When you’re questioning the level of trust in your relationship, the foundation of your relationship needs to be rebuilt and re-established. We’ve created a structured tool and worksheet for rebuilding trust in your relationship, which is also a free download, that provides you with the building blocks to make that happen.
As you work through the questions, keep in mind that this worksheet may take a few date nights to work through. You may need to take breaks and come back to it when you’re emotionally ready.
Feel free to revisit it after completing it to remind yourself of the work you’ve done to build the strongest, most meaningful relationship you possibly can have (and deserve!). Rebuilding trust after one or more breaches of trust in a relationship can be difficult and painful.
However, it’s possible, and that’s what matters. This worksheet will give you the tools to work through the pain of past experiences and navigate your healing process as individuals and a couple.
The best way to use this printable template is to sit with your partner, maintain as much eye contact as you can, and discuss the questions. This blog will walk you through all of the questions on the worksheet that also act as trust-building exercises.
You can download the worksheet at the bottom of this page. Before you get started, it’s important to take a moment to ground yourselves in the present.
We also recommend setting ground rules since rebuilding trust can be so hard. For many people, rebuilding trust is essentially rebuilding a relationship.
This blog is all about rebuilding trust in a relationship worksheet.
Before Your Start the Worksheet
You can ground yourself by taking a few deep breaths. Inhale slowly then exhale slowly. Feel the ground beneath you, whether you’re sitting on a couch or standing on the floor. Notice any sensations in your body and take one final deep breath before you begin.
To establish ground rules, you can think about what issues may come up as you talk through the following questions. This is unique to each couple, depending on what has caused the trust issues to begin with. However, you can start with some general rules like:
- If one of us feels too emotional or triggered to continue, we need to communicate that and take a break.
- This worksheet will only work if we are both invested in making it work, so we need to be honest if we feel like we’re not motivated to rebuild trust in our relationship.
- If at any point, we realize that we’re only talking so that we can hurt the other person, we need to take a break and cool off.
- We need to be kind to ourselves and each other above all else.
As you dive into the questions below, remember that you and your partner can share a motivation to work through the issues in your relationship without fully trusting each other yet.
Be kind to yourselves throughout the process and respect anything that you feel you need in the moment. We recommend that you two switch off on asking your partner questions and answering questions so that you share responsibility for leading this conversation.
If you’re not sure who to start with, you can choose the person whose name comes first in the alphabet. They will ask the other person the first question and you two can alternate from there.
How to Use This Worksheet
This worksheet is divided into two main parts. The first part includes six key aspects of a relationship.
Each aspect features a few questions that help you 1) define the concept for yourself, 2) communicate to your partner how you want to be treated, and 3) challenge you to consider how you can show up for your partner.
While you should answer the questions thoughtfully, it’s okay to admit you don’t know how your partner wants to be treated in reference to one of the categories below. We encourage both of you to get curious.
Have fun learning about your partner in ways you may not have considered before. Keep in mind that this is a valuable tool that will bring up lots of emotions, but you’re also allowed (and encouraged!) to enjoy the process.
You can use this valuable resource as a chance to practice effective communication. Once you finish the first portion of this worksheet, you will conclude by coming up with some actionable steps.
These key takeaways will help you and your partner take the next steps toward building trust back into your relationship.
The “Checking In” portion of this worksheet is geared towards each of you as individuals. On the other hand, “Steps Forward” portion is geared towards both of you as a unit.
Treat the first part as a space for learning about yourself and your partner as people. Treat the second as the future you’re building together.
REBUILDING TRUST IN A RELATIONSHIP WORKSHEET:
Checking In
1. Healthy Relationship: What does a healthy relationship look like? Where did you learn what a healthy relationship looks like? How does your idea of a healthy relationship differ from your partner’s idea of a healthy relationship?
Each of us learns about relationships from the ones we see around us when we’re younger. Whether those are good examples of healthy relationships or not, that’s what we associate with the idea of “relationships.”
For those relationships in our lives that were not healthy, most of the time we felt that. When we observed unhealthy relationships as children and teens, we most likely developed some understanding of how painful those relationships were for the people in them.
However, that still informs our perspective on healthy vs. unhealthy relationships. That’s why we need to ask ourselves what a healthy relationship looks like for us, so we can acknowledge the “goal” we’re aiming for.
Hopefully, we have a positive definition that is truly healthy and beneficial. Since this comprehensive guide is all about rebuilding trust, you can also think of this question as a reminder.
Regardless of what happened in the past, you’re completing this worksheet to develop a deeper connection and work through past traumas. Focus on that goal (AKA “healthy relationship”) and remind yourself what a healthy relationship truly looks like.
2. Mutual Respect: How do you know when someone respects you? What do they do differently than people who don’t show respect? How do you show respect for others?
Respect is earned. No one can force you to respect someone else. It’s also hard to force yourself to respect someone. So, when thinking about rebuilding the trust in your relationship, remember that you can’t force your partner to respect you anymore.
You also can’t force yourself to respect them. Come at it from a place of earning respect. Be open to rebuilding it and start with the questions listed above. It’s daunting and, honestly, terrifying to consider the idea that your partner may not respect you anymore.
But, they’re willing to rebuild that and that’s one of the most important ingredients. Get curious with these questions and dive into the idea of respect deep enough that you can rebuild your emotional connection with your partner.
3. Emotional Intimacy: What does emotional intimacy look like to you? How can your partner work on emotional intimacy with you? How can you initiate emotional intimacy with your partner?
Emotional intimacy is a concept that is woven throughout most of a relationship. So, it naturally overlaps with other answers you’ve given. This is the time for you to become conscious about when you feel closest to your partner emotionally.
Since you’re rebuilding trust in your relationship, this will be a tough one to answer. If there is infidelity, betrayal, lying, or some other breach of trust that violates someone’s vulnerability, it will be hard to think about emotional intimacy.
Vulnerability is difficult on the best of days, so go slow with these questions. Remember that you can focus inward on your own struggle with emotional intimacy before turning that outward.
When we acknowledge how our personal experiences and childhood affect the way we relate to our current partners as adults in romantic relationships, we find room for compassion. Think of emotional intimacy in the context of your struggles and listen to your partner’s struggles.
4. Open Communication: What does open communication look like to you? How comfortable are you with open communication? How can your partner make you feel more comfortable in speaking openly?
Communication is difficult. It may seem straightforward because you either communicate openly or you don’t. But, it can be much more complicated than that. Some of us try to overcompensate and talk about every tiny issue.
In that case, we’re afraid of the relationship issues that come up when we don’t talk. In those cases, we may be operating on a different wavelength than our partner, which causes a rift.
Maybe we want to avoid conflict, so we accept whatever our partners tell us no matter how much we disagree. In that scenario, one partner practices open communication and may be under the impression that it’s happening on both sides of the relationship.
If you take nothing else from this blog, remember that what you think you know about your partner and the way they think is rarely ever the way it actually is. The best way to know for sure is to ask without repercussions.
It’s okay to get uncomfortable with questions like the ones we’re asking. It’s scary, but it’s also important. That’s why the questions listed above will provide you with a powerful tool and communication exercise for rebuilding trust in your relationship.
5. Family Members: What role do your parents and siblings play in your relationship? How can your partner better demonstrate that they prioritize you in their life? How do you show your partner that you prioritize them?
Your family of origin (AKA the family that you grew up with) should play a role in your life, so long as you want them to. You deserve to have people you trust to talk to outside of your romantic relationship.
However, you also need to make sure you are nourishing your romantic relationship and prioritizing your partner. They need to feel like you value them in your life. How that looks is up to the two of you to discuss.
The key, here, is that you develop a sense of trust around being in each other’s lives. It’s hard to trust someone when you feel like they don’t value you the same way you value them, which has a lot to do with the way that value is shown.
In other words, you and your partner need to act in ways that show how much you value each other in your relationship. Think of the questions above as a great way to initiate that, whether you’re setting healthy boundaries or maintaining them, and figure it out once and for all.
Remember, since we’re about rebuilding trust right now, we want to focus on re-establishing the foundation of the relationship. Get curious about each other and stay focused on the present and future of your relationship.
6. Quality Time: What does quality time look like for you? How do you most enjoy spending time with your partner? How do initiate quality time with your partner?
Quality time is easily one of the most common concepts that we assume everyone defines the same way as us. We define quality time differently based on multiple factors.
For instance, we may define it differently because of how we were raised, how we were socialized based on our identities, and what we’ve missed out on in previous relationships.
It’s easy to feel like your partner doesn’t value you because they’re not spending quality time with you. This outlook gets more complicated when you realize they may define quality time differently. So, they may be spending quality time with you according to their definition.
The only way to truly understand their perspective is to ask these questions. By asking the most basic questions and defining some of the most basic concepts in a relationship, you can re-establish trust within your relationship.
Instead of assuming they don’t care or they’re neglecting you, you can learn to be lenient with them because you trust that they do care.
Steps Forward
1. Healthy Relationship: What’s one way you can collectively check in on your relationship to make sure it’s healthy?
Check-in on your relationship by asking if it’s healthy. This is an act of love because it shows that you’re dedicated to your relationship. Once you’re in a relationship that strives to be as healthy as possible, you can ask questions, be afraid, and still ask the questions anyway.
Re-building trust means starting from the ground up and recognizing that you can feel uncomfortable and still be in a safe relationship.
2. Mutual Respect: How can we show each other mutual respect?
When you walk away from this free download, you walk away with the precise steps you need to take to maintain your relationship. Mutual respect can often feel intangible and hard to describe. It may seem impossible for most people to understand let alone act upon.
Most of the time, we struggle to define it until we think of the ways we see it around us. It may seem like a silly question to answer, but that’s the point. It’s so simple and basic that you may think it doesn’t need to be voiced. Voice it anyway as a part of these trust exercises.
3. Emotional Intimacy: What’s one way we can both show each other emotional intimacy?
Emotional intimacy and physical intimacy differ in one key way: you’re getting emotionally vulnerable rather than physically vulnerable.
Maybe that’s not the perfect metaphor to describe the difference between them, but it does get the point across. Emotional intimacy is just as scary as physical intimacy and we need to treat it like it is. Be intentional with this question and answer it meaningfully.
4. Open Communication: What’s one area of our relationship where we can improve on our open communication?
This is one of our favorite questions on this worksheet. We always strive to make terrifying, overwhelming concepts seem more manageable, which is why we love this question. When we encourage you to start with one area, we mean it.
Avoid giving into the desire to “fix” your entire relationship at once. Start with this first step and move from there.
Revisit this worksheet after you and your partner have worked on these steps for a while and update it if that is helpful to you. Only then should you move on to open communication in other areas of your relationship.
5. Family Members: What’s one way both of you can involve your families in your lives while prioritizing each other?
You both deserve to have your families play a big role in your lives, whether your family is found family or blood-related. However, you both deserve to also have a partner who prioritizes you. This can be different depending on culture, so be sensitive about that and stay curious.
Consider the personal boundaries that you need to put in place with your family. You may also want to set some boundaries with your partner.
It can be difficult to balance your family of origin with your partner, but it can also be incredibly rewarding when you and your partner work together to identify a solution that works for you.
6. Quality Time: How can you spend time together so that both of you feel like it’s quality time?
Establish a baseline for quality time. You may come up with the ultimate date that meets both of your requirements or you may come up with the two different dates that you can commit to.
The key is caring about your relationship enough to want to plan out a time when both of you feel valued and loved by the other person.
Download the Worksheet Here
Sign up for our newsletter and you will automatically be redirected to the page where you can download our worksheet. If you’re interested in learning more about your relationship, click here for our other relationship download.
One Final Note
The worksheet we’ve created for you is designed to help you build trust back into your relationship. However, it is not a substitute for couples therapy.
Couples counseling is worth considering, especially as you open up conversations that have never been discussed in your relationship before. At Knockoff Therapy, we always recommend that you use expert support in the form of mental health professionals when possible.
The core principle behind Knockoff Therapy is that we understand how inaccessible therapy sessions can be. So, we create free downloads, like the one on this page. But, we never want to offer you meaningful resources without making it clear that you don’t have to do this alone.
