Gaslighting Took Me

It didn’t happen all at once.

There wasn’t a loud explosion, a screaming match, or a dramatic exit. No, the unraveling of who I was happened quietly, like a thread pulled from the hem of my identity. I didn’t see it then, but now I know the name for it—gaslighting. And it took me. Slowly, surely, and almost completely.

It started like every seemingly perfect relationship does: with charm. He was everything I thought I needed—funny, intelligent, attentive. He remembered the smallest details about my life and made me feel like I was the only person who existed. Our texts were long and thoughtful. Our dates were magical. When he looked at me, it felt like I was home.

But as with every illusion, the cracks began to show. I just didn’t want to see them.

Phase One: Doubt

The first red flag didn’t come in the form of abuse or control. It came wrapped in something much more subtle—correction.

“You never told me that,” he’d say, even though I was sure I had. Or, “You’re just being sensitive,” when something hurt my feelings.

At first, I brushed it off. Maybe I was forgetful. Maybe I was too sensitive. I started to second-guess myself—not just in conversations with him, but in everything. I began to keep notes, writing down things I was sure I had said or done, so I could go back and prove I wasn’t losing my mind. But when I showed him the notes, he laughed.

“You’re keeping notes on me now?” he said with a smirk. “That’s kind of crazy.”

That was the moment I stopped trusting my memory. But worse, I stopped trusting me.

Phase Two: Isolation

Once the seed of doubt was planted, isolation grew like weeds. He didn’t forbid me from seeing friends or talking to family. He didn’t have to. He simply made me feel guilty for it.

“I just feel like I don’t get to see you enough,” he’d say, his eyes sad, his voice soft. “But if your friends are more important, I get it.”

So I canceled plans. I skipped birthdays. I ignored phone calls. Every decision I made was through the lens of how it would affect him, how it might make him feel.

Eventually, my world became small. Just him—and the version of me that he approved of.

Phase Three: Erasure

Once I was isolated, the real damage began. My thoughts, my opinions, my voice—he slowly erased them, one by one.

When I shared something I was passionate about—writing, books, feminism—he’d mock it. Not overtly, just enough to plant the seed of shame.

“You still read that stuff?”

“You know no one takes that seriously, right?”

“I’m just saying, it’s not that deep.”

When I cried, he rolled his eyes. When I was excited, he brought me down. When I was angry, he twisted it back on me.

“You’re always trying to start a fight.”

“You love drama.”

“I can’t even talk to you without it becoming a problem.”

I stopped sharing. I stopped shining. I became silent in my own story.

The Turning Point

The funny thing about silence is that, eventually, you start to hear yourself again.

It was a random Tuesday. He had left in a hurry, annoyed over something small—I had bought the wrong brand of coffee. I sat alone, staring at the bag in my hands, and a question struck me like lightning:

When did I stop choosing things for myself?

I looked around our apartment—his posters, his books, his choices. Nothing looked like me. Nothing felt like mine.

That night, I dug out my old journal. I flipped through pages I hadn’t touched in years. And in those scribbled, forgotten entries, I found pieces of myself—raw, unfiltered, alive.

Rebuilding Me

Leaving wasn’t a straight line. It never is.

There were days I believed I had misunderstood everything—that maybe it wasn’t gaslighting, maybe I was the problem. But every time I tried to shrink myself back into the box he had made for me, I felt it: the suffocation.

I started seeing a therapist. I reached out to friends I had ghosted. Some responded with warmth, others with justified distance. Rebuilding those relationships took time. But each conversation was like a mirror, showing me a version of myself I thought I had lost forever.

The hardest part wasn’t escaping him. It was escaping the version of me I had become with him.

What I Know Now

Gaslighting is not just about lies. It’s about power. It’s about making someone doubt their reality so deeply that they cling to you for validation. And the worst part? You often don’t realize it’s happening until the damage is already done.

But here’s the good news: reality is resilient. Truth may get buried under manipulation, but it doesn’t die.

I found my truth again.

I write now—not just for me, but for others who might be reading this and thinking, “Wait... this feels familiar.”

If you’re doubting your reality, if you feel like you’ve lost your voice, your light, your sense of you—listen closely.

Gaslighting took me.

But I took me back.