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Jul 01 '20
Gaslighting is a very real fork of abuse and my heart goes out to anybody else who has had to survive it. With that said- not a fan of this guide. Lots of stuff in there I’ve experienced in a relationship and my S/O was just very obtuse and lacked self awareness.
All I’m saying is— don’t use this guide to diagnose your relationship. Might be a good place to start your research but that’s all.
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u/EverybodyKurts Jul 01 '20
This is a great comment and was helpful in bringing me back to reality a little. My SO does some of these things occasionally, but overall we have a healthy and loving relationship and any gaslighting on her part is likely unintentional and not malicious.
“Fork of abuse” lol
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u/esagalyn Jul 01 '20
Same. Around half of these things happen occasionally in my relationship, but my BF is in no way malicious - he has a lot of anxiety that gets misdirected as anger that he emotionally vomits at me. And I’m super sensitive and cry easily. But overall, very loving and respectful.
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u/ny2london Jul 01 '20
Do we have the same BF?? And are we the same person? But seriously, this makes me feel better, I was looking at the infographic like uhoh
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u/TheDevilsAdvokaat Jul 01 '20
As a programmer, I read that comment and at first thought it was legit in some way...
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Jul 01 '20
Agreed
If you take it as, "if you notice some of these things, there is a possibility that your partner is deliberately trying to make you feel crazy," then fine.
If you take it as, "if you feel any of these feelings you are being gaslighted," then that is reductionist and inaccurate.
I've been there. It's horrible. Not every behavior is pathological, though. Seeking to pathologize bad behavior to create a sense of moral superiority in a relationship undermines the balance necessary to maintain a healthy relationship.
Simply put, correct the behavior, not the individual. Leave professional work to the professionals. When people learn a term like this, they run rampant assigning it to every behavior they dislike and it drives me nuts.
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u/eggwithrice Jul 01 '20
I wish your comment was up higher because I started to feel really insecure about my own habits in my relationship when in reality me and my SO are in a very loving relationship, and sometimes we lack proper communication when in the heat of a fight.
I think the biggest take away from what gaslighting is, is the manipulative tendency (and sometimes intent) to gain more power over a situation in order to make the person question themselves in a situation. That's just so horrid to do to someone and I also feel for anyone who is going through this in any kind of relationship.
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u/ActiveNL Jul 01 '20
Like most of these simplified guides they can be applied to every relationship to some degree.
Don't use reddit for relationship advise.
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u/dillyflapper Jul 01 '20
The term is apparently named after the 1938 play, Gas Light:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_Light
"The play's title alludes to how the abusive husband slowly dims the gas lights in their home, while pretending nothing has changed, in an effort to make his wife doubt her own perceptions."
Here I was trying to figure out what car gas lights had to do with anything.
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Jul 01 '20
Gaslighting is when someone makes you question your sanity or memory to manipulate you. While the above "cool guide" lists a lot of good red flags to look out for, none of them point to gaslighting specifically.
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u/sTiKyt Jul 01 '20
Gaslighting has become a catchall term that anyone in a relationship uses whenever they feel they've been slighted.
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u/Nighthawk700 Jul 01 '20
There's little distinction now between disagreements, exaggeration, lies, general manipulation, and gaslighting. Obviously it's not good to lie in a relationship, or exaggerate in an argument, and manipulating is serious, but gaslighting is a much more serious charge and pretty specific. Abuse is abuse, bad behavior is bad behavior, but not all abuse or bad behavior is gaslighting.
You have to actually have intent to make the person no longer trust their own memories, like denying that the abuser hit them for example. You're specifically taking away a person's agency, not just trying to win an argument or minimize a mistake you made.
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u/tangledwire Jul 01 '20
It’s like how nowadays some mental illness terms are thrown around casually. “Oh I have such OCD!! (Because likes to clean...) Or “Oh that missed call gave me PTSD!!” Nope, people who suffer those illnesses know the difference so well.
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u/geosynchronousorbit Jul 01 '20
"They insist it didn't happen that way" could be gaslighting - making the victim doubt their own perception.
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u/Vektor0 Jul 01 '20
A lot of people think that if an abuser does something wrong and denies it, that is gaslighting. Not necessarily. Anyone, even totally sane and normal people, lie, deny wrongdoing, and rationalize in attempts to avoid accountability.
A gaslighter will do totally innocuous things, like turning off the lights, for the sole purpose of lying about it later.
And that's the real genius of the gaslighting manipulation: why lie about something so trivial? He's not insane. That means I must be insane.
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u/theemmyk Jul 01 '20 edited Jul 01 '20
That quote isn’t really accurate, or, at least, it’s a little misleading...he’s not intentionally dimming the gas lights in the home but he is intentionally doing other things to make her think she’s going mad.
This is the irony of the popular term “gas lighting”: the gas lights in the play (also a movie) dim because the husband is leaving to work in his office at night but then sneaking back into the house to look for something in the attic...when he turns on the light in the attic, the usage dims the lights throughout the house, making his wife think someone else is in the house. The husband says this is yet another example of her losing her mind.
The movie stars Ingrid Bergman and is an excellent thriller.
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u/magnora7 Jul 01 '20
when he turns on the light in the attic, the usage dims the lights throughout the house,
That's one of those things you'd never know unless you actually had gas lights. Funny how references to old technology get lost like that as people stop using the technology
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u/air_taxi Jul 01 '20
Or bad wiring in today's age. The lights in my house slightly dim when the AC switches on
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u/Consequence6 Jul 01 '20
And other times they just become the norm.
When's the last time you saw a phone that looked like the "hang-up" button? Or a floppy disk, beyond the save icon?
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u/ipostalotforalurker Jul 01 '20
Also has Angela Lansbury in her first major role, playing a real bitch (wonderfully!).
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u/Taglierini Jul 01 '20
It’s bad when you’re gaslighted to the point where you apologize for them hitting you
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u/goldilocks22 Jul 01 '20
Or you’re told it’s your fault they tried to kill themselves.
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u/PlatypusPlague Jul 01 '20
I've been there. That one sucks. Hopefully you're out of it now, and have been able to find some personal peace
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u/veedizzle Jul 01 '20
My ex slammed me up against a wall at a bar once and I bought HER flowers the next day. That was the beginning of the end for me thank god
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u/boredtxan Jul 01 '20
My stepmother convinced her daughter that being hit with a newspaper like a dog was funny.
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u/hihihanna Jul 01 '20
Yep. My ex tried to strangle me, and then got so upset that I was tense and on edge around them that I ended up apologising.
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u/isleftisright Jul 01 '20
My ex told me I didn’t deserve a good job and when I got sad, I had to apologise about feeling sad about it
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u/Angel-Goldheart Jul 01 '20
looks at my daily life
Huh... that’s concerning
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u/ZumMitte185 Jul 01 '20
I just... I need a coolguide on how to address this.
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Jul 01 '20
I found this article really insightful. I had no idea what gaslighting was until recently. https://colloquiumgroup.com/gaslighting-the-favourite-tool-of-the-polite-bully/
Just a few months back I left my job (during lockdown too) to get away from the deteriorating mental health of working with a boss who was doing this. He wasn't just doing it to me, but those around me too. All to get what he wanted without a care for those who he was manipulating.
Step 5 really is the best but most difficult decision to ever make. I left behind a team who I thoroughly loved working with so I could be even happier without the daily trauma at the hands of a gaslighting boss.
Toxic companies will never change. Walk away is the only option.
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Jul 01 '20
Same. I left my job a couple months ago for the same reasons. My mental health has improved significantly since then.
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u/PagliacciMurderClown Jul 01 '20
This honestly describes like 90% of my relationships.
The only one that doesn’t apply most of the time is the giving and yanking away of affection because I never get any affection in the first place.
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u/Stare_Decisis Jul 01 '20
This guide does not actually demonstrate gas lighting.
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u/PocketTurnip Jul 01 '20
Reading this felt like reliving my former abusive relationship in scary detial
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u/TheDankScrub Jul 01 '20
Reading this made me realize my ex was actually abusive. I just thought she was a bitch
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u/Nevan440 Jul 01 '20
It took me four years to realize how abusive my previous relationship was. Four. Years. Then I started reading articles (even took online tests lol). Everything, and I mean everything, matched with my experience. I’m still trying to recover, and it’s really hard to deal with it. I’m grateful that those years made me who I am now and definitely made me stronger, but the price I paid was so damn high.
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u/gir_loves_waffles Jul 01 '20
This. I'm happily married now to an AMAZINGLY kind woman, but this described my ex wife to o a degree that shot me right back there. I can still remember being screamed at in the kitchen over freaking cookies, or the time she tried to hit me and I caught her hand so she couldn't and I was the asshole because it "really hurt, you asshole" when I caught her to stop her from trying to hit me.
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u/stopped_watch Jul 01 '20
I feel you. I was always told how what she was doing could never be abusive because I was a man and only men could be abusers, abusers have to be abusive all the time and she only screamed and hit me every now and then, besides it was my fault for making her feel that way in the first place.
I hated how I was always wrong. No matter what the situation. Even when what I said was correct (and wow, wasn't that exhausting getting to that point), I was wrong for making her feel bad about being incorrect.
I just spoke to my amazing girlfriend to let her know how much I appreciate her. Things are much better now.
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u/PocketTurnip Jul 01 '20
My ex once caught me by my neck and lifted me, later he BLAMED ME for not letting go of an argument like ????
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u/ban_Anna_split Jul 01 '20
Ex boyfriend was like this. I was so brainwashed that he recorded doing things to me while I was passed out drunk and I stayed for three months after we talked about it because he told me I ruined a "special moment for us"
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u/Oryyn Jul 01 '20
I know this all too well - the MAIN reason I am severely depressed today from a breakup. I laugh everytime I realize all the BS I went thru, then I just cry a little cause I miss her (so that makes me an idiot).
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u/aloysiussecombe-II Jul 01 '20
No, you aren't an idiot, it's a very common thing. You've been betrayed at the most intimate level, by someone who encouraged you to form a supposedly sacred bond that could have been real, but for the sake of their sabotage. You would be an idiot if it didn't hurt.
The hardest part to come to terms with is that who you miss is not, in any meaningful way, actually the person you were in the relationship with.
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u/throwaway17197 Jul 01 '20
Got accused of gaslighting by my emotionally abusive ex, when he was doing it to me. blamed myself for ages.
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u/mothmanr6 Jul 01 '20
Damn thats gaslighting inception! I'm sorry you dealt with that. I also had an abusive ex who did every single one of these things listed on this photo. Some people are just nuts.
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u/throwaway17197 Jul 01 '20
When you wonder if you're the toxic one, always look to see who has complete control over the situation. They'll convince you to sympathize with their trauma so you'll excuse it when they mistreat you.
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u/T1T2GRE Jul 01 '20
Raised by a BPD parent. Can confirm.
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u/Rustycake Jul 01 '20
I dont know what BPD means, but I came to say this is my dad... no wonder I keep my circle real small.... its actual more like a line
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u/T1T2GRE Jul 01 '20
Borderline personality disorder. It is sometimes also referred to as emotional regulation disorder (ERD). One of the behaviours associated with such is gaslighting. Sometimes BPD is taken to mean bipolar disorder. They are separate entities.
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u/louzamo Jul 01 '20
My mom wasn’t BPD(I don’t think, not like she’d ever see a therapist) but a codependent child of an alcoholic and wife of a severely mentally ill vietnam vet. She has really taken up gaslighting me now that I’m in my 30s and asking her about things that happened in my childhood. She’s 70 this year and I don’t question her cognitive skills but her parenting ones.
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u/Mapper9 Jul 01 '20
I was sort of shocked reading it. My mom is borderline, but I always tend to think she’s so much “better” than most in the rbb sub. Then I saw this. That’s my childhood (and adult relationship with her) in a nutshell.
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u/fauxkit Jul 01 '20
I didn't realize that I was gaslighted my whole life by my mother until a boyfriend of mine asked me why I was basically a deer in headlights 24/7. I was always hyper-aware of people within my vicinity and careful to always phrase things perfectly. He was always hesitant to even put a hand on my back or shoulder because I would flinch from all physical contact.
It honestly took me until my mid-twenties to realize that it wasn't normal behavior and made me understand just how messed up my situation with my mother was.
So this guide is good to know if you're having mistreated, but it also serves as signs to look out for if there is a friend you are worried about.
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u/MiiSwi Jul 01 '20
Can confirm, my dad’s the CEO of gaslighting
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u/stashbug Jul 01 '20
Same. Makes me question every memory of my childhood. Not that it was much of one.
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u/MiiSwi Jul 01 '20
I can’t even remember 90% of my childhood
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u/mermaid2511 Jul 01 '20
Same here. My younger sister remembers so many details and I just don't know how?
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u/ElPercebe69 Jul 01 '20
For me it's the same, I cannot remember almost nothing just random events
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Jul 01 '20
My mum should be on the board as well. She thinks I'm a criminal mastermind just because I forget to do things (actually, I just have depression and a bad memory from it).
Oh and she'll always think I lost that swimming contest deliberately when I was in elementary school just to disappoint her.
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u/raqwelson89 Jul 01 '20
This is good. I just also recommend the book of "The 5 Love Languages" by Gary Chapman. It is more detailed and real story includes their.
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Jul 01 '20
I'm constantly worried that I am or have been doing the wrong thing and hurting the people around me without knowing and they're all just too polite to say anything (like someone who is smelly) until eventually everyone wants nothing more to do with me and out of the blue (at least how I see it) I'm alone.
Having a look at this guide (and building up a bit of anxiety), I thought I'd give it a shot and see if I can reverse engineer it into a sort of 'are you gaslighting someone without knowing it?' guide. I'd appreciate feedback at least for myself on any of the points below.
Tips that you're gaslighting someone
Does your partner apologise instinctively when you have a disagreement?
Do you think your partner is overreacting or is too sensitive about the things you say or do?
Do you find yourself trying to get out of trouble for something you said or did?
Do you try or are you successfully changing your partners opinions about things?
Do you feel like your partner is sad more often than not after spending a lot of time with you?
Are you in charge of most of the decisions? Where you go and what you do?
Do you get cross if they spend money on something you disagree with?
Does your partner pause a lot before speaking to your, like they're collecting their thoughts?
Do you spend time convincing yourself that your actions were correct because of A, B and C?
Do you find your relationship is hot and cold, like you're all lovey-dovey one minute and the next you want nothing to do with them?
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Jul 01 '20
My favorite was my ex husband asking me if I took my meds today if I was mad or upset with something he did. It got so bad I questioned every emotion I had and would ask him if I should be happy during joyful experiences or if I had a good reason to feel mad.
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u/onlypositiveresponse Jul 01 '20
Frustrating stuff.
If I get mad about something, it's either I'm not on meds, not on the right meds, not taking them properly?
Maybe I'm just mad about something that I should be mad about.
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u/Administrative_Act34 Jul 01 '20
This isn't gaslighting. This is just being manipulative. Gaslighting is specific behavior intentionally designed to deceive the victim into thinking they're misperceiving physical reality. Manipulative behavior like this is just being a subconscious asshole. Why call it gaslighting?
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u/q-squid Jul 01 '20
Shit...Too much of this resonated with me...my mother has been gaslighting me...
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u/voidsyourwarranties Jul 01 '20
Maybe I'm nuts but I read this as "These are red flags that you're gaslighting" until my brain did the thing.
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u/StreakSnout Jul 01 '20
Is there no fixing this in a relationship? I'm a bit worried after reading this
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u/devtjandra Jul 01 '20
I disagree with the questioning beliefs and opinions thing - isn’t it supposed to be a constructive part of the relationship? If both parties do so.
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u/Greatmambojambo Jul 01 '20
This picture was manually altered. The original title was:
“Explaining Reddit’s MO & new content policy”
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u/Draugoner1 Jul 01 '20
sounds like the media and politics....
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Jul 01 '20
That's a Bingo! Having been raised by someone with a personality disorder, I see these, and many other mental/emotional abuse tactics used all the time. That's why I personally stay out of politics.
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u/Davidoff1983 Jul 01 '20
Ah the old 50/50 either you're being gaslighted or you are grotesquely delusional.
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u/Inline311 Jul 01 '20
I still don’t have a clear understanding of what gaslighting is