When your Dad’s Affair Makes You a No Person

Photo by Kai Pilger on Unsplash

And how to say yes without freaking out

Around the holidays, lots of people talk about the need to set boundaries, say no to things, prioritize self care. But what if you have the opposite issue? What if your knee-jerk reaction is to say no when what you really want is to feel comfortable taking the risk of saying yes?

In my experience, this is actually quite common for adult children who discovered a parent because these adults often struggle with trusting in relationships. So they are really good at setting up hoops for people to jump through in order to earn their trust.

This post is part 5 of my series on How to Rebuild Trust after a Parent’s Affair, based on Brené Brown's Elements of TRUST. Here are part 1, part 2, part 3, and part 4, and explores the concept of generosity in building trust in relationships.

The basics of generosity as an element of trust in relationship means extending the most generous version of the story possible to the other person. You know, giving them the benefit of the doubt.

A small disclaimer here. Often adult children of infidelity also fall into a more broad childhood trauma category, which may mean that they are too generous with the benefit of the doubt and should be more critical. Will write more about this in another post.

But equally common is the impulse to keep people at arm’s length if they do even one small thing wrong. For example, when you are making a new friend, you are vigilant about looking out for breaches of trust. Like, do they show up on time, do they do what they say they are going to do. Do they respond to texts or calls.

Now these are all good hoops in and of themselves. What gets tricky for adult children with cheating parents is that sometimes we are looking for people to fail, and when they do, we assume they are like our parents and can’t be trusted.

But in reality, they may just have another way to roll. Trust looks different to different people.  

Part of healing from a parent affair means challenging yourself to resist your knee-jerk long enough to thoughtfully examine if the other person is actually acting in a mistrustful way, or you are still scared, or scarred, from your cheating parent.

So, before you write that new friend off, hit the pause button and consider:

Do you have a good gut feeling about the person?

Take a quiet moment to ask yourself how you feel about the person. What originally made you think the person would make a good friend? When you think about being friends with them, how does your body feel? Do you get tense and nauseous, or do you relax? Often a feeling a spaciousness in your body, even if your mind feels fear, is an indication that there is something in the other person that makes you feel safe.

Can you watch and wait?

We live in a culture where it can feel like everything has to happen at lightning speed all the time, including relationships. Can you slow down, watch and wait? See how you feel without the pressure to make decisions about spending time together? See how they act around other people? Often everything becomes clear with time.

Consider a different culture, context, or family history

If there is anything I have learned from living abroad is that the concept of being ‘on time’ is as culturally dependent as it is about the clock on your iPhone. When we attended school meetings in Costa Rica, predictably, the Europeans would arrive 10 minutes early, those from the US on time, the Costa Ricans 10 minutes late. It’s not that the Costa Ricans thought that the meeting was less important than the Europeans, it was that the cultural understanding of time is different.

Now, you may decide that your cultural feeling about the importance of being on time is so important to you that you cannot befriend anyone who is late. But realize that is about you and not the trustworthiness of the other person.

Time is merely one example. People arrive at relationships with all sorts of habits and ideas that dictate what it means to be a friend. Consider exploring these before you pass judgment on their trustworthiness.

For Example

Let me give you an example from my own life, because I am a No Person in recovery so I still struggle with it sometimes.

So, I have a new friend. Yay me. Things were rolling along pretty well and then twice, she canceled a meet up last minute. So, all my hairs went up, right? I can't trust her, she doesn’t do what she says she will, she overextends herself too much…all the things. 

I almost said something to her. Voiced my concern. But then we got together and had such a beautiful conversation that I did not. 

The next time we were set to meet, it was me who was late. Like, really late. I left the house late, I couldn’t find parking, all the things. I texted her and she was like, all good. When I finally got there, she was all, don’t stress, let’s enjoy our time.

I had a moment of, maybe this is what reciprocity in friendship feels like. Sometimes I get so caught up in making sure that my boundaries are strong and I don’t get hurt, I forget that not everyone rolls the same way. Maybe it's not about being untrustworthy.

May we all learn how too be a Yes/No People this holiday season. :)

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