Are You Being Gaslighted?

Check for these telltale signs:

1. You constantly second-guess yourself.

2. You wonder, “Am I being too sensitive?” a dozen times a day.

3. You wonder frequently if you are a “good enough” girlfriend/wife/employee/friend/daughter.

4. You have trouble making simple decisions.

5. You think twice before bringing up innocent topics of conversation.

6. You frequently make excuses for your partner’s behavior to friends and family.

7 . Before your partner comes home from work, you run through a checklist in your head to anticipate anything you might have done wrong that day.

8. You buy clothes for yourself, furnishings for your apartment, or other personal purchases thinking about what your partner would like instead of what would make you feel great.

9. You actually start to enjoy the constant criticism, because you think, “What doesn’t kill me will make me stronger.”

10. You start speaking to your husband through his secretary so you don’t have to tell him things you’re afraid might upset him.

11. You start lying to avoid the put-downs and reality twists.

12. You feel as though you can’t do anything right.

13. You frequently wonder if you’re good enough for your lover.

14. Your kids start trying to protect you from being humiliated by your partner.

15. You feel hopeless and joyless. Your husband crosses the line in his flirtations with another woman at a dinner party. When you confront him, he asks you to stop being insecure and controlling. After a long argument, you apologize for giving him a hard time.

Your boss backed you on a project when you met privately in his office, and you went full steam ahead. But at a large gathering of staff—including yours—he suddenly changes his tune and publicly criticizes your poor judgment. When you tell him your concerns for how this will affect your authority, he tells you that the project was ill-conceived and you’ll have to be more careful in the future. You begin to question your competence.

Your mother belittles your clothes, your job, your friends, and your boyfriend. But instead of fighting back as your friends encourage you to do, you tell them that your mother is often right and that a mature person should be able to take a little criticism.

If you think things like this can’t happen to you, think again. Gaslighting is when someone wants you to do what you know you shouldn’t and to believe the unbelieveable. It can happen to you and it probably already has.

How do we know? If you consider answering “yes” to even one of the following questions, you’ve probably been gaslighted:

Does your opinion of yourself change according to approval or disapproval from your spouse?

When your boss praises you, do you feel as if you could conquer the world?

Do you dread having small things go wrong at home—buying the wrong brand of toothpaste, not having dinner ready on time, a mistaken appointment written on the calendar?

Gaslighting is an insidious form of emotional abuse and manipulation that is difficult to recognize and even harder to break free from. That’s because it plays into one of our worst fears—of being abandoned—and many of our deepest needs: to be understood, appreciated, and loved. In this groundbreaking guide, the prominent therapist Dr. Robin Stern shows how the Gaslight Effect works and tells you how to:

Turn up your Gaslight Radar, so you know when a relationship is headed for trouble

Determine whether you are enabling a gaslighter

Recognize the Three Stages of Gaslighting: Disbelief, Defense, and Depression

Refuse to be gaslighted by using the Five Rules for Turning Off the Gas

Develop your own “Gaslight Barometer” so you can decide which relationships can be saved—and which you have to walk away from

Learn how to Gasproof Your Life so that you’ll never again choose another gaslighting relationship

[美]羅賓·斯特恩

紐約大學應用心理學博士，現為耶魯大學情商中心的聯閤創始人和副院長，也是耶魯大學兒童研究中心的學者。她是一名獲得執照的精神分析師，有30年的從業經驗，病人包括個人、夫婦及傢庭。羅賓是RULER（耶魯大學情商中心創立的將情商引入學校和工作場所的方法）的共同開發者之一，也是傢庭版的RULER的共同開發者之一，同時是中心各學院的首席培訓師。目前，羅賓也在哥倫比亞大學教育學院任教。她齣版瞭兩部著作：《煤氣燈效應》和《重生項目》（Project Rebirth）。

羅賓是伍德哈爾學院的創始成員之一。她在那裏花瞭15年時間創立並推動培養女性領導的計劃。她曾擔任許多美國廣播節目的嘉賓，並到訪多個地方，進行有關情商和關係霸淩的講座。羅賓定期對全球各地的學校和公司提供谘詢服務，並在過去的5年中和臉書閤作，開發齣瞭一套幫助成人和兒童培養情商、解決網絡暴力的工具。目前，羅賓為康涅狄格州紐黑文市的斯米洛癌癥醫院提供谘詢服務。在2014年至2015年間，羅賓是耶魯大學公共之聲團隊的成員，她的文章曾在多個廣受歡迎的媒體平颱發錶，包括《今日心理學》、《赫芬頓郵報》、時代網、《華盛頓郵報》、《國會山報》和《哈佛商業評論》。她還是情商研究協會、“危機熱綫”和“由我開始”的顧問團成員。

羅賓居住在紐約。她很珍惜和兒子斯科特、女兒梅利莎的關係。他們也都在追尋著自己充滿激情的夢想。

劉 彥 譯

資深媒體從業者，金話筒奬和中國新聞奬得主，《韋氏高階英漢雙解詞典》審稿專傢，擅長英語教學、交傳及同傳。