A pattern of manipulation in which one person causes another to doubt their own memory, perception, or sanity. Rather than argue a point, the gaslighter attacks the other person’s grip on reality itself — until the target stops trusting what they plainly saw or heard. It is corrosive precisely because it is gradual, and because the victim is trained to blame themselves.

Common forms it takes:

• Denial of events — flatly insisting something that happened never did (“That never happened,” “You’re making it up”).
• Rewriting history — recounting a shared event with the facts changed, so the other person’s memory looks faulty.
• Trivializing — dismissing feelings or concerns as overreaction (“You’re too sensitive,” “You’re being dramatic”).
• Countering — questioning the person’s memory of specifics even when they are confident and correct.
• Withholding — refusing to engage or pretending not to understand, so the conversation can never resolve.
• Diverting / deflecting — changing the subject or turning a concern back on the person raising it.
• Discrediting to others — telling family, friends, or officials that the person is unstable, confused, or lying, so outside accounts are pre-poisoned.
• Shifting blame — reframing the gaslighter’s own actions as the victim’s fault (“You made me do it”).
• Projection — accusing the other person of the very behavior the gaslighter is engaged in.

Posts tagged Gaslighting document instances of this pattern as part of reconstructing an accurate record — the central reason this site exists.