Common Gaslighting Tactics

1. Denying Reality: The gaslighter flatly denies something you know is true. For example, you saw them say or do something, but they insist it never happened.
2. Twisting Facts: They change key details in events or stories, making you question your memory. This tactic often involves altering small but significant parts of a shared experience.
3. Trivializing Feelings: Your emotions or concerns are dismissed as unimportant or irrational, often with phrases like “You’re being too sensitive” or “You’re overreacting.”
4. Withholding Information: Withholding Information: The gaslighter refuses to listen or pretends not to understand what you’re saying, effectively shutting down communication and making you doubt your expression. They will also sometimes tell you something that happened, but leave out key details, so that later the can claim they told you about it, and make it seem like your don’t remember the parts they never told you.
5. Countering: They question your memory of events, even when you remember them clearly. It’s a tactic that makes you second-guess the way you remember past events.
6. Diverting: When confronted, they often switch topics or cast doubt on your ideas. This redirection is an attempt to avoid accountability by shifting the discussion.
7. Blame Shifting: The gaslighter makes you feel responsible for their actions. When they do something wrong, and can’t deny it, they turn it around to make it look like it was your fault. A common version of this is statements like, “If you hadn’t done x, y or z, I wouldn’t have been so mad and acted like that.”
8. Using Compassionate Language as a Weapon: They pretend to show concern or support as a way to subtly undermine and control you. This can be very confusing because it appears caring on the surface.
9. Projecting: The gaslighter claims you are the one doing the things they are guilty of. If you tell them you know they are lying, they accuse you of being the liar.
10. Using Friends and Family: They bring others into the dynamic, often telling them false stories to turn them against you or to validate their perspective.
11. Telling Others the Victim is Crazy: The gaslighter spreads rumors or suggests to others that you are unstable or irrational.
12. False Praise: They give compliments or gifts to create confusion and make you question your perception of their harmful behavior.
13. Gaslighting by Proxy: They enlist or manipulate others to help in their gaslighting efforts, essentially using third parties to further their agenda.
14. Repeating Lies: The gaslighter frequently repeats their fabrications until you start to doubt your own version of events.
15. Fake Concern: They show insincere worry about your well-being to manipulate situations in their favor.
16. Withholding Affection as Punishment: They refuse to show affection or give attention as a way to punish or control you.
17. Love Bombing: Throwing affection and attention your way to manipulate and control you. This often occurs in cycles, with periods of negative behavior followed by over-the-top displays of affection.
18. Rewriting History: Changing the narrative about past events to benefit themselves. This can range from outright denying past abuse to changing subtle details about their actions to make themselves look better.
19. Isolating the Victim: Encouraging or forcing you to distance yourself from friends, family, and support networks, thereby increasing your dependency on them.
20. Threatening: Using threats or intimidation to control your behavior or thoughts. This can include threats of harm, exposure, or other forms of coercion.