Gaslighting – an insidious form of psychological manipulation that can leave people feeling really stuck. Let’s dig into the types of gaslighting, signs it is happening, potential effects on victims and crucially, how to deal with gaslighting.

A Story Of Recovery

I wanted to explore the topic of gaslighting after a recent and inspiring patient encounter. The patient was a young woman who I’ll call ‘Kate’. I’ll also change certain elements of her story to maintain anonymity.

Kate had developed an acute psychosis, with the characteristic feelings of paranoia/persecution and hearing of voices commenting on her every move. Fundamentally, she lost insight into the nature of her reality such that it put herself and others at significant risk of harm.

Thankfully, Kate made a fantastic recovery after just 2 weeks in a controlled ward environment with antipsychotic medication and support from mental health professionals. It’s often true that multiple factors come together to trigger psychosis, which was the case in Kate’s story. But she also disclosed an unusual additional factor.

Over the previous few months, Kate had developed a semi-romantic relationship with an older man, whose intentions she was starting to recognise as nefarious. Whenever they met, Kate felt pretty low afterwards. At first, the man seemed like an antidote to her sadness – he was charismatic while she was insecure, bubbly and outgoing while she was morose and melancholic.

But he gradually tried to exert control over her in various ways. For example, he would make ambiguous comments with sinister undertones, or crack seemingly innocuous jokes with hidden meanings. At one point, this man implied he was tapping Kate’s phone and tracking her movements. Ultimately, he was leading her down a particular path.

Anytime Kate challenged him on these comments, he reflected the attack back onto Kate. She was the one overreacting and being irrational. Initially, Kate wrote these off as eccentricities of character and bought into the idea that she had a tenuous grip on reality. However, following her recovery, the man’s malignant motives became clearer to her on an intuitive level. She decided to change her phone number, cutting the gaslighter out of her life.

What is Gaslighting?

So what actually is gaslighting? It is defined as “a form of psychological manipulation that seeks to sow seeds of doubt in a targeted individual or in members of a targeted group, making them question their own memory, perception and sanity.”1

The concept was popularised by 1944 film “Gaslight”, in which an innocent young lady, Paula, marries a charismatic gentleman called Gregory. He feeds her ideas which lead her to believe she’s acting strangely and losing her memory. To stoke her downward spiral, she hears knocking on the walls at night and sees the gas lighting dim. Gregory calmly orchestrates the loss of Paula’s grip on reality for his own ends.

To those outside this dynamic, the gaslighter’s malignant motives might seem obvious. Yet victims are often too vulnerable to face facts. They may be going through a hard phase of life or suffering from low self-esteem. Consequently, they can be suggestible to ideas which ultimately reflect negatively on them.

Add to this a barrage of distorted, misleading information, and sooner or later victims question what they truly know about not only the outside world, but their inner world.

The Types Of Gaslighting

Gaslighting isn’t just limited to romantic relationships, either. It can occur in almost any dynamic involving two or more people. Usually, victims are vulnerable and hit where it hurts the most: their sense of identity and self-worth.

Gaslighting may happen in the workplace as a form of bullying, in healthcare/educational institutions and in cults as a form of psychological manipulation. It may also be employed at the political level to mislead or suppress vast swathes of people (see Trump’s tirades against the media, use of ‘fake news’ claims, etc).

I listened to a great podcast which perfectly encapsulated political gaslighting: “a nation’s sanity depends on the basic trust relationship they have with their leaders and media… if they are repeatedly lied to, it damages national emotional health. Trauma ensues when you have to keep reconciling what you know to be true with lies you’re constantly being fed.”

Who Can Be Affected By Gaslighting?

Essentially, anyone is susceptible to gaslighting. It happens when it is less painful to buy into the gaslighter’s version of reality than our own version. And our own version may include the idea that the gaslighter is up to no good.

However, women are more commonly victims. This is thought to be reflected by sexist social conditioning, whereby women learn they are supposed to be less confident and more doubting of their beliefs/perceptions.

As for the perpetrators, these are commonly individuals with narcissistic or sociopathic qualities. Gaslighters themselves usually have a history of psychological abuse as children, from which they picked up maladaptive coping techniques.

We’re all capable of manipulating others and distorting the truth to a greater or lesser degree. For instance, car salesmen might tell white lies to help close deals. But such behaviour is habitual and pervasive in gaslighting. And it may not serve much purpose other than causing confusion or controlling others.

How Does Gaslighting Work?

There are 3 broad tactics gaslighters use2. Being aware of them can help when it comes to dealing with the phenomenon.

Hiding: the abuser hides or covers up what they’ve done. If challenged, they convince victims to doubt their own beliefs and turn the blame on them. To make themselves feel consistent, gaslighters must accuse victims of inconsistency. This might be a conscious or unconscious process. If you can recall someone who constantly tells feeds you blatant lies with a straight face, you may have met a gaslighter. Changing: the abuser feels the need to change something about the victim, such as the way they dress or act. If the victim doesn’t comply, the abuser may convince the victim that they are not good enough. This is a form of ‘ projection ’, the commonest psychological defence mechanism employed by gaslighters. Control: because the abuser wants full power over the victim, they may seclude them from friends and family. They can then more completely influence the victim’s thoughts and actions. The gaslighter might even utilise their own children for this end. It could also force the victim to turn to the gaslighter for ‘correct’ information. To compound this, gaslighters present one face to their victim and another to the world, leading victims to assume that if they ask for help, no one will believe their story of being manipulated.

How To Deal With Gaslighting

The effects of gaslighting on mental health can be quite profound. Perhaps unsurprisingly, chronic gaslighting can cause anxiety, depression and even psychosis in the end-stages.

Sadly, the emotional trauma can be bad enough to weaken the victim’s grasp over their own beliefs, perceptions and sense of self-worth. This makes the question of how to deal with gaslighting when confronted with it essential. A full answer is beyond the scope of this post, but I’ll summarise some key findings.

A good first step is to recognise a crucial fact: the gaslighter’s main weapons are words. They use words to try and throw people off-balance. Remembering this fosters a healthy degree of skepticism and the ability to question what the gaslighter says. Words only have as much power as we let them have. In this respect, developing a mindfulness practice might be of benefit.

Another important step is to confide in someone, whether a close friend or a professional. The simple act of sharing a burden with someone can be empowering, which is often just what victims need. Furthermore, if feeling unsafe, paranoid, or like harming yourself, reach out for help immediately – head to the nearest Emergency Department.

Lastly comes the question of how much to reduce contact with the perpetrator. Every situation will be different. As a general rule, there isn’t a magic bullet to ‘fix’ gaslighting behaviour, which will likely have been adopted in tandem with the individual’s personality.

Gaslighting may in fact be a by-product of what the mental health field today calls ‘Personality Disorder’, for which current treatment is years of therapy – that is, if the perpetrator chooses to engage.

Consequently, one must avoid falling into the trap of trying to fix the person. A degree of self-preservation is probably warranted, which might take the form of getting as far away from the perpetrator as possible (like Kate did by getting a new mobile number), or if this is not viable, mastering the ability to set firm boundaries.