on Survival and Hope
Grant Howitt, Franz Kafka, Walt Whitman, Bruce Springsteen, Susan Sontag, Melina Marchetta, @seravph , Mary Oliver, Keaton Henson
on Survival and Hope
Grant Howitt, Franz Kafka, Walt Whitman, Bruce Springsteen, Susan Sontag, Melina Marchetta, @seravph , Mary Oliver, Keaton Henson
Which of these extremely fanfic situations have you personally experienced?
Pretending to date someone in order to get out of a jam
Cuddling for warmth
Only one bed
Wait, you guys are getting into fanfic situations?
Two of these things have happened to me (pls specify in notes)
All of these have happened to me. My life is controlled by a sadistic author.
None of these but in the notes I will regale you with another
Whoa, dig this clicky button!
some trans people say that their younger selves were also trans. that they were never a [insert agab]. and that's absolutely a valid experience and i'm not saying they're wrong. but actually i was a little girl once. and also i still love her. she's like a daughter to me.
Pierre: You tried to elope with Natasha!
Anatole: Top 30 reasons why Anatole is sorry. Number 5 will surprise you!
Pierre: Top 10 anime deaths. Number 1: YOUR FUCKING ASS RIGHT NOW!
your thing about how machines are alive and are creatures reminded me of church organs because they're literally a system that exists within the very structure of a building and its got this very complex system of windpipes and gadgets and stuff and whatnot... church organs are also creatures :) and they're one of my fav creatures ever.
While I'm happy that the word "gaslighting" is more known than it used to be, and that people at large are learning to recognize what it looks like, I feel like we need to be careful not to turn it into something soft and casual we throw around off the cuff without meaning.
Being gaslit is psychological abuse that fucks you up very badly, very slowly, at such a gradual pace that you don't usually know it's happening until it's already re-wired your brain.
If you're unfamiliar with the term, "to gaslight" is to intentionally persuade someone that they cannot trust their own perceptions of reality. It's a destabilizing form of manipulation that leaves you constantly anxious, off-balanced, confused, and dependant on others.
This is done by lying about events that have happened or about things that are happening, invalidating feelings and observations, and either denying, refusing to acknowledge, or deflecting away from hard facts.
As someone who has experienced gaslighting as a form of abuse, this is what I remember from when I didn't know anything was off:
This is what I remember from when I first started realizing something was weird:
Getting out and adjusting to the real world is hard, too, and comes with rapid swings of unfounded guilt, shame, fear, anxiety, and self-deprication that are completely unfounded in reality.
You've been conditioned to believe that you are entirely helpless and unable to think for yourself, possibly "crazy" or otherwise fundamentally impaired, and that there is a singular source of guidance that knows exactly what is right, and all of a sudden that pillar of support has vanished.
The immediate "after" that I recall looks like:
The long term "after"- for which I can only speak for myself- looks like:
I don't intend to invalidate anyone currently struggling with this- if you feel that something is wrong, it probably is. That's the thought that got me out. Trust that feeling that something isn't right.
I just want people who don't know what to look for to know what gaslighting *actually* looks and feels like, so they don't just roll their eyes and think, "Oh, that word doesnt apply to me- I'm not some snowflake".
('Cause we all saw what happened with "triggered", right?)
I've experienced this, and this is a great explanation of how it feels and how to identify it. I agree that we cannot let it become a term used lightly or meant to downplay the seriousness of its effects, because it can have devastating effects on one's life - I know it certainly did for me.
Some of the more serious effects not already mentioned: it's also excruciating. Often, the abuser will convince you that you're the one who is acting harmfully (even if it makes no sense or was obviously a mistake rather than malicious) and so you spend tons of time going over every single little detail of your interactions to make sure that you didn't do or say something bad and raking yourself over the coals for every tiny mistake. It got to the point with me that I was losing hair from the stress and sleeping very little or too much in waves. I wasn't eating enough and was the skinniest I've ever been in my adult life despite him trying to force me to eat more and count calories to regain some weight. I still have digestive issues I can trace basically back to that time.
To that end: it can have long-term physical effects as well as mental/emotional, because the stress can be so severe that it triggers chronic illness or creates stress-induced health problems. Abusers may also mess with your healthcare by interfering with your willingness to seek help, treat or prevent illness or symptoms, convincing you that your medications are to blame for your appalling lack of memory or crazy behavior (instead of, y'know, the abuse), ruining your trust in your doctor's professional judgment, etc.
Another common thing I've seen in gaslighting relationships and also personally experienced, is that the abuser will use this to literally reshape who you are as a person and/or how you think of yourself. In my case, my abuser managed to gaslight me into detransitioning and accepting really traditional gender roles in the relationship, among lots of other random ideas and politics I never would have accepted otherwise.
Abusers will also use gaslighting to push boundaries and put you in situations where your consent is compromised because you only want to do [x] thing that the abuser wants, because it will alleviate some other facet of the abuse. Sex thing you don't really want to try but the abuser does? Give it a month, and it'll become a bargaining chip to try and get the abuser to treat you like a person again. And then it's not rape at that point, is it? You asked for this - begged for it, even - so why do you feel so violated when the abuser gives you the opportunity?
Groups, such as a family or polyamorous relationship, where the abuser's version of reality is supported versus your own make this all so so much worse and harder to claw out of, for probably obvious reasons. Incidentally, this is a huge reason why cults do such a number to people’s mental health and are so hard to escape.
Best thing you can do if you suspect you are experiencing this is, in fact, to document what you can to help regain some grip on reality outside the abuser's version of reality. That's what ultimately helped me to get out fully and to start the long road to healing. It's been well over a decade, and I've recovered about as much as I think I'm ever going to, and I still occasionally refer back to old writings of mine whenever I slip back into questioning whether it really was that bad.