What Is Gaslighting? A Therapist Explains the Signs, Examples, and How to Heal

RELATIONAL TRAUMA RECOVERY • April 05, 2026

She Stopped Trusting Her Own Memory

You sit across from Camille, a woman whose eyes betray a quiet exhaustion that no amount of sleep seems to fix. In her hands, she clutches a notebook, its pages filled with meticulously logged dates, times, and verbatim conversations. The room feels heavy, almost suffocating — the low hum of the air conditioner and the faint ticking of a clock marking each passing second as she struggles to reconcile her reality with the gaslighting she endures at home.

“I fact-check my own marriage,” she says, voice barely above a whisper. Her fingers tighten around the notebook’s worn spine, knuckles whitening. Eleven years of marriage, yet the man she loves insists she’s lost her mind, that she’s “too sensitive,” or “remembering it wrong.” Each denial from her husband chips away at her sense of self, leaving her adrift in a sea of doubt where even her memories feel untrustworthy.

Camille’s story is not unique. Many women in demanding roles — physicians, executives, entrepreneurs — find themselves questioning their own perceptions when faced with this covert psychological abuse. The internal conflict is wrenching: your mind says one thing, but the person closest to you insists otherwise, making you feel as if you are the problem. You start to wonder if you can trust your own mind anymore.

In the quiet of the therapy room, you hear the subtle tremble in Camille’s voice, feel the weight of the invisible burden she’s carried for years. It’s a burden that isn’t obvious to the outside world — a hidden injury, one that requires careful unraveling to heal.

What Is Gaslighting?

At its core, gaslighting is about control. It is a covert weapon wielded to destabilize your sense of reality and self-trust. When you’re gaslighted, you might feel like you’re constantly apologizing, doubting your decisions, or walking on eggshells to avoid conflict. It’s not just about lying; it’s about creating a world where you question your own experiences and ultimately rely on the gaslighter’s version of truth.

This manipulation often happens gradually and subtly, making it difficult to recognize. Over time, you may start to internalize the gaslighter’s narrative, losing confidence in your memory and perception. The effects can ripple through all areas of life, from personal relationships to professional settings.

The Neurobiology of Reality Distortion

Understanding gaslighting requires a look at how our brains process reality and how trauma and manipulation can disrupt this process. Dr. Robin Stern, PhD, psychotherapist and associate director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, explains that gaslighting undermines the “emotional intelligence muscle” that helps us read and trust our feelings and perceptions.

Neuroscientist Bessel van der Kolk, MD, author of The Body Keeps the Score, has extensively studied how trauma affects brain function. He notes that trauma can alter the brain’s ability to accurately appraise threat and process information, leading to confusion and dissociation. When you’re gaslighted, your brain is constantly forced to reconcile conflicting information — your lived experience versus the gaslighter’s denials or distortions — which can create a state of chronic stress and cognitive overload.

Jennifer Freyd, PhD, psychologist and professor emerita at the University of Oregon, developed Betrayal Trauma Theory, which highlights how gaslighting by a trusted person is particularly damaging because it violates fundamental assumptions about safety and trust. This betrayal impairs your ability to trust not only others but also yourself.

When you’re gaslighted, your brain’s reality-testing mechanisms — the processes by which you check your perceptions against the external world — become compromised. Reality testing, rooted in ego psychology and object relations theory, is essential for maintaining a stable sense of self and accurate appraisal of the environment. Gaslighting attacks this process, leading to confusion and self-doubt.

How Gaslighting Shows Up in Driven Women

Camille’s story offers a vivid example of how gaslighting manifests in the lives of driven and ambitious women. These women often excel in fields that demand precision, confidence, and evidence-based decision-making, yet gaslighting chips away at these very foundations.

In Camille’s case, her medical expertise and analytical mind clash with the emotional warfare at home. She finds herself doubting her own recollections and feeling isolated in her confusion. The notebook she clings to is both a shield and a prison — a desperate attempt to hold onto a version of reality that her husband denies.

Her experience is marked by a chronic internal battle: one part of her trusts her memory and instincts, while another part begins to accept the gaslighter’s narrative. This cognitive dissonance — holding two contradictory beliefs simultaneously — is exhausting and destabilizing.

Driven women like Camille often have little tolerance for ambiguity and value clarity, which makes gaslighting especially cruel. The constant undermining of their reality feels like an attack not just on their relationship but on their very identity.

Camille’s story is one of many where women begin to obsessively log conversations or create “paper trails” to prove their version of events. This behavior is a natural response to epistemic abuse — trying to reclaim trust in your own knowledge when someone else is systematically trying to erase it.

Gaslighting at Work: When It Happens in Professional Settings

Gaslighting does not confine itself to romantic relationships. Priya’s experience at her tech firm reveals how this form of manipulation can infiltrate the workplace, subtly eroding confidence and professional standing.

Priya is a senior product manager whose ideas have helped shape major projects. Yet her charismatic VP publicly claims credit for her innovations and privately tells her she “misunderstood” discussions. She starts adding her boss to every email, trying to create an irrefutable paper trail, a desperate effort to hold onto her professional reality.

This kind of workplace gaslighting is often cloaked in charm and professionalism, making it difficult to identify or confront. It can lead to chronic self-doubt, anxiety, and burnout — all while the gaslighter’s reputation continues to rise.

Priya’s first reaction when her therapist named what was happening? “But everyone loves him.” This highlights another layer of gaslighting’s cruelty: the gaslighter’s charm and social standing can make you feel crazy for suspecting them.

Recognizing gaslighting at work is crucial because it can affect not only your mental health but also your career trajectory. It’s a form of epistemic abuse that exploits power dynamics and often leaves victims feeling trapped in toxic environments.

Both/And: You Can Be Brilliant and Completely Fooled

Priya’s story illustrates a painful truth: being intelligent, driven, and successful does not make you immune to gaslighting. In fact, these qualities can sometimes make you a more attractive target.

You can be brilliant and completely fooled. You can excel in your career, be a trusted expert, and still find yourself doubting your own experience because someone you trusted has manipulated you so expertly. This paradox is one of gaslighting’s most insidious aspects.

Priya’s attempts to create a paper trail are a testament to her resilience and determination to reclaim her reality, but they also show the exhausting lengths gaslighting forces you to go to just to be heard and believed.

This both/and reality — that you are competent and yet deeply confused — is deeply destabilizing. It can lead to shame, isolation, and a sense of betrayal that cuts to the core of your identity.

Recognizing this paradox is an essential step in healing. You are not broken or “too sensitive.” You are responding to a form of psychological abuse designed to confuse and control you.

The Systemic Lens: Why Gaslighting Works Better on Driven Women

Gaslighting thrives in environments where your strengths can be weaponized against you. Driven women, who are often praised for their precision, control, and resilience, may find that these very traits make them more vulnerable to this form of manipulation.

Expectations to be perfect, to manage everything flawlessly, and to maintain emotional composure can create pressure to doubt or dismiss your own feelings when they conflict with others’ narratives. The cultural scripts around ambition and competence can silence the very doubts and emotions that gaslighting seeks to exploit.

Moreover, power dynamics in personal and professional relationships can amplify gaslighting’s impact. When you are seen as the “strong one,” others may assume you can handle everything — including abuse — without help. This systemic oversight can leave you isolated and unsupported.

Understanding gaslighting through a systemic lens means recognizing how societal messages about gender, power, and success contribute to the isolation and confusion it causes. Healing isn’t just about individual resilience; it’s about reclaiming your voice in a culture that often minimizes emotional abuse.

How to Recover Your Reality — and Yourself

Healing from gaslighting is a process of rebuilding trust in yourself and your perceptions. It’s about learning to differentiate between your own truth and the distorted narratives imposed by others.

Start by creating safe spaces where your experiences are validated without judgment. Therapy with a trauma-informed therapist can provide that sanctuary, helping you untangle the web of manipulation and reclaim your sense of reality.

Journaling or keeping logs, like Camille and Priya, can be helpful tools — not as traps to prove yourself to others, but as ways to reconnect with your memories and feelings on your own terms. Over time, these records become a resource for rebuilding trust in your mind.

Practice mindfulness and grounding techniques to stay anchored in the present moment. Gaslighting often triggers dissociation and confusion, so learning to notice your sensory experiences and emotions without judgment can strengthen your reality-testing skills.

Establishing boundaries is critical. This might mean limiting contact with the gaslighter, seeking support from trusted friends or colleagues, or making changes in your professional environment if gaslighting occurs at work.

Recovery also means being gentle with yourself. You are healing from a deep betrayal that shakes the foundation of self-trust. It’s normal to feel anger, grief, and vulnerability along the way.

With time, support, and self-compassion, you can reclaim your story and rebuild your confidence. Remember, your perceptions and memories matter — you are the expert of your own experience.

Healing is not linear, but every step you take toward trusting yourself again is a powerful act of reclaiming your life.

If any of this sounds familiar — if you’re reading this and thinking, “she’s describing my life” — you don’t have to keep carrying it alone.

If what you’ve read here resonates, I want you to know that individual therapy and executive coaching are available for driven women ready to do this work. You can also explore my self-paced recovery courses or schedule a complimentary consultation to find the right fit.

Related Reading

Stern, Robin. The Gaslight Effect: How to Spot and Survive the Hidden Manipulation Others Use to Control Your Life. Morgan Road Books, 2007.

Sarkis, Stephanie. Gaslighting: Recognize Manipulative and Emotionally Abusive People — and Break Free. Da Capo Lifelong Books, 2018.

van der Kolk, Bessel. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking, 2014.

Fricker, Miranda. Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford University Press, 2007.

Medical Disclaimer

Medical Disclaimer