Cognitive and perceptual distortions

[11JB68]

After the incident this morning when uocpdh insisted that I might *think* I answered him... I've been thinking and reading more about cognitive and perceptual distortions.
These are the things that often strike me as 'wow, I really think h has a mental illness'.
I still see a possible manipulation there, a sense of him knowing what he's doing, but sometimes when things like this happen I feel like maybe he really doesn't experience reality the way the rest of us do. It sort of scares me. Maybe because it feels unsolvable.
I'm trying to remember a post I posted in the past that had something to do with packing for a trip... That struck me in a similar way...

[losingmyself]

I see this, also.
The other day we were talking about an actress and H said she was on Jay Leno. I paused because it didn't make sense to me, and said "she was on Jay Leno??" He said "no, Johnny Carson!"
My attempts to convince him that he said otherwise were met with anger. Now I wonder if he really believes that he said the wrong thing, or does he think he can gaslight me that easily?
This happens a lot.

[Stillirise]

I have experienced this several times.  It usually takes the form of something he insists I said. He never forgets, and has perfect recall, right? Except sometimes I know for sure I didn't say it.  He may have inferred that meaning by twisting something else I said.  Then, he takes his inference as an absolute statement of fact. 

Sometimes it is also the reverse, where he insists he didn't say something. That doesn't happen as often, because since MC, I rarely call him out when he distorts his own words.  I honestly don't believe anything he says, anyway.

It really is like living in alternate realities.

[SparkStillLit]

Oh yes! He SWEARS that he told me something or said something, even if it was just moments ago and I KNOW he didn't.  Conversely, when I call him on horrible shit he says to me (I rarely lose it and do this anymore), he will deny ever saying it, or go round in circles trying to put it on me, or simply stonewall.

[losingmyself]

There's a hundred stories I could tell about things he decided I or other people said, that are just plain wrong. But also, since you mention perceptual distortions, there's a way that he perceives people react. Even if it's completely wrong. I have to be very careful with things I text, making sure that they can't be taken the wrong way. Other people don't know this, so they go about having a regular conversation with him, until BOOM there it is, they say something the wrong way, and that places them in the 'all bad' category for the rest of eternity.  It could be the tone in which they said Hi to me.
I often will say "I didn't take it that way" or " I don't think that's how he/she meant that" But it won't change anything, I just want him to know I don't agree. Which pisses him off, too.

[11JB68]

 
Absolutely that! He gets so mad about a basic email or comment them is angry at that person forever

[Bowsy26]

I experience this also.  He claims I said something that I didn't or that he said something (like answered a question in the last 2 minutes) that he didn't.  Recently while walking the dog, a neighbor was in their driveway across the street and we visited for a few minutes.  The next day H was positive neighbor was on our side of the road  petting the dog while talking to us.  People are using social distancing and no one ever came and stood near us.  But he is positive and I am wrong. 

[11JB68]

I don't know if this is the same or related, may need to start a new post...
But he has this thing... Never wants to spend money or put in time etc to fix up the house. Will get bothered by some thing that has gone way past where it should (rotted shed door) come up with some hideous trashy quick fix, say it's temporary... It's not.
Then will obsess about some other thing and come up with, we should make our porch a 3 season porch!
Yeah when our bathroom needed to be remodeled 20 years ago and the economy is now tanked.
A year ago I told him I wanted him to run numbers for selling the house and renting.... Crickets...

[SparkStillLit]

Oms the not doing maintenance and then freaking out when it's a giant ordeal!!!

[Honey_B]

I experience this a lot with mother. Her listening is completely distorted when a matter is discussed that she disagrees with or if said by someone she doesnt' like.
I stood besides her when her sister said something but 2 minutes after her sister walked away, she claimed she said something completely different. I sometime wonder what would happen if I recorded her and played what was said back to her.

In my mother's case I am pretty sure it's manipulation because she never distorts what was said if it was something said by a person she likes or agrees with. Also, I think that manipulative behaviour can be come such an ingrown/automatic behaviour that they don't even think about it anymore. They dont know how to not manipulate what was said.

[tragedy or hope]

All the time. I have even said, let's write this down because I know in the future you will deny you said this. (something important to me.) answer: "no and I don't care. I am saying it now."

If I remind him later, days weeks or months; you're crazy. I never said that.If I have said something he previously acknowledged: "you didn't say that", or "I didn't hear you," or we never had that conversation." I now sometimes say, "what you remember does not change what I said whether you remember or not, I remember."

They know what they are doing. we are like pets to them. treat, no treat.... we can never tell. best way for me is don't try to look for anything real from him and know that what seems real  will be changed. 

[NumbLotus]

I have wanted to write down agreements, too. It's so infuriating and unsettling to have someone whose world just shifts every way the wind blows. For my H, he used to be a man of his word, but now he is ruled by the emotion he is feeling right now.

If we wrote down an agreement and he signed and dated it, it wouldn't matter. It's hard to even imagine what one would say in the face of such bald evidence, but he would find something. Most likely turning it into an attack on me that I am such a crazy manipulative witch that I would make him sign some silly childish thing which proves how crazy I am - what wife keeps a list of signed agreements? - and them twist it all for my manipulative Machiavellian purposes.

[Bowsy26]

 

I've thought of getting agreement in writing butt realize it wouldn't make a difference anyway. Now I'm leaving.  Cooperation would have been so nice...

[SparkStillLit]

If I had a nickel for every time I've wanted to write/record interactions and agreement....well.
I too know it wouldn't matter if I did.
You just have to find a way to sidestep and keep moving on with whatever it is .
It's like a dance I don't want to do. I'm no good at dancing and don't enjoy it.
I am finding that this behavior has suddenly increased like crazy. This and incessant little criticisms.
I'm working so hard on sidestepping that I feel like a horse constantly in full travers. It's wearing.

[heron]

Same here about them saying they said or didn't say things. I have gone so far as to record just to make sure I am not crazy after being told a hundred times "that never happened", "I never said that". Ofc then I get told I'm a horrible abuser for recording private conversations.

Now it's "Even if you had a recording I wouldn't believe you, it's probably a deepfake!" Just goes to show that it's not about reality/truth, it's about feelings and perception and there is no point in JADE they don't care it doesn't work.

[Feeling sick]

Wow , this is soo familiar, the no of times I have been told I need my ears checked, that I'm needing to see someone because what I think was said was not . Her perception of events is frequently not mine and she's always right. Trying to say that wasn't  how I see it doesn't work , it really plays with your head. What's real and what isn't becomes a hard thing to work out sometimes.

[SeaBreeze]

Yes, I also experience this frequently with uNPDh, including things he said he swears he didn't, things he's never said but swears he did, things he thinks I said, things he forgot I said... I can't figure out if it's gaslighting, or he honestly thinks it's the truth, or maybe a little of both, but I know it is NOT normal.

My uNPD mom just flat out made up and repeated stories that never even happened! Very frustrating and confusing to me as a child, a source of much conflict when I hit adolescence, and cause of 3 years NC in my 20s after she lied about me during a smear campaign. She passed away a few years ago but my brother and I scratch our heads to this day wondering WTH our mother came up with some of these details. Some were embellished with a basis in fact she twisted beyond truth, but most just completely fabricated from her delusions??

Like Stillrise has described above, "alternate realties" indeed! 

[SparkStillLit]

YESSSSSSS to all of it!!!!!  I never said, I definitely said, you never said, you definitely said, I remember CLEARLY (no you clearly do not)
We live in weird parallel universes.

[blunk]

I definitely experienced a lot of this....in all of the variations described by others. It was one of the most difficult behaviors for m to deal with. And it was one of the reasons that I started journaling. I didn't want to doubt myself down the road when I was hit with...I never said that...I didn't rage scream 3 inches from your face...you didn't even comfort me when I was upset after my mom died. There were some really bizarre scenarios.

But my BPDxh did once admitted that when I started to say something, he would listen to the first part and then "already know" what I was going to say next. And suddenly a lot of what I had been through made sense. His take on the conversation was different than mine, because he wasn't listening to what I actually said, but to what he thought I was going to say.

[Breadroll]

Very familiar patterns- xnpdh would do all of these- gaslighting? Did he really believe it?  I got the point where I would write a note to self on my phone, just so I wouldn't go crazy.  The worst was where he would swear he had been / not been somewhere . If I contradicted this, / once with photo évidence - he would get angry, and Make sure  to be unpleasant in a sort of revenge. I am so so so glad I don't have to put up with this any more