It can feel like no matter what you do, life keeps letting you down. You put in the effort and try to do everything right, but your relationships suffer, friendships dissolve, or loved ones drift away. 

If you’ve experienced this, then you may be dealing with trust or abandonment issues. These issues make it hard to understand why your relationships don’t seem to work despite your best efforts.

While it may seem like these patterns are permanent or that nothing will ever change, trust and abandonment issues can be resolved with a little professional support.

How Do I Fix My Trust Issues?

Trust issues make it hard to rely on or be vulnerable with other people. If you have trust issues, you may:

• Hide your true thoughts or feelings
• Constantly question the intentions of others
• Struggle to ask for help
• Overanalyze others for signs of dishonesty
• Avoid committing to relationships fully

In many cases, trust issues stem from childhood trauma. Traumatic experiences, such as neglect, betrayal, or inconsistent care from a caregiver, can make it difficult to depend on others in later life. With that said, even adults can develop trust issues if they repeatedly experience dishonesty or abuse in their relationships. 

Fixing trust issues usually involves healing past wounds and learning how to be confident in yourself and others. This process helps you address the root of your fears and form healthy connections in your relationships.

Related Guide: Complex Trauma

How Do I Fix My Abandonment Issues?

Abandonment issues are a specific form of trust issue where someone fears they will be left or rejected by a loved one. These issues also usually stem from childhood trauma, and they can make someone develop unhealthy attachment styles to feel secure in their relationships. 

The problem is, these unhealthy attachments can put a strain on someone’s relationship and cause the other person to need space or distance. This only reinforces the fear of being left, which creates a painful cycle where the same behaviors meant to keep people close end up pushing them away.

Similar to resolving trust issues, fixing abandonment issues typically involves healing past trauma and learning how to form secure relationships. 

Related Article: Fearful Avoidant Attachment Style

Therapy Techniques for Trust & Abandonment Issues

There are several forms of therapy that can help resolve trust and abandonment issues. Some of these therapy techniques help you challenge unhealthy thoughts and behaviors, while others are designed to heal the past wounds that are still harming you and your relationships.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

What we think, how we feel, and how we behave are all interconnected. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) uses this connection to help you understand your harmful patterns and start shifting them in healthier directions.

CBT works by identifying negative thought patterns and reframing them in more positive, realistic ways. As your thinking becomes healthier, you’ll naturally experience more positive emotions and have healthier behaviors.

This therapy helps you understand how negative thought patterns can make it difficult to trust others or feel secure in your relationships. It teaches you how to reframe these thoughts into more realistic and balanced perspectives, which helps you build confidence in yourself and in others. 

Related Guide: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

Relationship Therapy

Unlike couples counseling, relationship therapy can be done on an individual level, and you can pursue it whether you are currently in a relationship or not. It also applies to all types of relationships, whether romantic, platonic, or familial. This type of therapy helps you work through challenges in your relationships and teaches you how to be a more loving, supportive, and trusting partner or friend.

It can also help you understand how past relationships and experiences are shaping your current ones. Many habits and ways of expressing emotions are learned over time and can unintentionally affect those you care about. Relationship therapy is designed to correct these patterns so that you can resolve your relationship issues more effectively.

Trauma-Informed Counseling

Trauma-informed counseling provides a safe, supportive space to process your experiences and understand how they continue to impact your life. It also helps you respond differently to the trauma triggers that may cause you to pull away, overanalyze, or form unhealthy attachments in your relationships.

Trauma-informed care means the therapist has a deep understanding of what causes trauma, how it affects people, and the best ways to heal from it. Therapists must go through extensive training to become trauma-informed, and not every mental facility offers this level of care.

At Inner Balance, healing trauma is at the core of every service we provide. Every one of our therapists is trauma-informed to fully support you as you work through the ongoing effects of trauma.

Related Guide: Trauma-Informed Counseling

EMDR

EMDR stands for eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. It’s an effective trauma treatment that uses our brain’s natural processes to control how we respond to traumatic memories.   

Trauma isn’t always stored correctly in the brain, and this can lead to distressing thoughts and memories that affect someone long after the trauma occurred. EMDR helps reprocess these memories so they become less emotionally intense, which allows you to recall them without the same level of distress or fear.

EMDR can be especially helpful for resolving trust and abandonment issues. By lessening the emotional impact of past betrayals or losses, it’s easier to feel safe and confident in your current relationships.

Related Guide: EMDR

Feel Confident in Your Relationships

Feeling safe, secure, and supported are signs of a healthy relationship. If trust issues are keeping you from having a healthy relationship, it may be time to reach out for professional support.

At Inner Balance, we can help you resolve the root of your trust issues and learn how to create healthier connections with the people you care about. All of our services are trauma-informed to help you heal the past wounds that may still be affecting you and your relationships. 

‍Reach out today to connect with a mental health professional and learn how we can help you feel more confident in your relationships.