Tonight, Advice Goddess Radio, 7-8pm PT, 10-11pm ET: Dr. Robin Stern, Ph.D., Giving The Boot To The Manipulators In Your Life

Tonight, Advice Goddess Radio, 7-8pm PT, 10-11pm ET: Dr. Robin Stern, Ph.D., Giving The Boot To The Manipulators In Your Life
Ever had somebody keep telling you down is up and 2+2 is 5 until you break down and agree with them?

At first, you're all, "Naw, that's not how it is," but they keep at you and keep at you until you start to say "Maybe they're right..." against all your better judgment.

If you've had this experience -- and I think we've all had this experience -- you've experienced gaslighting, an insidious form of emotional abuse and manipulation. If you keep putting up with it, you can lose who you are and start living a life where you're walking on eggshells all the time, trying to avoid setting off the person who's been manipulating you.

Tonight on Advice Goddess Radio, 7-8pm Pacific, 10-11pm Eastern, therapist Dr. Robin Stern, Ph.D., on gaslighting -- what it is and how to stop it:

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/amyalkon/2012/02/07/advice-goddess-radio-amy-alkon

Listen live, call in (347-326-9761 when show is live), download the podcast afterward.

Stern is the author of a book, The Gaslight Effect: How to Spot and Survive the Hidden Manipulation Others Use to Control Your Life, that's helped many, many of my readers stop being victimized by partners, bosses, and others in their lives. I write about gaslighting and quote from her book here:

What your boyfriend's doing to you is "gaslighting," which, unfortunately, only sounds like lighting farts on fire. It's actually insidious emotional abuse that gets its name from the 1944 Ingrid Bergman movie, Gaslight, about an heiress whose husband makes small changes around their home (like making their gas-powered lights flicker), then denies anything's different, making her believe her sanity's gone off its hinges.

In a relationship, writes Dr. Robin Stern in The Gaslight Effect, you're being gaslighted when somebody relentlessly pressures you to believe the unbelievable and do what you know you shouldn't. Stern explains that the gaslighter "needs to be right in order to preserve his own sense of self and his sense of having power in the world," while the gaslightee allows him to bully away her sense of reality and self because she fears losing his love and approval. Of course, in your case, it could have something to do with not wanting to think you've wasted five years with "a selfish, manipulative ass." (Fart-play suddenly sounding inviting?)