Marriage and trust are two sides of the same coin. It is often said that marriage is the biggest decision of a person’s life, a lifelong commitment. Therefore, a lot of factors come into play in order to sustain a marriage. Communication, love, trust, understanding, all of these components play a major role in making a marriage happy.
However, out of all of these, trust becomes an element of utmost importance. Without trust in a relationship, be it marriage be it anything else, things will not last. Marriage and trust go hand in hand. Once, one thing gets broken, the other will anyway get scattered.
Why is Trust Important in a Marriage?
Marriage is not a cakewalk. Believe it or no, often a marriage requires a little bit of compromising on both ends. If you want to be in a happy marriage, you have to learn to trust your spouse.
This would serve a lot of purposes. For instance, firstly you would feel safe and secure in your relationship. Secondly, it will help you to have faith in your commitment better. Thirdly, it will allow you to confide in your partner much more with all your thoughts, worries, and troubles.
In fact, according to the studies of an entire branch of relationship psychology, called ‘attachment theory’, trust comes out to be the primary experience in any relationship.
A marriage is considered to be the eldest father of all relationships. This is so because it begins only with a talk of lifetime togetherness, it requires a lot of effort on both ends. It is like a long loose string. Even if one side leaves the string, the string falls. Henceforth, everything gets over.
What Happens When You Lose Trust in a Marriage?
Once, this danger called a breach of trust hits a marriage/relationship, it can spoil everything. When spouses lose trust in each other, they tend to go to any extent to prove that they are right. They do not see the mistake in their suspicious behavior but instead go all in proving that their partner is wrong.
Lack of trust or breach of trust can also have its origin in inherent suppressed feelings that have risen out of childhood trauma or childhood family problems. Trust in a marriage can either go if your partner does something on those lines, for instance, cheat on you. Or, it can happen if you have a constant tendency to doubt your partner and not trust them.
When do you start Losing Trust in a Marriage?
Just like there is a saturation point of chemicals in a laboratory, there comes a saturation point in a relationship too. When two partners/spouses reach this point, they become devoid of any efforts, full of frustration.
Let us look at a few ways in which a lack of trust can occur in a marriage.
1. Selfishness
If one of the partners or both partners are only concerned about themselves, there is a high chance that the initial faith will be lost. To make your partner feel loved and secure, you have to show them that just like yourself, you are all in for them as well.
When you fail to portray that, your marriage steps towards the ending drain one bit.
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2.Negativity
If you never appreciate your spouse, never look at their positive side, and always judge them over something or the other, they lose faith in you. They get more and more distant from you. Therefore, it is either negativity in a relationship or trust. One cannot have both!
3.Extreme Possessiveness
When your partner becomes over possessive about you, doubts you in every sphere of life, and does not trust you even after repeated confirmations, you start doubting them. You start doubting your choice of marrying them in the very first place.
This leads to further toxicity between you two and might even result at the end of a marriage.
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How to Rebuild Trust in a Relationship?
Although, it is often said that once trust is lost in a relationship, there are no mending ways. But, this is not the whole truth. If there is love in a marriage, then trust can be rebuilt with a two-way effort process. With warmth, care, and compassion, a marriage can once again turn into a happy relationship. According to a study conducted by Northwestern University and Redeemer Univerity College, Ontario, people who trust sooner or have a necessarily trusting personality enjoy happier relationships.
Let us look at a few ways in which two partners can rebuild broken trust in a marriage.
1.Listen to the Reason
While listening to a reason for your partner’s lie will no way make the betrayal less hurtful. However, it will give you a mind space to reason well and understand what let them do so. You will at least get a concrete closure after you re-analyze the whole situation.
For once, you can put on your partner’s shoes, and look deep into the exact reason for them to do something that they did.
2.Forgive
This is the most important key to mend a broken marriage. Forgiveness can do wonders in healing your relationship. Forgiving your partner once may make your marriage better for good. Everybody deserves a second chance, regardless of their mistake. Therefore, you should give your partner a second chance too.
Many times, self-forgiveness is also necessary. Doubting yourself for all the mishaps that happened in the past will only throw you into a cycle of self-doubt. Henceforth, a fresh start calls for the complete forgiveness of everyone.
3.Give Time to Each other
It may take time for the both of you to forget your past and move on. However, spending a lot of time with each other can bring a positive change. Talk about what happened, why it happened, and how it can be repaired.
Spend time doing things that can help both of you move on from the past misery and communicate with each other how you want to start things again in a good way.
4.Do not live in the Past
While it is important to talk about why things occurred, dwelling in the past can never be a viable option. Keep your past in the past. Try to focus more and more on the present and future.
When you discuss things with each other, be present. Communicate about what you can do now to make things better between you two. Do not waste time talking about what could have been done so that things would not have resulted like this. Instead of making things better, it will spoil things more.
The same above-mentioned study also indicated that a strong amount of trust in a relationship reduces the chance of dwelling in past problems. “You can remember your partner as better or as worse than he/she really was, and those biased memories are important determinants of how you think about your partner and your relationship,” explained the study’s lead author Laura B. Luchies.
Conclusion
A marriage can be equated to working and moving bikes. It requires two wheels to move on a road. If even one of them stops working, the bike will stop moving. A similar theory lies for marriage too. Just when one partner stops putting in efforts, the marriage will stop working out.
Two people who love each other immensely, decide to marry each other. Things stop working out between the two, they give up. This is not how things should work. People who commit to each other for life should stick to each other till a point when everything truly seems unrepairable.
Once the sand moves completely out of your hands, leave it. But, till it’s in your hand, try to hold it tight!
For more articles, Click here: 10 secrets to making your partner feel loved
Sources 1.https://www.huffpost.com/entry/love-and-relationships_b_5227929 2.https://www.healthline.com/health/how-to-rebuild-trust#if-youve-hurt-someone 3.https://blog.poweroftwomarriage.com/2013/10/trust-in-relationships/
