Gaslit at the Age of Four: A First Experience
Estimated Reading Time: 12 minutes
Not long ago I realized my first example, or first introduction, to gaslighting, came at the very young age of five.
A few weeks ago, my therapist and I were discussing a recent episode of gaslighting I had experienced around a family event I was left out of. In short, a family member was hospitalized, and only finding out about it through a roundabout way on social media, I called another family member to find out the details. This family member then told me, “You get left out because you moved to the boonies.”
Here’s a little background: I left California in 2022 because I could no longer afford to live there, so I moved a few states away to New Mexico (a 1-day drive or 1.5-hour flight away). So, according to this family member, it’s my fault no one fills me in on family news because I moved, but everyone else in the family (from upstate New York to Cleveland, to Arizona, and beyond) is fine. They aren’t in the boonies. Also, phones in California cannot connect to phones in New Mexico. Who knew? Anyway, this made my insides feel like a hot erupting volcano.
My therapist (we’ll call her Trisha because that’s the name she was given at birth and prefers to go by, so shut it) patiently listened as the lava ran out of my heart and brain and mouth and all over the room, seemingly burning up all of the work we’d done the past few years on this repeated theme. I’d felt pretty confident about my growth in this area as of late, yet this time I was triggered emotionally, becoming sad, anxious, incredibly frustrated, and utterly confused. “To be expected”, she said.
“OK, so I haven’t relapsed? I’m not crazy?”
“No.” Trisha then asked, “When was the first time you remember feeling like this?”
“When was the first time you remember feeling like this?”
[Enter: Lengthy pause.]
My first known example of gaslighting had to be the grocery goblin incident.
At just 4 years old a shy little girl with wide eyes, a very crooked haircut, and cat shit on her knees (don’t ask) took it upon herself to go door-to-door in her quaint California beach neighborhood and ask the neighbors if they could help:
“My mum says we don’t have any food and we’re hungry. Can you help us?”.
That smelly little mongrel was me.
Mum apologized profusely to the neighbors who’d come to the door, some of whom had brought us carrots, canned goods, and a box of Mac and Cheese.
“Oh my God, I’m so sorry! I don’t know what’s gotten into her! We’re fine.”
I was beyond confused.
In my generation, Gen X, kids were indoctrinated from a young age: LIES BAD, TRUTH GOOD. In school, Saturday morning cartoons, even on the back of a Captain Crunch cereal box you’d see truth propaganda. “Look me in the eye and tell me the truth!” they’d yell, and when you did, they’d beat the living crap out of you and send you to your room, isolated from the world without a device to distract you from the hell you’d just made for yourself. (Perhaps another reason many of us don’t do eye contact.)
The more I told the truth, the more I’d be punished for it. Make it make sense.
The more I told the truth,
the more I’d be punished for it.
Make it make sense.
For days Mum had been saying we didn’t have food. We were “broke”, she said. Dinner the night before was a half bag of frozen french fries. Our cat was so hungry he’d jumped up on the kitchen table and snatched a couple clean off of my plate.
“Piss off turd face! These are all mine, you stringy-haired, sticky-fingered little bastard!” Then, with a flick of his orange tail, he was off down the hallway and under my bed with his fresh catch of the day. (And just to calm the kitty haters, he was right to call me a bastard. I didn’t know my dad at that time. So chill, dude. Leave the cat alone.)
This dramatic event became a humorous anecdote in our family, but also marked the inception of a more significant pattern: Gaslighting.
Gaslighting, in short, is an abusive type of emotional and psychological manipulation in which the perpetrator disputes accounts of the victim’s experiences and rewrites history, causing self-doubt, confusion, and isolation. You’ll hear them say, “I never said that,” even though you specifically remember them saying “that” and may even have evidence of the fact (the digital world has helped greatly with this, but for us Gen Xers, the clunky Atari 2600 was pretty useless in that regard–its all we had, shitass).
Back to Mum.
Here’s the tea: I did, and still do love my mum deeply (RIP, Mum). Love between mums and daughters can be really complicated. But let me tell it to you straight: Mum was no shining star of the PTA.
I believe my mum had a lifelong undiagnosed mental illness that she self-medicated to get by. She liked to drink. A LOT. Michelob was her main drug of choice at this time. If she could have had an IV drip filled with the stuff, I think she easily would have, if it weren’t for her child-like fear of needles.
And of course, there was that white powdery stuff from time to time, but settle down. It was the 80s, kids.
Partying necessitated babysitters, and I had them aplenty: the hippy neighbors (God, I loved them–their incense, tie-dyed curtains, tarot cards, and weird shit like that giant clam shell with the sparkly blue marbles in it), the nice lady who made me my first chocolate chip pancake (Is this even allowed?!), or Nana and Papá (thank the Universe for them), I had to comply.
Have you ever noticed there’s this weird phenomenon with adults when they are around super shy kids? They can’t handle the silence. So they ask questions. A lot of them. And your girl here, she told ALL the truths. Because despite the hypocrisy around me, honesty felt right to my quirky little weirdo brain and heart. And thankfully, still does to this day.
A couple of lively examples:
- Pancake lady: “You’ve never had chocolate chip pancakes?” Me: “No. I didn’t know there was such a thing. My Mum isn’t usually awake in the morning to make breakfast.”
- Little brother sitting on the floor in front of the TV at Nana and Papá’s: “See Mama! I told you that was bad.” It was the evening news and the graphic on the screen was of a mirror, some lines of white powder, and a straw. “Tony’s right, Mum. It’s really bad. You could go to jail or even die.”
Late one night I called Nana and Papá in a panic. Mum’s partner was yelling obscenities at her and holding our mahogany coffee table over her and my little brother.
“Please come over! It’s an emergency! He’s gonna hurt them!”
They arrived 20 minutes later, my 4’ 11” Nana, on fire, in her curlers and housecoat clenching her jaw as she did when livid, with the cops trailing right behind.
Mum’s response to all the commotion: “Brandy was exaggerating, it wasn’t that bad. I’m sorry she woke you up. No, I won’t be pressing charges. We were just having an argument. Geeze!”
Bitch, don’t “geeze” me. I know what I saw.
(Personal note: I would never call my mum nor anyone else “bitch” in real life, but it sure sounds punchy and cool to say it in this instance. So, deal with it.)
What an inconvenient little turd I’d become.
Time after time I’d be asked a question, I’d tell the truth play-by-play, and the family, neighbors, and teachers were told, “She’s exaggerating. It didn’t happen like that.” “She’s always making up stories.” Perfect examples of gaslighting phrases adopted by toxic people. This ensured any time I spoke up about any injustice, shared any feelings, or said anything at all, really, it would all be regarded as lies.
“I’m not feeling well.”
“You’re lying.”
“I think I have a fever.”
“You’re lying.”
“I’m bleeding down there.”
“You’re lying.”
“April pulled a knife on me after school.”
“You’re lying.”
“Jesus wept.”
“Nope. Totally lying.”
I had mastered screaming on the inside by the time I was 12.
Years of gaslighting, my friend, had fostered a deep-seated obsession to constantly prove my “goodness” and honesty, an exhausting effort for a child, and an even more tiresome plight for an adult dealing with other adults who may have had the opposite goals. I had to be fucking PERFECTION. I overexplained everything, ruminated on every conversation for weeks on end (“Should I should have said this instead?” “Oh God! Why TF did I say that?! Damn it all to hell!”), hyper-focused on what others would say and think about what I said or did, constantly doubted my abilities, and my emails . . . goddess help you if you’ve worked with me and had to read one of my lengthy, overly descriptive, bullet point-ridden emails.
This obsession led me to run full speed ahead into joining a religious cult at the age of 18 (because no one will lie or betray you in church, right?!). It led me into a lifestyle of self-defeatism–choosing to put my family (and their drama, chaos, addictions, and narcissistic tendencies) above focusing wholeheartedly on any of my own dreams and goals (let’s face it, I’d get started on them and abandon them once a gaslighting or scapegoating episode occurred in order to “focus on healing”, again and again and again). My biggest goal was to bring our family together and that we’d all heal and rise above the generational trauma, addictions, and hurts together under blue skies and rainbows with cute little bunny rabbits and that goal got me absolutely nowhere but into a therapist’s chair.
Now, at 48, I’ve been officially diagnosed with Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD), and I navigate life with a heightened sensitivity to dishonesty (i.e. per Trisha, I have exactly zero tolerance for bullshit).
I’d questioned for years why family members would rather choose to spend time with deceptive, manipulative, narcissistic family members and purposely exclude me. My first instinct was always to create a timeline and start from the beginning, “What did I say? What did I do? Was I an asshole? How can I better show them I care? Did I scare them off by sharing my feelings? Am I the narcissist? Do I exist?” Perfect examples of how someone will react to being gaslit.
Now, thanks to Trisha-the-badass-therapist (another name she officially carries), 12-step rooms, books, supportive friends, and hundreds of Youtube videos (thanks Dr. Ramani and Crappy Childhood Fairy) rather than beating myself up and “should-ing all over myself” (thanks for that one, Trisha), I have an understanding that not everyone values honesty in the same way I do, and others may have a much higher tolerance to bullshit, able to stomach hugging and laughing with the devil (likely because they don’t share the big whopping betrayal wound I have on my back–Trisha’s words, not mine). And sometimes when people have treated another like a giant pile of doo doo, they aren’t inclined to see them and be reminded of reasons they need to change or perhaps ask for forgiveness. Gaslighters prefer the status quo and would rather sacrifice a loving relationship to protect their own insecure egos.
Gaslighters prefer the status quo and
would rather sacrifice a loving relationship
to protect their own insecure egos.
Healing from gaslighting is no easy road to travel. Being the truthteller in a family or group who prefer to protect toxic patterns over innocent lives, is a painful position to hold. However, knowing you are the one to break the cycle is powerful. And knowing you’re not alone is EVERYTHING. I still occasionally find myself emotionally triggered (sad, anxious, lava-spitting volcano-esque type of shenanigans) when I find out family gatherings have occurred and I was excluded–though each time it happens I peel away another layer of the toxic family system onion and get to the heart of things–I want to love and be loved, authentically. Period. So why would I so badly want to be part of a group that doesn’t take part in that simple equation? Especially when there are friends and neighbors out there who have shown more love and concern for me than nearly anyone in that emotionally stifling environment.
Newsflash: no one’s coming to save us, champ. So self-care is of utmost importance on this journey.
A few self-care practices that have worked for me, personally are:
- creating stronger boundaries as needed (100s of hours of Youtube videos helped)
- meditating twice daily
- attending group recovery sessions (acronyms like ACA and ALANON come to mind)
- seeing my therapist, weekly (Don’t stop searching ’til you find the right one, OK?)
- hugging my dogs (because, duh)
- singing annoyingly high-pitched songs to my dogs (because they cannot escape me and my powers)
- basically worshipping my dogs (because they are perfect stinky butt little angels from heaven)
Also, for my safety, sanity, and well-being, I’ve now gone “no contact” with some particularly harmful family members, and am applying the “grey rock” method with others who are enabling the particularly harmful family members. (Don’t know what “no contact” and “grey rock” is? Watch this and this from the amazing Dr. Ramani and maybe read this here. But not yet, hold your horses. I’m almost done here.)
I also read the book “The Body Keeps the Score” by Bessel van der Kolk which deals with how we (often unknowingly) hold trauma and abuse in our bodies and how to knock that shit right off. This book led me to some of the best, most powerful tools to move past the yuck and heal. (Stick around and read future blogs if you’re curious. But seriously, go read the damn book. It’s a game changer.)
If you’ve gotten this far, thank you for taking the time to read my gaslighting blog entry and for excusing my weird sense of humor. (Don’t worry, kids, being called “weird” for a Gen Xer is the highest compliment one can receive. I know, different language entirely. And yes, I did just give my sense of humor a compliment, because I can, damnit, and I will. Self-care, re-parenting: in your face!)
If you’re on this road, just know you are not alone. It’s not your fault to be part of a dysfunctional family. If you haven’t found your people, they are out there. We are here. We’ve got your back, homie.
If you’re just here for the ride, I guarantee you know someone who can relate to being gaslit and the “monkey mind” gaslighting creates and feeds. Share if you feel your person can relate. Sometimes just feeling you’re not alone in this makes all the difference because growing up gaslit is a lonely ass road. (And cursy words can be good sometimes, too, so get used to it, sissy.)
Rise above it. Take back your power. Embrace peace.
