To Trust And Trust Not

What is trust?  Why do people trust?  Is trust a commodity to be bought and sold?  Or, perhaps, trust is a liability.  Where do I begin to answer my questions and try to figure out why one five letter word stifles me faster than any other, save love alone.

Random House begins their definition as such; “Reliance on the integrity, ability, etc. of a person or thing.”  But, doesn’t reliance mean trust?  OY!  The English language is confusing.  Maybe the part I have trouble with in this definition is “of a person…”  Roget didn’t even attempt to tackle the word trust.  They went from ‘truss’ straight to ‘trustee’.  Smart people they have working for them.

Trust is so overrated.  People use the word without really understanding it, like ‘love’.  They say “just trust me” or “you have to trust me”.  Why?  Every time I have put blind trust into another person, I alone have been hurt.  One should be able to trust the folks who gave them life.  Mine abused me physically and emotionally; and they allowed another parental figure to physically, emotionally and sexually abuse me.  Why trust?

I trusted my grandparents who had me most of my childhood.  They protected me until they wanted to make it permanent.  When they were denied this by my mother, they too gave me away.  They gave me back to the very person who wanted nothing more than to hurt me.  Why trust?

I trusted a man.  I gave him my heart and two years.  However, after a year and a half engagement, he decided to marry someone he knew for only two weeks, pretty much leaving me at the alter by sending me a letter one week and three days prior to our wedding.  Why trust?

I have trusted doctors who wrongly diagnose me and put me on medication that I do not need and which causes other more severe problems.  Doctors think they have all the answers and look at me as a troublemaker of sorts because I know more about me than they do.  Just be cause you have a degree is not a reason for me to trust you.

I used to trust myself.  But now Meniere’s is in play.  I never know if I am going to have a bout of vertigo or perhaps a drop attack.  I stagger along my way running into walls and furniture.  I can’t trust me or my body to do what I want them to do.   How can I trust me when I am laying sprawled out on the floor in pain from an illness that I cannot control nor vanquish.

Long ago, I would trust those who were, or at least seemed, different from my parents.  Until they proved I couldn’t trust them.  Now I trust no one.  I try to, but it just never comes.  I am finding more and more that there is a lot to be said for cynicism.  Maybe there is a future in it.  Or perhaps just a nice side venture till I can at least trust me once again.

So, why trust?  I still have not found any truly viable reason to trust flesh and bones.  When I have to rely on others, I suffer and always feel that it is not from goodness that they help me, it is for good old fashioned currency or some other form of repayment.

WHY TRUST?