The disorientation you feel after bringing something up in a relationship that you end up apologizing for has a name.
You feel like you just experienced an emotional drive-by, but somehow the problem has become you.
That is gaslighting in a nutshell.
What is Gaslighting?
Gaslighting is when someone causes you to question your own perception, memory, or judgment. They make you doubt what you clearly saw, felt, or experienced.
Even when gaslighting is not deliberate, it always benefits the person doing it.
Gaslighting Patterns
Here are some common gaslighting patterns that will help you recognize what you’re experiencing:-
- Being told something that happened never happened.
- Being told you’re too sensitive when you’re just trying to have a basic conversation.
- When your feelings and concerns are minimized by being told you always make everything serious. By the way, this also deflects from the actual situation.
- Rewriting the history of an argument until you can’t remember who said what.
Gaslighting slowly disconnects you from your own reality and instincts. When it happens enough, you stop trusting yourself in that relationship and beyond.
You start running every feeling through someone else’s filter before you allow yourself to have it.
What Can You Do About Gaslighting?
- Write it down immediately. Notes with dates are harder to rewrite than memory.
- Trust the feeling before the explanation. Your gut registered something, and that’s important, even if you can’t “prove” it.
- Pay attention to the pattern, not just the incident. One misremembered moment is human. A consistent pattern is a strategy.
Gaslighting is one of the patterns explored in The Soft Recenter: Loving Without Losing Yourself.
The Soft Recenter is a modern A-to-Z guide that explores the patterns, dynamics, and implicit rules determining how women love and how they can end up losing themselves along the way.
If you’re interested in learning more about dating and relationship patterns and loving without losing yourself, grab the full book in paperback or Kindle format HERE.
You can also grab a free preview here if you’re not sure this is the right resource for you. You can explore more patterns here as well.
Ola is the founder of Harmony Zone and Love & Self-Esteem, a platform dedicated to helping people break free from emotionally draining relationships and reconnect with their inner power. Learn more here…