When you have been repeatedly gaslit, you are accustomed to not being taken seriously. Sometimes when you are in recovery it can feel very strange when someone does take you seriously.
Why It Feels Strange
As a person who has been gaslit by doctors as well as my ex-husband, I am used to not being taken seriously. In my relationship, my emotions or feelings didn’t matter. In the medical world my symptoms didn’t much matter. I was pretty much told that both my feelings and symptoms were crazy, not real, or just a matter of anxiety. Given how much this happened, my brain thinks it is true.
When your brain is accustomed to gaslighting, you will often start to do it to yourself. Then when someone comes along and says that all of this is real and serious, it is alarming. It can transform the way your brain thinks. But our brains can’t handle all of that at once so it can be scary at first.
When People Take me Seriously
For me, after leaving my abusive relationship, I have found it strange when I am taken seriously by people in power positions. I have always had great friends and family. But I have never been taken seriously by those in positions of power. Specifically I am talking about doctors and the police community.
I have had some great experiences after leaving in which both police and medical professionals have taken me seriously. However, because of my past experiences, my brain associates that with everything being very bad. Before things were really bad, but I had been gaslit into thinking they weren’t. So, if it is serious now, my brain thinks things are worse than they ever were before.
This isn’t the reality. The reality is that it was always that bad. The only thing that has changed is the perception of others and the validation that I have gotten from others. The challenge is to remember to validate yourself. Don’t let others determine how you feel or determine how serious your situation is. This is challenging, but it is part of overcoming gaslighting and learning that it is not a scary thing to be taken seriously.
