"I lost myself first-slowly, quietly, in the way that only happens when someone you trust makes you doubt everything you think and feel. It started with small things. A plan I made that somehow became her plan. An opinion I shared that she gently, persistently dismantled until I wasn't sure why I'd held it in the first place."
"What made it so hard to name was that it never looked like what I thought control looked like. There were no raised voices. No threats. Nothing dramatic enough to point at and say, 'There, that.' It was quieter than that. It was the weight of her disappointment."
"I stopped trusting my own instincts. Not suddenly, gradually, the way a muscle weakens from disuse. I had been told, in a hundred indirect ways, that my judgment was off. That I was too sensitive. That I misremembered things."
Manipulation in relationships can lead to a gradual loss of self-identity. Trusting someone deeply can blur personal boundaries, resulting in self-doubt and guilt. Small adjustments to please the other person can accumulate, leading to a significant deviation from one's true self. The absence of overt control makes it difficult to recognize the manipulation. Over time, one may begin to doubt their instincts and perceptions, believing they are the problem rather than acknowledging the unhealthy dynamics at play.
Read at Tiny Buddha
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