live journal and? Maybe he doesn't even know the girl. Sometimes I happen to bump into websites, live journals, whatever, I find them funny and bookmark them. Why don't you just ask him? Tell him you saw the site and ask if it's someone he knows. Probably the answer will surprise you and you can forget all about it.

 

And then start regaining your trust. Look at things the way they are. He didn't cheat on you, he didn't lie to you and he loves you so much. Tell him about your fears and let him now how you construct things in your mind. Then once he'll understand that he can help you but you know you're the only one who can control the misstrust before it goes out of hand.