It’s amazing how people can have differing opinions of the same book. Last May, the Lovefraud Reader Ox Drover wrote a review of The Gaslight Effect, by Dr. Robin Stern. I am always on the lookout for books that will help readers understand, and recover from, a traumatic entanglement with a sociopath. Because Oxy was so complimentary about The Gaslight Effect, I was anxious to read it, and possibly recommend it to others.
Well, I read the book, but I’m not sure I can recommend it.
Oxy did point out that Dr. Stern never mentions the word, “sociopath,” referring to the perpetrator as the “gaslighter,” and the victim as the “gaslightee.” Although Oxy was willing to look past this omission, I’m not.
First of all, let’s define “gaslighting.” According to Wikipedia:
Gaslighting is a form of psychological abuse in which false information is presented to the victim with the intent of making them doubt their own memory and perception. It may simply be the denial by an abuser that previous abusive incidents ever occurred, or it could be the staging of bizarre events by the abuser with the intention of disorienting the victim.
Gaslighting is nasty behavior. The problem I have with this book is that Dr. Stern never, ever mentions, not once, that a person who is gaslighting someone else may be malicious, controlling, and intent on destroying the soul of the victim. She does not mention that the gaslighter may be mentally and emotionally abusing someone else, simply for his or her amusement. She does not say that the gaslighter may be evil.
Here’s how Dr. Stern defines the gaslighting relationship:
The Gaslight Effect results from a relationship between two people: a gaslighter, who needs to be right in order to preserve his own sense of self and his sense of having power in the world; and a gaslightee, who allows the gaslighter to define her sense of reality because she idealizes him and seeks his approval.
This definition makes it seem like the two parties—gaslighter and gaslightee—are equally responsible for the dynamics. I don’t think that’s true. Then, a few pages later, Dr. Stern writes:
Of course, neither of you may be aware of what’s really happening. The gaslighter may genuinely believe every word he tells you or sincerely feel that he’s only saving you from yourself. Remember: He’s being driven by his own needs. Your gaslighter might seem like a strong, powerful man, or he may appear to be an insecure, tantrum-throwing little boy; either way, he feels weak and powerless. To feel powerful and safe, he has to prove that he is right, and he has to get you to agree with him.
Excuse me while I barf. Sociopaths who engage in gaslighting do not feel weak and powerless. They are motivated by dominance and feel totally entitled to do what they want and take what they want, even if it is someone else’s sanity.
Three types of gaslighters
Next, Dr. Stern describes three types of gaslighters—the Glamour Gaslighter, the Good-Guy Gaslighter, and the Intimidator. She spends the most time describing the Glamour Gaslighter:
He lets you know you’re the most wonderful woman in the world, the only one who’s ever understood him, the fairy-tale princess who has magically transformed his life. He’ll transform your life, too, he implies or even promises, he’ll shower you with affection, take you to wonderful places, sweep you off your feet with gifts or intimate confessions or sexual attention of a kind you’ve never known before.
This is a perfect description of a sociopath in full seduction mode. But Dr. Stern doesn’t seem to get it. Instead, she explains that this man is in love with the idea of a relationship. He likes to be a leading man, and is looking for a leading lady to fill her part.
Dr. Stern describes the Good-Guy Gaslighter as someone who needs to appear reasonable and good, but is deeply committed to getting his own way. She spends the least amount of time describing the Intimidator, perhaps because the problems are so obvious—put-downs, yelling, bullying, guilt trips and other types of punishment. In order for a relationship with an Intimidator to be more satisfying, she says, the Intimidator will need to alter his way of relating. Yeah, right.
Stress response
Much of this book describes sample cases of gaslightees trying to understand and cope with gaslighters. I’m sure this helps people realize and identify what is going on in these relationships.
The book, however, falls down when Dr. Stern explains why this behavior happens. She writes, “Gaslighting is a response to stress; people become either gaslighters or gaslightees when they feel threatened.”
Sociopaths don’t engage in gaslighting because they’re stressed. They engage in it because it’s who they are and what they do. And victims don’t become gaslightees because of stress. They are trapped because of a psychopathic bond created by the predator.
Then, Dr. Stern asks the reader to be honest:
Think about the ways in which you aren’t being your best self. Do you set off your gaslighter by being overly critical or demanding? Do you belittle your gaslighter or play on his vulnerabilities? Do you say or do things that you know will make him crazy?
Gee, the people I hear from are walking on eggshells trying not to set the guy off. Until, of course, it gets so bad that they have not choice but to explode.
What’s your view?
In the last chapter, Dr. Stern offers three courses of action for people in these situations: Changing the gaslighting relationship from within, limiting a gaslighting relationship, or leaving the relationship. Yes, these are the three choices, and the book offers suggestions on how to decide what to do.
When considering whether to stay in the relationship and change it from within, Dr. Stern reminds the reader to be compassionate, both for herself and the gaslighter. She writes:
You don’t have to put up with unlimited bad treatment, but if your gaslighter persists in gaslighting you, you can remind yourself that he is also suffering, perhaps even more than you are. After all, he almost certainly grew up in a home where he was gaslighted by someone and couldn’t make it stop—so now he doesn’t understand why you have the power to say no.
Is this true? I am asking an honest question of Lovefraud readers here, and I would appreciate your feedback. Have any of you ever been subjected to gaslighting by someone who was basically a good person with problems? Can any of you attribute gaslighting behavior to the perpetrator’s stress or internal pain? Or, do you feel that gaslighting behavior is due to sociopathic traits?
Afraid to recommend
Overall, I have mixed feelings about this book, The Gaslight Effect. The author does a good job of explaining what the behavior looks like, and the questions victims should ask themselves to determine what is really going on. She offers strategies for coping with the behavior, including leaving the relationship.
But Dr. Stern seems to come from that school of therapy that believes both parties contribute equally to relationship problems. Throughout the entire book, I kept waiting for the author to warn the reader that some gaslighters have dangerous, pathological personality disorders, and they should run, not walk, for the nearest exit. The warning never came.
Therefore, I’m afraid to recommend the book, because it may encourage people to stay and try to work things out with an abuser. And the longer people stay in a gaslighting relationship, the more power they lose, and the harder it is to finally leave.
Oxy,
I’m not at all offended. At the time it was painful to know that you were pulling away from me, but it was necessary. I was in denial and wanted to find answers that made sense. The answer is that I can’t help him and he doesn’t want help. He is disordered and will never be a good partner for anyone.
Thank you for everything and especially for saying your proud of me, that is a huge endorsement!!!!
Hope4joy,
thanks for your kind words.
I probably come across as more confident than I am – even to MYSELF. Deep down, that spath has probably shaken me to the core. I can’t feel it, but I see it in my behavior.
It scares me. Then the parental stuff… icky.
I like what you wrote to Oxy, we can support each other, but this growing up is ultimately our own journey and no one can do it for us – darn it, I was going to try to hire someone…and get my parents to pay for it. 🙂
Skylar,
You mean we can’t hire someone to grow up for us? Dang, I really was thinking of hiring a handy person to take over all my problems, do you have a coupon for “Grown up replacement surgery”? It might be covered 80/20 under my insurance.
You are doing fine, starting to trust the bf more and figuring out your parents. Whatever they are, you can decide how much you want them in your life, limiting their ability to hurt you further. This is what I have to do with my dad. He is a narcissist and I can’t get too close because he will do something to hurt me. He is not deliberately hurtful, he just can’t see beyond his own needs and he will never change. So limiting time with him is the best thing for my sanity.
I think he is harmless but at times he scares me with all the guns he owns and talking about shooting idiots, thankfully, he is halfway across the country. He uses a target of Osama Bin Laden for target practice at the range.
LOL,
how about we get a Groupon Coupon for Grown up replacement surgery?
Distance from the parents does help buffer. My N dad, doesn’t bother me, it’s my saintly mom that scares me. creeps me out how much I have always loved her and now think she lies all the time. Reminds me of the P.
Maybe normal people don’t inspire the kind of devotional love that P’s do? Maybe we can recognize them by how WE feel about them?
KIM –
“The rocks in his head fit the holes in mine.”
Wow! That IS so true for some of us. I followed all of the comments on “codependency” etc. posted above and would like to add my two cents’ worth – While I agree with other posters that a relationship with a spath does not a “co-dependent” make, and that an abusive upbringing (family of origin stuff) does not an abuser make, I DO think that an abusive family of origin and/or a co-dependent personality make us more vulnerable.
To explain – as we know and continue to have proven to us here – ANYONE (no matter how clever, secure, privileged, supported or wealthy) can be conned by a spath. By the time my spath got to me (and in spite of past abuses and traumas in my life, which I had overcome by then), I was cool with who I was. I was in a comfortable position (even if not wealthy), I had a good, secure job that I loved, I lived in a nice house in a nice area, I had good friends, my health was reasonable, my social life was all I needed it to be at that time and I had plans and goals I was working happily towards. I had voluntarily left a 3-year relationship with an otherwise good, but alcoholic man who simply wouldn’t address his issues and had become a danger by insisting on driving drunk. It was sad to leave him, but I knew I deserved better than what the relationship had become, mostly due to his addiction. I believed in me and was happy just being by myself. I had been pursued by a very good-looking man shortly after moving into my own place, but after dating him for several weeks, was able to decide that he was not the one for me (among other things, he told stupid and unnecessary lies for no apprent reason) and ended that relationship quickly and decisively. When he called and wrote begging me to reconsider, I rinsed and repeated, “No. This will not work for me.”
So – I was NOT (I don’t think) in an especially vulnerable position when the spath rocked up some months later. Also – some of the victims on LF had none of the past baggage that I had. It is not a given that baggage and past abuse guarantee vulnerability to spaths. EVERYONE is vulnerable to spaths.
Having said that, I would like to say this – baggage and past abuse and/or a tendency to a “co-dependent” personality (or way of doing things) probably ensures our vulnerability just that little bit more; I think we might be a little bit easier to spot, assess, target and overcome. I think that perhaps we might go down more quickly than other victims and that perhaps we might stay down and trapped for longer. We might also find it more difficult to extricate ourselves and stick to our determination to go “no contact”. We might be inclined to go back more times and/or to stay longer than others perhaps might.
Perhaps our “predispositon” (as a past victim of abuse and/or co-dependency) makes it pan out harder or worse or stickier for us than it might otherwise have been. Just my thoughts….
skylar –
“My programming has been that control= love. That is what my parents did to me, so it must be true, right?”
I agree. On some level we KNOW that it’s wrong and unhealthy. We fight to escape that programming and vow to avoid relationships with people who “look like” our controlling parent/parents; yet we hook up with it anyhow. I actively sought to marry a man who was the opposite of my (possibly N) father. My first husband could not have been more different on the surface to my father. However, when it came down to the stuff that mattered – the control freakiness, the disapproval of me, the arrogance, the verbal and physical violence and the cruelty – he was EXACTLY the same. I married my father. By not understanding exactly what it was that I should have been avoiding, I avoided all of the things that were obvious, but not important, and picked up all of the things that were not obvious (at that stage of my learning and experience) but were the most important.
Eva –
“most of “psychologists” know about psychopathy much more less than the psychopaths’ victims do because most of those lack the practise. It’s necessary to suffer any psychopath in order to understand psychopathy. It’s not enough at all with just the theoretical study of the charter “Psychopathy” of the books they studied at university”
Amen sister! A few more “case studies” in their training would not go astray!
Nottoolate –
Ex was …. not the financially irresponsible, substance-addicted, “immoral”, flaky type of person. In fact, I always thought he was a very “moral” person. … I didn’t think leaving was an option. Most of my friends still think that way, even after knowing the history of violence, his criminal record, the assault, child abuse. etc.”
Violence? Criminal record? Assault? Child abuse?
NTL, immorality goes further than your sexual habits or telling the truth. The things you have listed are VERY immoral. As far as honesty goes, also, to hide the truth or omit to tell it when you should, is the same thing as lying. I don’t understand how you could have thought him a “moral” person if he did these things?
“Is it something about the way I write that is offputting?”
No. I gave this a lot of thought – the question of why this site might be different to other forums. This is what I came up with – it’s just my opinion, so feel free to argue or ignore –
we here (at LF) are by and large the victims of sociopaths. I know that there are other situations, involving other personality disorders and mental illnesses, but the overwhelming majority of us appear to have tangled with spaths. Spaths (regardless of what the particular “supply” is that they individually seek) target people who would give them the time of day. They target kind and decent people; people who would give the benefit of the doubt; people who would lend a helping hand; people who believe (or, who used to believe…) that “everyone deserves a second chance”; people who are generous; people who are loving, open, affectionate and/or demonstrative. We are the type of prey that is attractive to them.
The same things that make us attractive prey for bad people, are the good qualities that also make us a cohesive, responsive, helpful online community. We are NICE people. It worked agaginst when it came to our engagement with the spaths bUT it works FOR us here, where we share with like-minded people in our healing journeys. JMHO.
skylar –
“I think this is where I am stuck: in my childhood….. I still feel stuck with my programming. I think my programmers did an exceptional job on me, because ….It’s not enough to KNOW the truth about my parents, I have to feel it and I don’t. All I feel is the need for my mommy to approve and love me. It sucks. ”
I am so very with you on this Sky. I was like it with mine until a few years back. It resolved a whole lot when I went NC with them for a few years, but resurfaced once we wre back in touch. By then, I could manage my mother (who is not the main offender, but is definitely the enabler he needs to wave his magic wand effectively) but was right back in the trap of seeking my father’s approval again, like the 3 year old who never had it either. I eventually realised that if I had not had that unconditional love and approval when I was a gorgeous little child, who was cute, polite, well-behaved’ kind-hearted and good at school, there was no way on God’s green earth that I would have any of that stuff once I had formed my own opinions and was making decisons as a adult that were out of his control and jurisdiction; even if they had been decisions he would made himself, he was no longer the puppet-master; I now got to pull my own strings.
I wish I could tell you when it was that I stopped caring about his approval or opinions. It was well after I started ignoring them, which is not at all the same thing as not feeling the weight of them. The weight shifted some years back and has stayed gone. I am NC with him right now, but not as a result of that weight shifting. It had already been gone a long time when he crossed a line in late 2009 and I never went back.
Hmm…. another mega-post. Best go do some housework and let someone else talk for a while! 🙂
Mega good post, Auzzie girl!
LL….sorry. It wasn’t you that wrote that you came from a loving family.
My niece just met a guy in a state south of here where she was living. Not sure of the whole story..but she move back to this state and he moved in with her. She was supporting him….(red flag). Then I see on FB, that she is so angry! She called him a lying sociopath!
I’m not close to her, but my sister, …her mother..is a sociopath who abandoned her and my nephew…her brother. He took his own life at age 24. Why? Because my sister abandoned them when they were young…and he never got over it. …the loss of his mother. So, when his g/f of 5 yrs left him…it brought up old “issues” and it was too painful…so he took his own life.
Very sad.
So, even though many women who are targetted by conmen/socios..appear to be “succesful”…”confident” etc…
we never know what childhood “issues” they have.
I am an example…Masters Degree, career girl…travelled around the world…attractive…outgoing…smart..etc….
But, deep down, due to my abusive childhood….I was insecure, didn’t feel worthwhile….sufferred from anxiety and depression…..
Noone knew that side of me. We all have a persona…and a shadow.
Aussie,
GREAT summary of everyone’s situation! I, like you, could care less about my Spathy family’s opinions or anything else about me. There are times that it bothers me, holidays, etc…but I no longer seek to give my Spathy family any gratification with hurting me now.
Aussie, I have a tendency to agree with you about the codependency issues and how vulnerable we are or are not. I too have seen people in here who were NOT going in with the baggage that I did either. One of the things I recognized when I NC’d bio fam was that the ONLY toxic individual left in my life was exPOS. I had incorporated new friends into my life from school (all great healthy people!) got rid of the ones that weren’t and retained a few from the past, one I allowed to stay but with HUGE boundaries attached. Amazingly enough, that IS working out. She’s no longer verbally abusive TO ME, because I WILL NOT tolerate it any longer. And frankly, I just don’t have too.
ONe of the things that’s dawned on me (LOTS of enlightenments today) while reading here and posting and reading and posting is that my grieving over the loss of this relationshit is truly TRULY very symbolic in nature….because it’s also a grieving of what has ALWAYS BEEN for me, surrounded by toxic people, spathy or not. Even though this change is a healthy one for me and my life, there is a very DEEP grieving about the letting go of the one tie that kept me plugged into my abusive past.
I think you’re right on that level. I can see my vulnerability because when POS came into my life, EVERYTHING was chaotic and dramatic. There were differences in initial appearances and such (ex hubbyP, POSspath), I admittedly did not SEE those differences. Because first was more violent and raging (almost all the time), POS seemed a calming walk in the park. Yea, right. How WRONG that really was!!! If anything he was more DANGEROUS because he was so STEALTH!!!
I have lots of work left to do. I’m ok with that. I don’t even want to THINK of dating or trying a relationship, if ever again. My therapist I had last said, “LL, never say never, because then you set yourself up again”. There might be some truth to that, but I can say I don’t WANT a relationship right now and I don’t know that I will EVER want a relationship again. I need to learn to be happy with me, and all the other stuff in my life. I don’t need a man to rescue me. Particularly not a POSspath. But all of this awareness of my vulnerabilities, venting about family history and all the abuse…almost creates a fear right now, almost a very protective feeling FOR MYSELF….It’s not great, and it will take a long time, and it’s HARD, but I think this is probably the single most important and RIGHT decision I’ve ever made in my life.
Aussie, your comments are particularly helpful to me, as well as discouraging in some respects. I guess it’s a good example in that even if you OVERCOME your abusive baggage, you can still attract these people. THAT is really scary!!! I hate to think that we all have to be HYPERVIGILANT (and I will be for a long time) but it’s made me MUCH more aware of what’s going on around me and if I would be approached, even in a healthy, healed state, it could still happen. UGH!! But if we’re empathic human beings, aren’t we BOUND to have some vulnerabilities? I don’t want to stop being a kind, caring, loving person, just more aware, and much more SELF PROTECTIVE….
Thanks for your insights, Aussie. They are always well thought out. I learn a lot from you.
I think I have AHHD.
I get so overwhelmed. I want to thank for posts recieved but, after scrolling down the posts my memory forgot what I wanted to write.
I’m trying to read posts instead of skipping to what I wrote. I am not too good at this. I wanna stop being selfish and give to others and help with a kind word if I can.
I find that reading though the posts is kinda like walking through a croud of people and knowing what everyone is thinking. All these posts keep your mind busy, so insightful and I want to respond, and you can only take it one thought at a time. Then I feel like I can’t even deal with that one post cause so many posts have happened about different issues after the last post I read.
I look at it like a deer in headlights.