The responsibility for rebuilding the trust in a relationship or marriage after it's been broken lies primarily with the person that broke the trust in the first place.
If you have cheated on your partner, or otherwise betrayed her either by turning her world upside down or constantly acting in a way that causes mistrust, it's your job to take ownership of that situation and do the work necessary to repair the trust if you want to heal your relationship.
The person whose trust has been broken plays a role in this process as well which I will describe in detail in a moment. But you should know that if your trust in your partner has been shaken you aren't going to be able to fix that problem on your own. You can't make your partner do things so you can trust him again. He needs to take the initiative in this process if you are truly going to heal from the wounds that have been created.
Ultimately there are 3 steps the person who broke trust needs to take if you are going to heal your relationship and rebuild what has been destroyed. Let's go through this process step by step to make saving your marriage or relationship from this devastation as clear as it can possibly be.
Step #1: Change Your Behavior
You have to change the behavior that caused the problem in the first place. If you have been having an affair you have to end it and take steps that will keep you from even getting close to the possibility of having another affair. In short, you need to change your behavior such that your spouse has the capacity to trust you again.
But not only do you need to change the behavior itself, you need to understand enough about how it became a problem and be able to explain that to your spouse. This gives you a better chance to change your behavior so it won't happen again. That is the only way you are going to create a situation where your spouse might begin to trust you again.
If you aren't clear about what I mean here, take the situation away from yourself and think of it this way: Imagine your mother, sister, or another close female friend or relative came up to you and told you her husband broke trust the same way you have. Suppose your sister's husband cheated on her, for example.
What would her husband have to do to rebuild the trust that was broken? What would he have to understand to reassure her it won't happen again? This should give you a hint about the work you need to do to rebuild your relationship and what you need to understand to make sure you never break trust again. Each situation is different, so there aren't any hard and fast answers here.
But what I can say is this ...
If you don't change your behavior and try to understand how it began at the very first step and why what you did was such a problem for your spouse you probably won't rebuild what you destroyed.
So it is critical that you take this step and do everything you can to change your behavior permanently.
Once you have done that you have a chance at rebuilding the trust. You increase your chances considerably by completing the rest of this process. So let's move on to step 2.
Step #2: Give a Complete and Full Apology
After you have changed your behavior, the next thing you must do is give a complete and full apology. You should know, my version of a complete and full apology is more detailed than simply saying, 'Yes, it was wrong. I'm sorry.' If you say something like that, it's almost like saying nothing at all.
A COMPLETE and FULL apology means you have to do three things. They are:
1.Come to a complete understanding of how wrong you were and take total ownership for that mistake.
This means you have to take some time and try to step into your partner's shoes for a few moments. You have to feel the pain you have caused by seeing the problem from her perspective.
Usually this means talking with your partner and taking the time to truly listen to what she is saying to you. Once you completely understand how much pain you have caused you have to 'take the hit' for the mistake you've made. That means not rationalizing it, not defending it, and not trying to blame it on your partner in any way. You must completely accept what you have done and take ownership for the damage you have caused.
2. Take care of your partner's feelings surrounding this issue.
Not only do you have to understand what you have done and take ownership for the transgression, you have to show some effort to be sensitive to your partner about her feelings in this area and take care of those feelings as much as you can.
That means not being defensive or cutting your partner off emotionally. It means showing some compassion and sensitivity about the pain she is in. And it means clearly changing your behavior so she can see you truly care about what you have done and how much you have hurt her.
3. Finally, in addition to apologizing for all the pain you have caused and taking ownership of the mistake, you have to make a verbal reassurance about your commitment to the internal change you made in step 1 of this process.
Of course, this verbal commitment has to be backed up by a real change in behavior otherwise what you are saying is just a bunch of empty words.
Keeping these three elements of a full and complete apology in mind let's look at how a sample apology might sound. The apology that follows is what Jack gave Eliza in the way of an apology after he admitted having an affair.
‘Eliza, I can see that I have hurt you. I was the one person you totally trusted above all else. Your world depended on my fidelity and consistency. I tore your world apart when I had that affair, and caused you to suffer with feelings of betrayal, anger, outrage, and despair.
Now I know how wrong I was, and I will do the work necessary to repair what I have destroyed. I know it may take a long time, and I am willing to keep working for it, but I hope one day we can rebuild our marriage together. I love you, and I want this marriage to last. I am truly sorry for what I have done.'
Once you have made this kind of apology and reinforced it by making the necessary changes in your behavior it's time to move on to the final step in the system.
Step #3: Let Your Partner Play Detective
The final step in my system for rebuilding trust revolves around giving the person whose trust was betrayed the tools she needs to begin trusting again.
For this step to work completely BOTH partners need to be fully engaged in it. Here's how it works.
The spouse whose trust was betrayed gets to check on her partner to make sure he isn't betraying her trust again by becoming a detective.
Like any detective she has the right and the responsibility to fully investigate any instances where she has the slightest suspicion that something is amiss.
If your trust has been betrayed by your partner, it's natural for you to be suspicious and worry that he might make the same mistake again. After all, he betrayed your trust once. What's to stop him from doing it again?
Thoughts and feelings like this are absolutely natural and you shouldn't condemn yourself for thinking and feeling this way. When you think about it, worrying your partner may betray you again is perfectly logical. Considering what you have been it makes complete sense.
I have seen a lot of patients who simply try and bury these thoughts and feelings, and you may be tempted to do the same thing. You may think that you're suspicions are irrational or that you will never be able to rebuild the trust if you keep worrying about whether or not your spouse is telling you the truth.
As a result you may try and simply push your suspicious thoughts and feelings out of your mind, but this will not work. No matter how much you try and repress your suspicious feelings, they will rise to the surface and torment you unless you deal with them properly.
Instead you should actually accept your suspicious feelings and use them to prove to yourself that your spouse is indeed being truthful.
If you are worried he is hiding his phones and doesn’t want you to see and read through his inbox and check his/her phone contact, ask him/her to give it to you.
This is what I mean by becoming a detective. You should use your suspicions to investigate your partner and make sure he is telling you the truth.
Investigating this way is the only way you are ever going to be sure your spouse isn't lying to you anymore. It's the only way you will be able to truly overcome the suspicious feelings you have been suffering with.
The reason is that it allows you to prove to yourself that your spouse has actually changed his behavior. Getting tangible evidence that your suspicions are false will, in time, help them diminish and eventually die away.
So now I want to turn my attention back to the person who violated the trust. If you have betrayed your partner and she can no longer trust you, not only do you have to change your behavior, you have to prove to her that you've changed.
I hope that with these few points you will be able to rebuild the trust that you once had for each other.
Drop a comment or a question below and you will get the answer without any delay.
