🎠What it means to have grown up with gaslighting
Growing up with gaslighting meant your parent constantly questioned and redefined your reality, making you doubt your own account of events, memories, and feelings until you learned that your version of events was inherently unreliable.
You may have learned that expressing authentic thoughts and feelings was dangerous, so you became a master at self-censorship and reading other people's versions of reality. When you said you were hurt, they told you it didn't hurt that bad. When you remembered something clearly, they insisted you were confused or making it up.
You may find yourself constantly asking "Am I overreacting?" or "Am I crazy?" even when your instincts are screaming that something is wrong. You struggle to trust your own judgment, and the disapproving voice inside your head constantly gets in the way of decision-making because you never learned that your perception of reality could be trusted.