Take Your Gaslighting Elsewhere

The past couple years, I started to develop an immunity to gaslighting. Today, I realized it’s great that I’m nearly impervious now to gaslighting but what’s even better?

I don’t have to put myself in situations to experience gaslighting at all!

Common refrains I heard for many years included such hits as, “I never said/did that, you must be crazy,” “You don’t need to be so melodramatic about it,” “That’s totally not how I meant it, learn to take a joke,” and “I only did/said that because you said/did that other thing first.”

It’s taken a long time to learn how to advocate for myself and set boundaries. Also for a long time, trying to set boundaries would cost me dearly. If I tried to stand up for myself or say that something I was being subjected to was wrong, I could expect nothing but mockery, and it often got turned around. Somehow, I became the aggressor and the instigator. I was so mean, so aggressive! I always ended up feeling bad because by telling someone that hitting wasn’t okay, or calling me a slut wasn’t okay, I ended up hurting their feelings because they were just mad, they didn’t mean it. Why did I have to be so mean?

It took me a long time to learn the word ‘gaslighting’ but I’ve been well versed in the concept for years.

Every year, my company covers an event that’s so large, every accommodation sells out over a hundred kilometres. Last year, I lucked out and found an AirBnB that had just gone on the market. It was the perfect location, close to our main location for the event, and an adorable little house. The day we checked out, I messaged the owner and said the house was perfect and the company would like to rent it again next year for the same event.

His reply was that he was glad we liked it! They don’t open it up for booking that far in advance, but if I messaged him the first week of February he’d book me in for July.

Yay! What a load off. What a relief that I had accommodations for some of our staff next year, one less thing to worry about,

February 1st, I messaged him. It looked like it was already booked for the weekend he’d said I could have it for, but maybe it was blocked out because it had already been promised to me. I reminded him who I was, that we’d talked about it last summer, and I was reaching out the first week of February as he’d said to get it booked.

I waited 2 weeks for a response, but I knew he’d rented it to someone else despite what he’d said. Once again, the fact that I take people at face value bites me in the ass. I looked for other accommodations over a hundred kilometres: motels, hotels, AirBnB, VRBO, you name it. Nothing.

So whatever. Once again some asshole gave me their word on something, then screwed me over without a second thought. I’ve given up pretending that I’ll ever change. I take people at their word, I expect them to honour it, and I expect them to be of moral character.

Did you know positive projection is a thing? I suffer from it. As my therapist explained to me, it’s not that I’m gullible or dumb. I just expect people to have the same positive traits that I do. Like integrity, and keeping one’s word.

But I digress…

I’d need to see if some of the staff were going to the event with RVs again and maybe they’d be willing to let one or two others sleep in theirs. Ours sleeps 6 but it’s a huge event with a lot of staff. So I’d get to work on trying to solve a problem that I thought I’d already solved.

I’d moved on, and then this guy messaged me two weeks later to tell me it was already rented but if anything changed he’d be in touch.

I went from acceptance of the problem this dipshit had caused me, to angry in about 1.2 seconds.

I started sending a response, then stopped. I’d eat breakfast first while I mulled over my anger. Was I being too aggressive? Was my temper out of control? Maybe I’d misunderstood the emails from the summer. Maybe I was hangry. Then I had to decide if I needed to call this guy out, or if I should just let it go. Would this be one more situation in life that I’d regret saying nothing or would I stop caring eventually if I just sucked it up and let it go?

I realized that I was fed, rested, and perfectly justified in my annoyance. I was also perfectly justified in telling this guy that he’d done something crappy that had caused me grief. Because I still had all our correspondence, I was able to review it before I replied just to assure myself that no, I hadn’t misunderstood,

When I say I keep my receipts, I don’t just mean for tax purposes.

I replied politely, “Thanks so much for your timely response. It’s unfortunate that you’ve gone back on your word, as there are now no accommodations for that weekend in three counties. Have the day you deserve.”

And I sent it.

I was done with it and proud of myself for saying something. Imagine my surprise when I got an email from the b0oking app letting me know I received a response.

Oh, two weeks to respond initially because not enough balls to tell me you’d screwed me but a brief half hour when I’ve politely called you out on something?

I looked at my phone for quite awhile. To see the message, I’d need to log in to the app. There was no preview.

Based on my many years of conditioning, I immediately assumed he was going to tell me I was rude, or that he never said he’d rent me the house and had no idea what I was talking about.

I had the proof in writing if he wanted to argue, but then I shook my head. There was nothing for me to prove and nothing to argue about. I had all our correspondence, and I knew exactly what had happened. He’d pulled a dick move, and I was in the right. I didn’t need to plead my case or prove that I wasn’t in the wrong. Even if it was an apology, I had no interest in anything he might say.

I realized I don’t need to put myself in a position to be gaslighted or subjected to rudeness, deflection, or defensiveness. This man is irrelevant to my existence and we’re done interacting.

I deleted the email.

Then I emptied my trash folder.

I’d said what I wanted to say as opposed to letting him skate unscathed, and then denied him any further response from me. I felt good about it and happy to move on.

However, I’m not that highly evolved because a small part of me hopes whomever he rented it to for that weekend accidentally puts a hole in the drywall and breaks a bathroom tile.

Where it all started to come together: I Said What I Said And I’m Not Sorry