We Do Therapy: Yes, You Did Say That!

Therapy Lesson #6: Be Curious—Is it Gaslighting or Dissociation?

In the introductory posts to this weekly, We Do Therapy series (available to paid subscribers). Scott and I shared both the struggles and triumphs of two young adults who believed they had found someone who would care for them. Our intent in the initial posts and this series of Therapy Lessons is not to offer marriage advice. We are not licensed therapists. We are survivors who hope that what we share about our journey together will help others to be curious about how trauma might be impacting their marriage. Hopefully, far sooner than we did! (Please read the statement at the end of this post.)

AI Generated Image that has some issues: “What did you say?”

Therapy Lesson #6: Be Curious—Is it Gaslighting or Dissociation?

“But you said . . .”

“I never said that!”

Sounds like gaslighting doesn’t it? Not that it changes how disorienting and damaging it can be, but what if what we see as gaslighting might sometimes be a symptom of dissociation? Would it matter? It might so let’s be curious.

Dissociation is too complex for one article to cover the topic but it is a beginning! The coping strategies included in dissociation fall on a spectrum from daydreaming or losing oneself in a book at one end to the other end which includes complex coping strategies employed by those who have experienced severe trauma. On this far end of the spectrum, dissociation is identified as various dissociative disorders which are better explained as responses to trauma. In between the two ends of the spectrum are all the ways humans cope with stress, both normal, everyday stress, and toxic stress.

Dissociating—or distancing ourselves—from life's overwhelm isn’t always unhealthy! However, when dissociation impacts life and relationships, it becomes a problem. Not recognizing it is happening is certainly problematic.

Because of our trauma histories, Scott and I could probably put a checkmark on every spot of the dissociative spectrum. Remarkably, for thirty-five of our forty-five years of marriage, we thought feeling like we were living just outside of ourselves was how everyone felt and lived. Neither of us was ever fully present in our body or life.

The important truth is this: We could not have survived any other way—not without the professional help we have received over the past ten years.

Ninety percent of the time, we were completely functional adults holding down professional jobs and being decent parents. Outwardly, we were doing great, inwardly our nervous systems were on constant high alert Dissociating was one way to cope with this—tightly controlling ourselves was the other.

Miraculously, it all worked out pretty well until it didn’t. As I often mention, it is like holding a beach ball under the water. You cannot do that forever. If we had not gotten help, we would have likely begun to blame each other for being really lousy partners. Only understanding how trauma impacted each other helped us through. Distinguishing between what the other was doing as being either intentional or the result of dissociation was tricky.