Manipulation manifesting as gaslighting in marriage breakdown

It’s so common in broken marriages that one party will up the ante on the other and make it harder than ever for the other to simply survive.  This is often overt but can be just as often covert where gaslighting is so prevalent it causes everyone to do double takes continually.  Unfortunately, and very sadly, this happens just as much in separated Christian marriages as it does in those without a faith or other faith.

Narcissism is no respecter of faith systems.
The narcissist delights in deluding people.

I want to focus on the most common dynamic I find in counselling, and that is when the husband turns friends and family against the wife, manipulating existing relationships through classic gaslighting, where they’re skilled exponents of DARVO — defend-and-reverse-victim-and-offender.  Those who engage in the Ninja craft of DARVO manipulate the perceptions of bystanders so they, the aggressor, look like the victim, and the real victim is made out to look like the aggressor, the unreasonable, unreliable, untrustworthy one.  Those who engage in DARVO challenge and confuse everyone except the one who knows what to look for.

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Of course, what we find, is not only the manifestation of manipulation but also the other tools that Psalm 82 Initiative have identified, and that is intimidation, isolation, and deflection.  The ex-husband deflects the resistance that the ex-wife responds with — everyone in their right mind responds to abuse, at least initially, with resistance.  The isolating behaviour of getting friends and family to take his side is what we find.  And his direct attacks against his ex-wife, those that others don’t readily see or put up with, are motivated and exacted in intimidation.  She doesn’t feel safe in his presence, and yet even in his absence she feels dogged by the mere threat of his presence.

What is the ex-wife able to do in the situations?  She won’t win any battles fighting the way he fights, that’s for sure.  He’s got the market cornered on that front.  And, besides, in the present context, she’s not capable of fighting like he fights.

So, what does she do?  I’m not sure that trite answers are helpful, and because the nuances and dynamics in abuse situations are so variegated, I firstly just want to empathise.

It can feel as if you’re going crazy when people are believing wrong things about you given wrong information they’re fed.  Part of the issue is one of gender.  Society still favours the strength and compelling nature of a manipulative male.  Society doesn’t cope well with overbearing “confident” types, which are ironically those who, deeper down, are the most threatened individuals.  There’s no question there are manipulative females, but they’re not in the frame in the present context.

Add to the manipulation is the isolating effect of losing the confidence and support of key family and friends.  Think about it this way.  If there is any situation where you feel your ex-partner strategically wooing others to their side with lies and half-truths (lies), their isolating of you is evidence of their capacity for manipulative behaviour.  Reasonable people don’t manipulate others and situations routinely for their own advantage.  Put yourself in the situation.  Would you have the capacity to routinely manipulate a person and situations for your own advantage?  It is in your best interest to be honest.

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Now there are two scenarios: people are isolated for the right reasons (this is called boundaries) and people are isolated for the wrong reasons (this is called abuse).  It depends on the heart behind each.

The latter approach preferences one person or maybe two, certainly only a few, and others are exploited, whilst the former approach considers all, is fair and respectful, and employs boundaries only because it must.

When someone has chosen to manipulate people and situations, and they do it so constantly that you don’t know whether you’re coming or going, there is very little advice that can be given.  And I sense you know that.  More is the case that you need empathy, and encouragement to continue to do the right thing even though wrong things are done to you all the time.

To get out of what we would call “victim-mode” is a challenge but not one that cannot be overcome.

First, be thankful if you operate in a way that honours the truth at all times.  Be thankful that you are respectful at every juncture.  Be thankful that you have the capacity to absorb the wrongdoing done against you.  Be thankful that someone can see everything that goes on, and that one is God.  Be thankful that integrity matters more than winning, for those who win through manipulation ensure that everyone including themselves lose.  Be thankful that as a parent, all your children need is one good parent.  YOU are their example by your calm, reasonable, reliable, rational, logical, responsible ways of responding.  Take a humble sense of pride in the fact that you are a safe person, not least for the children themselves who need a safe person in their lives in order to prosper and to develop properly, giving them the best start they can have going forward into an ever more concerning and confronting world.

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One motto I live by is “threatened people threaten people.”  I’ve seen it so much in others and I’ve seen it in myself.  Whenever we’ve been demanding in our life it’s usually because we’ve been feeling threatened, and thereby, when we’ve not been conscious of the fact, we can be a threat to others.  For most of us, just being aware of this is empowering.  It helps us because we don’t want to be unkind.  But for some people, there’s not the awareness and that’s usually because there’s a strong sense of entitlement driving their attitudes and behaviour.

In the choice between being true to your children and other relationships and maintaining your integrity, and not doing these things, be thankful if you can’t compromise.  God has made you this way.  Even though wrongdoing will be done against you, over time you will “reap a harvest [of goodness] if you do not give up.”  (Galatians 6:9)

IMPORTANT NOTE: these dynamics do also occur in reverse where the woman is the manipulative gaslighter AND, of course, so very often it happens that both partners engaging in manipulative gaslighting of the other.