When you’ve been gaslit, you can’t trust your own feelings. You can’t believe your own emotions. You start to wonder whether you’re going crazy, whether you’re stupid, whether you’re actually the toxic one in the relationship. You start to question everything about your reality. Things that you should be 100% sure about suddenly feel clouded with uncertainty. You stop trusting your memories. You stop trusting your gut. You stop trusting yourself.
When you’ve been gaslit, you might choose to keep your experiences to yourself because you aren’t sure how others are going to react to your stories. You might feel like you don’t have a right to complain. You might feel silly for caring so much. You might feel like you’ve been overreacting because you’ve been told you were overreacting again and again until you started to believe it was the truth. You’ve been tricked into thinking that your emotions are wrong, that your gut feelings are wrong, that everything about you is wrong, wrong, wrong.
The important thing to remember is that you were manipulated into feeling shitty about yourself. The things they told you, the lies they made you believe, weren’t accurate. The way they made you feel wasn’t okay — and that’s on them. It’s a flaw of theirs. Not of yours. You might’ve made a mistake by allowing them into your world, but you can always leave them behind. It isn’t going to be easy, but it is absolutely necessary.
Moving forward, you have to remember, your emotions are valid. You’re allowed to be upset, angry, disappointed, confused, bitter, resentful, or all of the above. No one gets to tell you that you’re handling your situation the wrong way because there’s no right way to handle pain. Your experiences are yours alone. No one knows how they would react if they were in your shoes because they aren’t you. They don’t know how your past has shaped you. They can’t climb inside your mind, so they don’t have a say in the decisions you make.
Remember, you don’t need permission from anyone else to feel the way you feel. You don’t need permission to cut someone out of your life, either. If someone treated you poorly, then you shouldn’t deal with them anymore. You shouldn’t accept their phone calls. You shouldn’t respond to their texts. You shouldn’t act polite in order to keep the peace.
It doesn’t matter if your reaction makes people around you uncomfortable. You don’t need their blessing in order to kick others out of your life. If you don’t want them around, then don’t allow them in your world. You can’t look to other people to guide you. You have to make your own decisions. You have to set your own rules.
Remember, you are in charge of your own life. You are in control of your own path. Being gaslit might’ve made you feel like you couldn’t trust your heart, your gut, or your mind, but you aren’t stupid or weak or helpless. You are strong. You are capable. You are smart.
You are enough.