How to Get Your Parents' Trust Back

Communicating with Each Other

Apologize for violating their trust. A sincere apology can go a long way to making your parents trust you again. The best apology acknowledges your wrongdoing, restates what happened clearly, acknowledges the nature of the hurt or harm done, asks for forgiveness, and proposes a means of avoiding the error in the future. Try not to expect anything in return. Though it would be nice if the apology immediately fixed everything, that is unlikely to happen. It’s possible that your parents may not know the best way to respond to your apology. The words you use are less important than speaking genuinely. Another part of apologizing is forgiving yourself.

Ask your parents what you can do to regain their trust. The most obvious way to figure out how to get your parents’ trust back is simply to ask them what you can do. They may not have an answer ready, but tell them that they can think about it and let you know at a later time. Be honest in your response to their request. If they seem to have an unreasonably long list of things for you to do, tell them (without whining) that you think you would have trouble being successful at meeting their expectations. Offer a compromise instead.

Trust your parents. Trust builds trust, and trusting them will help encourage them to trust you. In fact, you may find that you do not feel like you trust them right now; it is normal to feel that way. Trust is a two-way relationship, not a one-way feeling, so you will need to work on trust on your end as well.

Listen to your parents. To really have meaningful communication, you need to both talk and listen. Try to put yourself in your parents’ shoes and really understand what they are saying as they talk to you. If they say something that confuses or offends you, ask them about it. Once the lines of communication are open, you and your parents can start rebuilding your trust relationship.

Altering Your Actions

Spend time with your family. Spending more time with your family benefits your trust relationship in several ways. First, your parents won’t be suspicious about how you’re spending your time if it is with them. Second, spending time with people helps you understand and communicate with them better, which can help your relationship. Third, your parents will be reminded of your great qualities, like your sense of humor, instead of focusing only on the trust violation.

Demonstrate responsible actions. Do your chores. Pick your brother up from school on time. Offer to help with the dishes after dinner. Showing responsibility for everyday things can help your parents think of you as a responsible person. This alone may not be enough to rebuild trust, but combined with other things like open communication, these small steps can help.

Show that you care. Demonstrating to your parents that you care about them, yourself, and your relationship is an important element of your two-way trust relationship. Showing that you care may take on many different forms, but doing and saying things that you know will make the other person feel good is a place to start.

Perform reparations. If you have hurt anyone aside from your parents as part of the trust violation, apologize and try to make it right. If you asked your parents what you could do to regain their trust, do what they said to do, even if it seems silly. Even if it seems like, for example, washing your dad’s car may have nothing to do with regaining his trust, you are showing that you are willing to do what it takes.

Demonstrate your readiness to change. Showing that you are willing to change in a small way—such as making your bed every day like your mom always asks—can prove that you are willing to change in a big way, which may be necessary for trust-building.

Avoiding Occasions for Distrust

Control your emotions. Often the situations and experiences that disrupt a trust relationship are motivated by rash or emotional decisions. Trying to act rationally and control your feelings may help you become more trustworthy. If you do not feel like you can control your emotions on your own, consider meeting with a therapist to discuss strategies for coping.

Understand your parents’ expectations. If you know what your parents don’t want you to do, it is easier to avoid doing it. If you are unsure about their exact rules or expectations, ask them. If your violation of trust is recent, you should be extra vigilant about any activities that may be considered off-limits. Don’t go on apologizing and doing chores as soon as you break their trust as they may think that you are just trying to suck up and look good again. Instead wait a little while. Trust takes a lot of time to recover after you broke it.

Follow the house rules. You live with your parents for a limited amount of time. They likely have rules or expectations about what should and should not be done while you are living under their roof. Stick to those rules, even if they seem unreasonable to you. Remember that you will eventually have your own home and you can live the way that you want to live later. Even if it seems like an eternity before you move out of your parents’ house, the time will pass and you will be able to move on eventually.

Avoid the cause of the breach of trust. If there was a specific person, habit, activity, or event that broke you and your parents’ trust relationship, avoid it at all costs. If you feel that you need help avoiding it, ask for help. In the case of something like substance abuse, you may need professional help to fight an addiction. If there is a particular friend who leads you to make bad decisions, it may be time to move on or take a break from that friendship.

Overcoming Specific Trust Violations

Regain trust after lying. If you violated your parents’ trust by lying to them, particularly if you have had a history of lying, then you need to make a practice of being completely honest all of the time. Demonstrating a commitment to complete honesty will enable you to rebuild trust. Unfortunately, this may take a long time.

Come back from breaking specific rules. If the nature of your trust violation involved breaking a specific rule that your parents have set, such as no underage drinking or being home by a certain time, communicate with your parents about the house rules. It’s important that you understand what the rules are, why the rules are in place, and how to follow them. An open dialogue with your parents about these can help you make better decisions in the future.

Alleviate hurt feelings. If you have hurt someone, you should make reparations. If you have hurt your parents by doing something that disappoints them or makes them sad, then try to understand their emotions. Putting yourself in their shoes and thinking about how you would want someone to apologize to you can help you know what will heal the wounds.

Recover from damage to property. If your transgression involved damage to property—for example, if you wrecked a car or vandalized public property—you need to do what you can to repair the damage. This may mean doing what you can yourself—painting over spray-painted graffiti, hammering out a dented car panel, or cleaning toilet paper out of trees. However, it may also mean offering to pay for the cost of repairs, as with a car accident.

Accept financial responsibility. If you have done something that has cost someone else money, you should offer to compensate the injured party financially. Even if this means giving up your entire paycheck for several weeks, accepting financial responsibility can go a long way towards showing that you understand the consequences of your actions.