Debi Silber - Trust Again: Overcoming Betrayal and Regaining Health, Confidence, and Happiness

Published by Rowman & Littlefield
An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
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6 Tinworth Street, London SE11 5AL, United Kingdom

Copyright 2020 by Debi Silber

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Silber, Debi, author.

Title: Trust again : overcoming betrayal and regaining health, confidence, and happiness / Debi Silber.

Description: Lanham : Rowman & Littlefield, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: At a time when we need support the most yet were the least likely to seek it, this book will provide comfort, support and community for those struggling to heal from a painful experience with betrayal. Readers will learn about, and move through the proven five stages from betrayal to breakthrough which were one of the three discoveries made during Dr. Debis study, and will be lovingly guided with tools and strategies along the way. Theyll also learn how predictable healing can be as they read not only Debis journey through betrayal, but the stories of The Fab 14; the brave study participants who shared their experiences so that these discoveries could be used to help others ready to healProvided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020007292 (print) | LCCN 2020007293 (ebook) | ISBN 9781538140635 (cloth ; alk. paper) | ISBN 9781538140642 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Trust. | BetrayalPsychological aspects.

Classification: LCC BF575.T7 S55 2020 (print) | LCC BF575.T7 (ebook) | DDC 158.2dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020007292

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020007293

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

To you. Yes you, the reader. This book was written for you so that you can have the tools, support, and strategies you need to heal right at your fingertips. I know how much betrayal hurts, and I also know whats waiting for you when you move through the Five Stages of Betrayal. You deserve a life thats filled with love, laughter, meaning, and fulfillment. Although that may seem like a far fetch from where you may be right now, my wish is that you use this experience as an opportunity to become the highest and best version of youone that you never imagined existed yet one thats patiently waiting to be revealed.

I ve known Wm Paul Young for a few years and have enjoyed many deep and meaningful conversations about life, love, betrayal, remorse, regret, growth, trust, grief, forgiveness, God, and spirituality. During our last conversation, we spoke in depth about trustthe precious nature of this sacred and earned gift, the devastation created when its been shattered through betrayal, as well as the unique opportunity it provides for growth and transformation. Im so grateful for his insight and perspective, and its an honor to share his beautiful words with you.

To take the risk to love is to expose yourself to possible betrayal. To choose to trust will also create the space for potential betrayal. When one is allowed the honor of entering the story of another human being, often it will be framed around the themes of love, trust, loss, and betrayal. These light and dark threads are woven into the fabric of our shared human condition and illuminate the angel and the beast who coexist in the human heart and experience.

I would love to write that I have never betrayed anyone. I have. And while there are moments that the regret for destructive choices, regardless of motivation, seems almost consuming, I have learned to live with regret as part of grieving and not part of shames whisper of accusation. But that took years of work, therapy, community, truth telling, exposure, and grace.

It would also be wonderful to tell you that I have never been betrayed, that I dont understand the cataclysmic dismantling of experiencing trust violated and destroyed. I have been. The closer the proximity of betrayals bomb, the deeper and wider the devastation. To be betrayed by someone to whom you have given your deepest trust and around whose love you have built your sense of belonging, is to experience a death and the shattering of the heart. It is a death in which it seems impossible there ever could be resurrection.

Perhaps it is the circles I wander, but I know almost no one, except for some children, who has not been betrayed. That is incredibly sad and sobering. Even the God whom I have come to know and love has experienced betrayal at the hands of human beings. I see Jesus as the ultimate expression and incarnation of complete Love and the crucifixion and cross as our corporate response of betrayal.

Is it possible that betrayal can be justified? Can infidelity and disloyalty ever be redemptive? Can such a loss be reconciled?

The prophet Jeremiah, in the Hebrew Scriptures, announces in no uncertain terms that God has divorced Israel. Why? Betrayal. Specifically, adultery: relational betrayal. The answer to the first question is no. Betrayal is never justifiable! There is never justification for adultery, for infidelity, for lying and gossip, and for all the other forms of betrayal.

The second and third questions, can these losses ever be redemptive and reconciled? If they could not be, there would be no hope for any of us. At the beginning of 1994, my wife caught me in a three-month affair with one of her best friends. I blew up our world. Absolutely not a shred of that could possibly justify such a betrayal. That began an 11-year dismantling journey of redemption and reconciliation. It was a journey through hell, one that I would never, ever want to experience again but for which I am grateful every second of every day. As someone once said, Religious people believe in hell, but spiritual people have been there. What was shattered in a moment took years to rebuild: trust. And it required staying present, not running. It meant being exposed, and, as painful as that is, it is essentially necessary. The unexposed is the unhealed. One has to face the wind of fury and consequence and do the arduous, incremental hard work of taking down all faades and masks and in the rubble finding the good, the true, the right, the beautiful, and the worthy. It is inviting others into the spaces where no one has been allowed to enter and offering again the gift of trust. This is no simple task. My friend Debi has experienced this, has studied this, has done this, and has created a road map so you can do it too.

I have a dear friend who played semiprofessional rugby for 25 years. There is a phrase in rugby: First to the breakdown. It has layers of meaning. I will be there when things start to fall apart. I have your back. I am all in. In the journey of knowing God, the divine, love, you must often travel through the wilderness of atheism, where you begin to no longer believe in who you thought God was in order to open your heart to something truer. So too, the journey toward wholeness of the soul will go through the wilderness of breakdown, where the true has an opportunity to usurp the power of the false. With the resurrection of the true will also arise your capacity to trust again. To that end, I offer you (with permission) this poem, written by my poet friend David Tensen.