Poking the bear

Does it ever feel like your gaslighter says and/or does things to push your buttons? This can happen in a variety of ways, with a number of different results. In today’s episode, Sarah and her guest deconstruct how she experienced her gaslighter doing what we call poking the bear.

Would you like to share your story, get Sarah’s brain on what you’ve experienced, and understand more clearly what’s been happening in your relationship? Access the calendar here.

Word of the day: Exaggerate. According to dictionary.com, to exaggerate is to magnify beyond the limits of truth; overstate; represent disproportionately. When it comes to gaslighting, we typically see this in two different flavors: the gaslighter exaggerating their wounds, OR, as we’ll see in today’s story, exaggerating “faults”… and when we say faults, it’s taking normal, human behavior, and exaggerating them so that they appear as character faults.

Story Time: Sarah and Linda discuss how Linda came to see how her soon-to-be-ex-husband used this tool of exaggeration to paint himself as the victim, and was able to “poke the bear” in his interactions with her – especially once the divorce process began.

Deconstruction Zone:

• Linda’s gaslighter used exaggeration to both exaggerate the impact on him and the intensity of her behaviors in order to change the narrative and paint himself as the victim. He used multiple techniques and tactics to do this: deception (lying), mind games, diversion and brainwashing, as well as distorting the facts.
• Gaslighting is an exchange – a discarding of our reality and a taking on of another person’s reality as our own. We don’t know that we do it, AND, we need to see how/where it happened for us if we’re going to avoid it in other relationships. We can see this exchange happen in Linda’s story – she was this kick-ass, single mom, getting shit done, and she became (because of the gaslighting) someone who doubted themselves deeply. This is a common result of chronic gaslighting.

Set Your Alarm:

1. With exaggeration, Sarah gives her clients the UHH scale, as a sort of “fact checking”. When someone paints themselves as the victim, they use words to try to convince you of how you’re hurting them, but the evidence does not support it. Ask yourself, where on the UHH scale does what I’m doing fall?
2. As in almost every case – sink in to YOUR knowing. If your gaslighter is telling you your anger is out of control, etc., - get clear on how YOU would define these things. Your gaslighter doesn’t have to agree with you, but it changes the way we SEE OURSLEVES, which is key. They can continue to hold whatever description of you they want – YOU know when you’re stepping out of alignment with how you want to behave when you are angry, etc. YOU DEFINE YOU. Nobody else gets to define you.
3. If needed, check with other (safe) people to get feedback: “Is this how you see me?”. More likely than not, your safe people will tell you the truth (and it will likely be something like, “That’s ridiculous).

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And remember – it’s not about becoming who...