Podcast Player Episode 042

Dr. Robin Stern: Welcome to The Gaslight Effect podcast. I'm Robin Stern, co-founder and associate director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, and author of the bestselling book, The Gaslight Effect. I'm an educator and a psychoanalyst, but first and foremost, I'm a wife, a mother, a sister, aunt, and healer. And just like many of you, I was a victim of gaslighting. Please join me for each episode as I interview fascinating guests and explore the concept of gaslighting. You'll learn what it truly means to be gaslighted, how it feels, how to recognize it, and how to understand it, and ultimately how to get out of it.

Dr. Robin Stern: Before we begin, I want you to know that talking about gaslighting can bring up challenging and painful emotions. Give yourself permission to feel them. Some of you may wanna go more deeply with your emotions. While some of you may hold them more lightly, no matter what you're feeling, know that your emotions are a guide to your inner life. Your emotions are sacred and uniquely you respect and embrace them for they have information to give you. If you want to listen to other episodes of the Gaslight Effect podcast, you can find them at robinstern.com or wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for being here with me. Welcome everyone to this episode of The Gaslight Effect podcast. I'm really excited today to have with me Jessica Willis Fisher, singer, songwriter, author, and advocate, advocate for people who are suffering, struggling with emotional abuse and trying to leave that situation

Jessica Willis Fisher: Correct. Thank you so much for having me, .

Dr. Robin Stern: Thank you for joining me. Jessica, please tell us your story.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Yeah, in a, in a nutshell, I grew up, um, in a large performing family. I was homeschooled. Um, we were evangelical Christians, um, conservative of many of our worldviews. And, um, yeah, it was all, you know, as a child, there isn't a huge distinction between what's just our religion, what is an educational decision, what's a career decision? So I ended up, if you were to flash forward to kind of the really, um, the crux of the matter, I ended up being in my early twenties, um, in a family band on tv. We were called the Willis Clan, and there was this outward picture that we were this wholesome positive, you know, family making music and art together, um, kind of for the glory of God and, you know, for these, um, important purposes. Um, but the chapter that was being left out of the story was the fact that my dad was, um, abusive in so many of the ways that people can be, it feels like every way.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Um, but he was sexually abusive. He was, of course, if you're sexually and violently abusive, you're being emotionally abusive as well. Um, financially controlled. My relationships were controlled and I came to this point where I couldn't continue to do my very necessary part in keeping that outward show going. I was living essentially two lives, three lives, just com you know, my sanity was barely hanging on and it was becoming extremely dangerous, and I wasn't sure I was going to survive, and I was supported in getting out of that situation. And so in my early twenties, I was restarting my life, um, trying to figure out how one moved through this world that I had kind of looked like I belonged to, but really hadn't because I was in kind of a mini cult. You know, there was the psychological control, um, and coercion. And I, I've learned a lot about, um, abuse, how it happens, grooming, um, high control groups, things like gaslighting, you know, hearing some of these terms for the first time and realizing, oh, I have a lived ex, you know, 20 years of lived experience of that was pretty wild.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Um, and so I did a lot of therapy for a number of years. I was able to participate in, um, bringing my dad to justice. He is serving 40 years, um, in prison for, um, some of his crimes, of as many crimes. Um, but yeah, I reclaimed my voice in music since that's what I had grown up doing and had had a deep love for. I've put my story into a first book, um, and that's been deeply cathartic and healing and purposeful, and that's turned into speaking and advocacy, um, you know, abuse, childhood abuse, um, emotional abuse is something that basically, if you haven't experienced it, someone you know or love either has or will. So it, it feels like it's everywhere. Um, and that can be heavy and hard. Um, but if you wanna be a part of the change, um, you know, you can have a deeply meaningful, um, cause to work towards for the rest of your life. And that's where I find myself and sharing my story has been healing for me. And it's crazy to feel some of the most beautiful and meaningful things that I experience now have kind of been this alchemy process of taking the hardest things that I've been through and, and trying to make something good out of them. So there's, you know, we can dive in wherever you'd like, but that's a little bit of the overview of my story.

Dr. Robin Stern: Well, thank you. Thank you for telling us and sharing it with me. So I would like to dive in, um, particularly about, uh, when you began to know when were you really aware as a child that what was going on was, certainly you knew it was other than what you were presenting to the world, but did you, let me ask that a little bit differently. Did you know all along it was not okay? And what were you told about why these things were happening? In other words, what was the gas sighting you were, you expected to believe that this, your loving parents had your best interest at heart and they were doing all these things for you while they were, while your dad was actually doing things to you that were not like that? I'll stop talking and let you tell the story. Sure.

Jessica Willis Fisher: , you know, it's, I think this applies probably to many people's stories of abuse. It is hard to articulate. It's hard to process, it's hard to know. And I feel like I'm doing my best. And my book was a comprehensive effort to not just think about it and, well, I think it was this, to really recall experientially which moments I seemed to come to understand which part of a complicated situation. And so I'll try to, um, you know, that work is not fully done in my book. I was able to capture some of it and articulate it in context. We can talk about some of those kind of like highlights. Um, but I do think the fullest context that we can give really does matter. It helps us understand how these things happen, how to try to prevent them, how, you know, and my story.

Jessica Willis Fisher: It's wild to see how it follows the pattern. These universal patterns of like grooming a lot of times look so similar, but the differences do matter. And it's interesting to kind of dive into those. Um, for me, um, I think it's important to, you know, some of the broad strokes because there was this religious, um, framework that was being used in my family. Um, there were a number of things, you know, our religion, like many people's experience with religion, um, has a patriarchal construct to it. So, you know, we believed that God the father, um, you know, was the ultimate father, the ultimate authority, the ultimate, you know, deity patriarch. But that was modeled by the human men in our circles. So my father had a very similar role. My grandfather, who was an actual pastor, um, you know, these were the shepherds. These were the people that God put in control and we were supposed to obey them.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Now, not necessarily the same thing as obeying God, because if, if a man tells you to do something versus God tells you to do something else else, you're supposed to obey God. But I think it's unfair to look at a child and expect a child to be able to really differentiate when that clash may be happening. So if I'm told to not question my father, and yet in certain, in certain circumstances, I would be expected to question, you know, I think that's unfair and is a type of gaslighting that I still experience, um, in a broader religious context. Because for me, I, I loved my father. Um, I did not have the experience of never having the desire to make him proud of me, make him happy to be the good little girl I had that that was my default. And, you know, my earliest experiences of sexual abuse were not something that were painful or, um, or filled me with fear.

Jessica Willis Fisher: They were confusing. They were something that I didn't understand what just happened. But if we can hold space for our really early childhood selves, that's a daily occurrence, right? So when we're three and a half and four, which are some of my earliest memories, period, and include memories of abuse, every day we eat a food or hear a word or have some sort of experience that we look to the adults around us to help us interpret or label. Right? And so for me, I did have, um, this one of, you know, these first few memories that I have, which include these, um, what I would now say sexually abusive, um, experiences. I had this inclination to be like, I should kind of ask my, I should tell my mom or ask my mom what just happened. Um, but I didn't know what I would've said.

Jessica Willis Fisher: 'cause I didn't know how to describe what just happened. Um, my father was touching a part of my body that I didn't have a name for. You know, I put that line in my book 'cause it's the best way to describe like, kind of the unspeakable, not like a horror or a fear, but just a confusion, uh, not having whatever context it is that I need to be able to process this experience that I just had. Now, um, that being said, um, you know, how do we navigate 20 years basically of experience that I had? So, you know, that's one point in the process. Um,

Dr. Robin Stern: Also, if I, if you don't mind my interrupting, since you were on, um, national television Mm-Hmm. . And you were performing when you were little, I'm assuming as well? Yes.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Well, that didn't really happen until I was in my late teens. So some of my younger siblings would've been young during that period of time. But, you know, 20, I was born in 1992, and it wasn't until, yes, I was doing music, I was on various stages, but it was really 20 14, 20 15, 26, well, 2012 to 2016. There were like four years of that. And I was a lot older at that point.

Dr. Robin Stern: Okay. So that you, there, you weren't living that dichotomy yet? You weren't living having Not

Jessica Willis Fisher: Quite yet. I would say that, you know, the initial chapters of my life that I can remember were quite normal in that, um, the only thing that set us apart is we already had quite a few kids. You know, not everybody's one of five, six kids. Um, but we had a big family pretty quickly over those initial years. But, you know, four kids is not unheard of. Five kids is not unheard of. 12 is much less common. But it didn't start that way. And, you know, my mom had studied teaching. She taught us at home. It wasn't that extreme to, you know, not go to kindergarten instead to have your mom who knew how to teach you, teach you. Um, we went to, we went to church on Sundays. Lots of people do. Our grandpa was the pastor that wasn't that abnormal. My dad worked nine to five, as many people do.

Jessica Willis Fisher: So, you know, that was really a quite a normal shape as time went on and we continued to be homeschooled into middle school years and high school years, you know, that was less and less common is we had double digits kids in our family. That was less common. Um, my dad was able to retire. It's a long story. We can go into it if you'd like. Um, but due to some actual tragedy in our family, my father got money from a wrongful death settlement and was able to retire in his like mid to early thirties, I think. And so he had a lot more access to us. He had a lot more control with money comes power and control. And so he was able to kind of make a life that I don't think would've been possible . He can't have 10, 12 kids and just work a regular nine to five and have the ability to fund all sorts of kind of strange things. And I think between having a large family and my dad's money, and then the way those things combined to let him kind of LI think he had delusions and thoughts and things in his head that would've kind of gone probably un unrealized, um, if this hadn't been the path. But that eventually led to tv, which gave him quite a large megaphone.

Dr. Robin Stern: So I read, um, the, the story of your dad and the tragedy, losing siblings and his parents being in that horrific car accident. And did he talk with you about it? I mean, clearly he was traumatized and whatever he's done in his life since def definitely was impacted by, you

Jessica Willis Fisher: Know, I have spent quite a bit of time trying to think empathetically, um, towards both my parents and my grandparents. And you know, I try to be in an empathetic state of mind when thinking of anyone's story. I think we're all going through things and if we, we, I do kind of tend to agree with that idea that if we knew everyone's full stories, like we would be so much more understanding. I'm in no means wanting or excusing, wanting to excuse things that my dad did or that I did, or that others did. Um, I think it's empathy and accountability are important to, to balance. Um, that being said, you know, my dad, um, basically I was, when I got into therapy and I was trying to make sense of 24 years of all the processing that I had put off, all the emotional work, all of the, just admitting what I had gone through, the lying to myself and therefore, you know, not admitting it to anyone else, um, you know, I was trying to take my experience and understand it in greater context.

Jessica Willis Fisher: And to learn that other little girls are touched and abused by their dad is sad and yet means that it's not just your fault or just a problem with you, or just a problem with your dad. Like, what was wrong with me that this was done to me? Or what was wrong with him that he did this? You realize it's so much greater than any one person's choices or issues. And I came at it from a more general point of view, learning that most sexual abusers were abused themselves. Um, learning that, you know, violent, um, whether it be head injury or repetitive injury or CTE or things like that can create a loss of empathy and a uptick of violence in people. Um, learning that high control philosophies and religions in one sense can attract people who have issues and or exacerbate issues that people have.

Jessica Willis Fisher: And I think, um, that certainly was present in my, so I'm seeing all these things. I will probably never be able to confirm it, but it does seem like my dad experienced abuse in his childhood. He had injuries, he had great loss and trauma with losing his siblings. To your question about whether we talked about that or not, um, I would say yes and no. Um, you know, I think my dad, there was something missing. My experience was that there was something missing in him, being able to truly, I mean, when you just sit back and look at the sexual violence and emotional violence that he did, obviously we healthy people have something in us that keeps us from doing that to others. Like you have to dehumanize others. And I think that to some degree, when we're able to visit such harm on other people, we're probably already doing that to ourselves internally.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Um, so I think that for me, if I go back to dad's younger self or the parts of him that went through hard things, I can feel very, very sorry for whatever those may be, even if I'll never have the answers for them. Um, and I think where choice comes in is like, I've had horrible things happen to me, but I, wherever nature versus nurture free will versus whatever, you know, things that were just gonna always happen. I choose to believe that I have agency to choose something different. I'm not, I'm gonna do everything in my power to make sure I'm, I'm not gonna visit my harm unto other people. But I think my dad probably falls into the category of someone who did not take the steps, wasn't given the opportunities to get support and healing, and or did not do the work that he was supposed to do, and all the rest of us suffered as a result.

Dr. Robin Stern: Certainly you are doing your work and even even being here and telling your story and gifting yourself to the world in this way is also doing your work.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Thank you.

Dr. Robin Stern: You're moving through your own healing by also giving people the opportunity to, to hear your story and to not feel so alone, to not feel like it's their fault to be able to process some of the things that you were saying so articulately and say, well, maybe that, you know, maybe that's me.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Well, yeah, and I think people that you know, cer certainly, um, you know, the contributions that you personally have made that you're continuing to do with this podcast. Um, I don't know how it feels necessarily quite, I don't know if this will be part of my story, but it's wild to me to think that, you know, at there was a point where I didn't know the word gaslighting, and now think of how many people not only know that word, but use that word, um, you know, maybe for better or or worse, I would think like I'm an advocate for just talking more. And like, I think sometimes there's an effect where people, um, there's a lot of processing that we have to do, especially if we have decades of chronic reoccurring abuse. Um, sorry about that. Um, but I think it takes a long time to figure out which things apply to us.

Jessica Willis Fisher: It, it can take a long time. I, there were some things that immediately changed overnight the minute that were immediately helpful. But man, there's still so many things to pick apart. And I think for me, understanding the, um, like the subtler things like gas lighting for example, that wasn't the top thing on my list. It is completely valid in and of itself. It was the only thing that was happening. It's still so harmful and can be so difficult to undo or heal or, you know, process or whatever words we wanna use. Um, for me, the fact that there was criminal sexual abuse ongoing for a long time really kind of rises to the top. And it's, it can be sensationalized. It certainly shouldn't ever be diminished or dismissed. And at the same time, to some degree there is at least, you usually don't have to prove to other people why that's so severe or why it's so, you know, harmful. Um, the more we get into the psychological and emotional stuff, it's much more common for it to be dismissed, which in and of itself is a harm

Dr. Robin Stern: Well and much more common, especially for women to blame themselves.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Yes. I, I think it's very interesting because I didn't necessarily have the experience of my dad saying, this bad thing is your fault, or even you need to be quiet. Um, it was really built into the system we were already in. Um, I was already, I think, predisposed and was being brought up to, as a female and as a child as I was in all these initial years, um, my role was taught to me that I was under the authority of my father, under the authority of a system, a community, and a religion that really told me that my voice mattered least out of everyone else's. And I know that there are other interpretations of our religion, but that was the one that I was in.

Dr. Robin Stern: You accommodated to the point of giving yourself up, and that was, you were supposed to do that, right?

Jessica Willis Fisher: Absolutely. If there was an issue, the best, most ideal response I was told, like the way God wanted me to be was to be as all forgiving as possible. And, you know, the model that we had was Christ's humility, Christ's sacrificial, all of those things. And, um, you know, there were things in our extended family, in our religion, in our interpretation of the Bible where you could point and say, you know, here's where a child or a sacrifice or, um, forgiveness, you know, you didn't wanna be the reason that a family was broken up. You didn't wanna be the reason that someone else's sin was held against them. And I have a real big issue ongoing. I think there's so much gaslighting that happens with, um, you know, the women. It's not only women, it's not only in Christian circles, it happens. Sexual abuse is gonna happen.

Jessica Willis Fisher: I think anywhere humans are and especially where there's an imbalance of power, um, doesn't matter exactly how that looks specifically within the systems that I'm in, you'll have the most common thing is to have young girls and women that are preyed upon by the men in authority. And when it comes push comes to shove the system, whether it be the church, the family, the extended community tends to support the abuser as opposed to the victim. Um, and I'm very lucky that I had people around me, the agents around me, my, um, now husband's, family advocates and people I live in Nashville, Tennessee, the music community, um, and some of the Christians and families that were in my community did speak up for justice when they did learn something was happening. But, um, you know, I had to step into that fear of, um, everything that I had feared. You know, my dad was spanking me on the day that I left 23 years old. And it, there was a sense that he had the authority to do that and he didn't.

Dr. Robin Stern: So how, where did you find the, the agency, the personal courage to be, to say to yourself, I've gotta get outta here. Like, where, yeah, what did that happen? Take us through that.

Jessica Willis Fisher: I think, man, it would be so nice to be like, ah, here's the winning formula. All we have to do to help people get there is provide them with this sort of support. It's so interesting. It's kind of this delicate scaffolding that, or a Jenga, you know, the Jenga game where pieces are missing here. And it's this like, how do you climb this ladder? One piece of difference, and the whole thing collapses. So I feel extremely lucky that things went the way they did in all the detail that they did. There was this long list of people that, it was a comment here, it was a book recommendation there, it was a good piece of advice. It was a listening ear. Um, and I think because I was not being, I was not asking for help and I was not saying I was in distress, distress, um, that I think some of these people may not even have known .

Jessica Willis Fisher: What a help they were being, um, along the way. And, you know, I had, as I grew older, maybe if we go back to, you know, I had these experiences as a kid, I was confused by them. Um, if I switch, if I skip forward to being around nine years old, I finally did have a sexual abuse experience that was extremely overwhelming, extremely dis uncomfortable panic in my body, like truly traumatic incident. And that experience shifted my whole understanding of every other thing that had led to that moment. So the moments that hadn't been painful or overwhelming or scary became that when I realized that this was an escalation of that same kind of behavior.

Dr. Robin Stern: And what was overwhelming about that? Was it the physicality? Was it something your dad said? I mean, what, what was it?

Jessica Willis Fisher: It was the actual act. So, you know, I don't, I'm to a place where I can talk about some of these specific things, and it is no longer, it would've been so triggering and so overwhelming. And I sometimes actually can derive quite a bit of control and healing from naming it. But I, I know that can be so triggering to people listening. Um, but basically he had been doing, um, some like touching, it would've been classified as molestation. Um, but then he, um, committed an act that according to Tennessee, um, law code is considered child rape. Um, so that is, um, oral sex is considered a form of child rape depending on like the age and the circumstances. And so I was 10 years older or younger when this happened. And I found the experience to be extremely physically uncomfortable. It was emotionally obliterating. Um, so I write about it in my book.

Jessica Willis Fisher: It's one of the only, you know, there were all these different experiences that I had and I had to make a choice of whether I was going to include the details of any of those instances over all these years. And I chose this one because it ended up being the thing that was used for the arrest warrant all these years later. Um, I remembered it very vividly. It, it's just seared in my memory. And, um, it was so overwhelming and physically uncomfortable that, um, there was a mirror behind where I was physically placed. And I remember subjectively, I have this memory of like, not being able to see myself. So for me, it was definitely an overwhelming physical experience. And I, my brain was doing that thing that I've learned is quite common where you're doing everything you can to dissociate and try to say what's happening isn't happening.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Um, to the point where I had this sense that I couldn't even visually see myself, I was kind of erasing myself in my mind. And when I wrote about it in my book, when I was recounting how after that, you know, it's seconds and minutes that change you in this fundamental way, every time I thought back to it, immediately I was going, that wasn't me. That was some other, like, invisible girl I call her in the book because it wasn't me. Um, you know, for me, one way to summarize healing, that particular element of the abuse was getting to where I could admit that little girl was me. It was not someone else. It was me. And those physical, overwhelming traumatic experiences were mine. And that I could kind of had to go back to that moment and sit in it and add that chapter back to my story.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Um, but for the majority of those years, the only way, the way that my mind automatically chose to say we have to do this for our survival is to either pretend like it didn't happen or pretend like it happened to someone else, or, you know, otherwise it just doesn't make sense. We're not gonna be able to go forward. I'm not gonna be able to be in this man's presence. This isn't gonna be able to be your daddy. You aren't gonna be able to smile, you know, it, it just does not compute unless that didn't happen.

Dr. Robin Stern: Yeah. Trying to make sense out of your world. Right. And try to live in it as you're making sense of it. That's the way, it's actually a brilliant way to do it.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Yeah. It's not, it's not something that I had ever been said, Hey, this is an option of what you can do. You know, it's not like a skill that I learned. I think it's, it's survival is really what we're talking about. And not everyone's mind and experience and body is going to kind of serve up the same thing. But it is very common. And, you know, um, I think a lot of people would've heard of like fight or flight. Um, I'm not, you know, a scientist or researcher. I'm not an expert in defining exactly what those mean or whether they're the sum totality of our options. But it certainly has resonated with me when I hear people describe that there's more, you know, there's more than fight or flight. There's freeze and fawn, and I feel like, you know, whatever those particularly mean, like that's what I was experiencing.

Jessica Willis Fisher: When you don't have the option to fight because you're a child, female child has no hope of usually fighting. It doesn't mean there weren't moments where that response kind of came up. For me. My dad was very physical. He was a wrestler. So sometimes in a clearly now abusive way, but a little, a little more like we're in the living room and dad's wrestling me, but he's pinning me down to the point where I can't breathe. And like this would give a lot of people pause. But in our circumstance, in our little circle, this was a normal thing. You know, I would, I would pinch and bite and like, you know, that's where fight felt like the right response. But in that moment, when I was nine, 10 years old, where this was being done, to me it was an escalation. It never occurred to me to fight. It was not an option that my brain served up. Um, and, you know, fleeing wasn't an option either. Um, to freeze and to try to shut down and to just go as comatose as possible was the choice in a sense that I, it felt like the only option didn't feel like a choice. It was just the response.

Dr. Robin Stern: Well, and it was the, the option that you used to take care of yourself.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Right? And then over time, I think Fawn also became one of the major ones because, you know, I am going down this road of, well, that didn't even happen. And then I kind of have to continue to take that road where, um, I need to respond in a way that I talk about in my book. Um, that I was kind of constructing this mask for my dad that I couldn't bear to like, look at that face and those eyes and like, remember that happening. So when I looked at my dad, I kind of looked at a construct of my dad that I was kind of making, like I was putting in the effort to look at the potential of what a good dad he could be, or who I wanted him to be. And that's how I was going to react to him because that otherwise I couldn't face what the reality really was. Um, 'cause I can't speak to his internal experience throughout, I don't know what, in some ways it's like, I don't even wanna know, you know, , um, how that would be to really see it from the other side. But I was doing what I needed to be like, I'm a good girl. I, it is right for me to trust this person, obey this person in every other aspect, and we just pretend like that thing didn't happen or isn't happening anymore. So

Dr. Robin Stern: What made you get out?

Jessica Willis Fisher: Well, I think that, again, this is not anything special about me in particular, but, um, just like looking at, you know, how did my dad get to where he was doing? We may never know, but it certainly follows the pattern of this, this, and this. I look at my kind of response and ability to be brave to seek help. And I definitely see markers of, you know, I think there were things that I received, um, support and attention that I received from, um, even my mom, other extended fam, extended family members. I was the first child in the family. I think that I had a pretty impact belief that the world was generally good, which is pretty crazy when you realize like there was abuse from my earliest memories. But when I have talked with other people, whether they're in my family or elsewhere, some people just struggle to even think there's anything worth escaping too.

Jessica Willis Fisher: And I had that all the way through. And that's not something I feel like I can really take credit for . You know, like by the time my prefrontal cortex came online, um, there were certain, you know, beliefs, the use of imagination, hope, like the belief that love existed. And, you know, unfortunately I was trying to get that from my abuser for many years. Um, but so that framework was there. I don't know if that makes sense, but I'll just go on to some others. Um, you know, I certainly had, um, relationships and interactions with people that broadened my, um, horizons, if you will. And I think at some point realizing that what what is normal for you is not normal for everyone else, . And that's a scary thing to face. Um, but when I had, by the time I met my now husband, I was in a place where his viewpoint on some of the things that he saw, even just from the outside, like not all the deep secret hidden things, he did not have, he did not see that happen.

Jessica Willis Fisher: He did not have access to that information, but just going, Hey, you know, like, and it helped that more time had gone by. So again, a 9-year-old being told they can't date, no one bats an eye. A lot of nine year olds don't date 16 year olds. Okay, now we're going, oh, like, hopefully it's an endearing thing where it's just part of their culture. It's part of their belief system. But if you have a 23-year-old who doesn't, isn't allowed to have their own phone, isn't allowed to have their own car, isn't allowed to have one-on-one time with anyone, that's a lot more strange. And so, you know, the part of it was timing and just the way the story went. I think some of the resources and information I was given in my early twenties, if I had gotten it earlier, some of that could have definitely helped.

Jessica Willis Fisher: So I'm all about education and prevention and everything we can do. Um, but in my story, it just, you know, I think I was doing the best that I could with the information that I had, but my relationship was a huge, um, it was a trap door. People talk about, um, I, there's different terms, but like trap door relationships where someone falling in love, being physically attracted to someone, um, having it gives you courage. It moves you, it gives you perspective, um, however you wanna parse out all the motivations there. But that was a huge part of me getting out. Um, that doesn't always lead to marrying that person or it being a healthy relationship in and of itself.

Dr. Robin Stern: It's often a third party. What is this, this is very strange. Right? But I'm, I wanna take us back a little bit to your siblings and, and your mom and how did you talk about what was going on when you were young and how much did you feel, um, and did you feel supported by your, by your brothers and sisters and certainly your mom, somebody who gave you support? Can you talk a little bit about that?

Jessica Willis Fisher: Sure. Yeah. And for people listening, you know, there's only so much time we have to talk about, and I love and welcome questions. It's a great challenge to try to tackle them, to try to tell as much of the full truth as possible while not telling other people's stories and understanding that we can't fit all the context in. So I would definitely urge people to, you know, I am comfortable sharing a lot of details and you know, the fullest context is in is in my book, um, it's called unspeakable. But, um, if I were to just be careful not to put one fact and leave out others, but there, there was an awareness in our family that there was a problem, um, and that the problem was dad, and that the problem was that dad was being inappropriate. Um, sexually it, that was a known thing, but the word known knowing, like that whole concept, I feel like it's a sliding scale.

Jessica Willis Fisher: You know, you could know one thing and not another. You, you know, once you hear a piece of information, do you trust that information? Is there conflicting information? So basically, anytime I affirmed that something was happening, my dad was saying that it wasn't happening. So, you know, who gets believed, right? Um, is there room for misunderstanding, misinterpretation? Like, I'm just saying stuff that we all hopefully know, uh, you know, we understand that that's complicated. Our, our hearts, our minds also say like, it should be simple though. Like, if there's something that's happening and you know what's happening, things should be done. It should be stopped. It should, you know, and I'm not here to argue with that. Um, there were definitely, um, so many things should not have gone on as long. My mom had an initial suspicion, um, shortly after that, like really traumatic experience that I had when I was like nine or 10, she came to me and she asked if dad had done anything weird to me.

Jessica Willis Fisher: And kind of, they kind of like gestured to me if I, I think the exact words were something like, you know, has dad touched you weird? Has he done anything weird to you? And I nodded, I don't have any memory of giving any information other than like a wordless affirmation. And, um, part of that time period, like I thought, oh, great, the adults are gonna take care of it. I certainly don't wanna be asked anymore questions. I don't know what I would've said. All of the unspeakable ness of it. And I don't know what I would say, like, was very much still there. Um, it was like icky, ashamed. I felt like, oh no, is this, is it my fault? All, all these questions, um, still so young. And um, unfortunately it didn't stop. I did hear, for example, my mom like, confront my dad, yell at him.

Jessica Willis Fisher: I would learn years later that he was saying that was all like, he was denying that anything was wrong. She didn't really know what to ask. Um, I think maybe if I were to objectively as objectively as possible, look at it, like, pretend like these weren't my parents pretend like this wasn't my story. My mom was in a situation where she was raised in this conservative system. She didn't, her, her parents were divorced. She'd had very little experience with men. She thought her whole purpose in life was to be the best Christian wife and mother possible, which meant there was something wrong. She should submit more, she should be more pleasing, she should be more accommodating. And she did not have really means to take her children with her and like, get a job and like support herself. There were financial and logistical things. Um, but I think emotionally, her whole identity of like the way to be a good woman and the whole goal of life was literally not centered on her being safe or her being successful. It was to put her whole existence underneath this man, my dad. That's really

Dr. Robin Stern: Incredible. Because then the direct teaching is, is how to accommodate to your gaslight. That's the direct teaching, right?

Jessica Willis Fisher: We end up doing the work for them , you know, and we end up enabling our own pain and our own harming. And you know, when I look at my mom and I say, wow, you really let me down in this moment. She almost always had to let herself down first. And it was never that she meant to ever be a bad mother or, or not take care of her children. It's just that I don't think you can allow yourself to be abused and stand up for the abuse of others, you know, like to stop the abuse of others. So, um, there's a lot of context just if you don't talk about something, so many things can be swept under the rug for years, which is exactly what continued to happen for me. Um, but, you know, I knew what I took away from is, oh, mom can't stop this from happening, and I don't really have any other built in place to go to ask for help.

Jessica Willis Fisher: So it's really on me. So when things started happening again, and they were a little different, and my dad started taking on a lot more of the classic grooming techniques where how do he would take steps to get me more alone than normal to, um, to give gifts and try to create like other secrets and leverage other, because he was in control of my education, my everything. Like, and I was not in the place where I was. So I was ready to let go of, I never wanna see this man again. It was still, how do I not lose? How do I not ruin this whole thing? And the truth was, he was ruining it. He was already ruining it . But I felt like I had to preserve, like, you know, somehow kind of, um, , this isn't a great way to say it, but you get this concept of like, um, like a eater or, or a sacrifice or whoever it's put on. Like, hey, the way this whole system works is if you just take this, absorb it, somehow, process it and, and shove it down and like, don't let it ruin the rest of what's happening. Um, and what's so unfortunate is we were basically all doing that in our own way, except for my dad. You know, we were all covering for my dad and the things that he was doing to us in our own ways.

Dr. Robin Stern: So much to unpack. And you've done such incredible work on yourself that you're able to speak about it in such vulnerable and, and open ways. So thank you for that. Um, what would you say, what, what do you want listeners to take away? What's the message that you want people who are either in really difficult relationships right now, abusive relationships, cult-like families Mm-Hmm. or, um, even trying to get free. Mm-Hmm. . What are some key takeaways you'd like them to have?

Jessica Willis Fisher: Yeah, so a couple of things. I'm, I'm always asking myself that, and because I am in a place where I get to be a part of trying to make the change, um, this comes up a lot for me. I, I'm, I am actively talking with people, um, all the time. Like you were just saying, people that are trying to get out, people that are trying to make sense of their experiences or people that don't have that experience, but they're trying to support someone that they love through that experience. They wanna be an ally if that should ever come up in the future. So a couple things. One, um, for some reason this comes up over and over again is I truly believe according to my experience, and so much that I've learned is a lot of times it gets worse before it gets better. Um, which doesn't seem like the most happy thing to hear, but I think it's a dose of reality.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Because if you're having an experience where you're being abused, whether it's sexual abuse, violent abuse, um, emotional abuse, gaslighting, one of the first homes to get over is admitting to yourself and, and really facing what your experience really is. Just how bad it is. Because if you're experiencing it, chances are some version of survival has kicked in to where we're excusing how we're being treated. And in order to take a different step to get out of the situation, to defend ourselves, to try to educate ourselves, whatever it is we probably need to do, a little bit of all of it is the story gets a lot darker because we have to let go of whatever we wanted for that relationship or whatever. You know, the fact that our father is doing this to us, or our lover, or our husband, or our grandparent, or our friend or our coach is just such a hard emotional thing to face and holding space for that in that it's part of the process.

Jessica Willis Fisher: And it may be one of the first things you'll have to do in some manner or form. I don't like making it sound easier than it is. I think it does a great disservice to people. Um, so that's something I usually try to say or it comes up. And yet it is absolutely part of the process. And I think I hope everyone, I hope to share and spread the courage to everyone to go through that process to face it because you are worth it. And, um, it may be a whole upward battle to even accept that we are worth it. But there really is, um, so much on the other side of abusive relationships if we, if we go through that process and we seek out the help. I think if you have a story that you haven't told, seeking out a professional, um, and or safe person to tell is absolutely incredibly important.

Jessica Willis Fisher: I think that as we try to support people in getting out of situations or telling their stories, educating yourself about how these things happen and how to truly be a good ally is really important because it doesn't always go according to our common sense. We think well just speak up, we'll just get out. That can be extremely dangerous. Um, and that's part of the, it getting worse before it gets better. Sometimes, you know, if you try to get out, that can be the most dangerous time in your relationship or in, in your situation. So I think that consulting professionals as soon as possible, um, is absolutely the right next move because it's hard to give good advice for every situation. Sometimes just getting up out the door, that's a hundred percent what you should do . Um, but sometimes that's just not possible. So getting professional help, telling the professional the truth of your situation in as much detail as you can manage, and then, um, letting them use their expertise to speak to you about what the best steps might be. And that's not, hopefully not a cop out, it's just, again, I tell my story in my book, not as do what I did, but as, hey, you know, here's a chance for us to kind of look up close at one case of how this happened. Um, but every story is different, um, in its details. And I think that's part of the challenge of trying to stop abuse, is there isn't a one size fits all. Always do this response and it will make you more safe or more healthy. It's, it can be quite complicated.

Dr. Robin Stern: I, you're so right and you are a healer and it's wonderful for you to give that healing to so many people. How did you learn to believe in yourself and believe that there was a future? 'cause I think that that's sometimes when people are listening to, uh, a story as powerful and and raw as yours, think, well, she, she knew, she knew she was deserving. How did you get to know? How can people know?

Jessica Willis Fisher: I'm not sure. I think there, it's a, I personally think it's a balance between things that I didn't even choose for myself and things that happened prior to my remembering. I have read so many interesting books. I love to read voraciously and learn and, um, I don't wanna discredit myself and the choices that I have made. Um, but I also don't feel like I can really stand and be like, I did this alone. I certainly didn't do didn't do this alone. In any stretch of the imagination, you

Dr. Robin Stern: Rarely do these things alone.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Right? Right. And, and I think that, you know, I read the book what happened to you, um, by Dr. Bruce Perry and, and Oprah Winfrey. And I thought that was such an interesting conversation. And it seems to be that, you know, neuroscience is telling us that even as children, as young as six months old, coming down to like, whether we had a caregiver that was attuned to us, like shapes the way our brain finishes developing and and, and our sense of the world, something good happened. Yes, I really feel like I benefited from things I can't remember, but I know that I had, like, I had many grandparents and great-grandparents when I was born, and I had a grandmother that every time she saw me, she would go, there's my firstborn grandchild. And she didn't know I was being abused. She didn't like tell me, Hey, you know, she wasn't like, she wouldn't have known that she was giving me something that I do think figured in to those push or shove moments where I went, do I have what it takes to get out of here?

Jessica Willis Fisher: And I'll just reference one more story that I write about in the book, which was like one of the lowest lows. Um, long story short, we were on our tour bus. Um, we were, this was when we were touring, we were on TV and all these things from the outside looked great. Um, but my dad knew that I was trying to get out of the situation and I wasn't just being smart enough or brave enough to just put on my shoes and walk out the door, which I really kind of could have done. But psychologically I was like, I, I can't, I can't leave. I need to get out. How do I fix this? And, um, he attacked me. He hadn't done this before, but he, um, like hit me in the face and then it, I was bleeding and my face was swelling, and he was screaming at me and telling me that I was, my family was there and it was terrifying.

Jessica Willis Fisher: And, and I had this sense of like, no one else stepped in. I was the oldest kid, so, you know, many of them were still children and they shouldn't be expected to do something different. But I realized I'm not stopping him. Like this has escalated so far. What's the next step? Him killing me and I'm gonna let this happen. And it was really, I had to ask myself, do I just want this to be over? And that was one of, that was one of my reactions. I just want this to be over. I don't wanna be alive anymore. And yet there was some other part of me that was like, I am going to survive. I do have to figure out like, no one else is coming. If someone's gonna get out, it's gonna be you. You're gonna have to figure out how to do this, and you're gonna have to want to survive enough.

Jessica Willis Fisher: You're gonna have to believe there is a different life for you where you don't have to experience this every day. There is another way this story can go, but you do have to admit like, just how, how bad it is that you've let it get this far so that you can choose something different. And I think between my husband's support, the amazing professional therapy that I've gotten, the financial support, um, people believing me, that's a privilege. We don't know whether the people we trust with our stories are going to have good advice, are going to listen, are not going to use that to abuse us in some other new way. Um, so, you know, I think that there were moments of, of bravery that I'm so lucky that was met with support, and I just wanna be a part of that for other people. And when I hear people weren't believed or, you know, don't have access to funds or therapy, it's like, okay, how do we fix that? How do we get in these trenches because one survivor that is well supported that then makes the choice to speak about their story and turn it into something beautiful. It's like that's how we make real change. That's a snowball effect that we can be a part of. Um, ooh. And it gets me so , so passionate, you know, like I could work all day and night on that.

Dr. Robin Stern: And you are, and thank you so much for sharing yourself with us today and, and for all the work you're doing, and I wanna join you in some way. Let's do some stuff together. I mean, this is really incredible. What you're doing is wonderful. So please tell people where they can find you and where they can read your book.

Jessica Willis Fisher: Yeah. So, um, I am, as you mentioned at the beginning, a singer-songwriter. Um, I could just talk about the therapeutic, um, truth telling properties of and healing properties of music. That's a whole conversation. We could , I don't know, maybe we should do a number of different conversations, but, um, you know, I've been able to put my music or my story into my music and, and then share that with other people. Um, and so you can look up my music and my book unspeakable, um, my memoir, um, both are kind of available wherever you get your music, wherever you get your books. My website, certainly Jessica Willis fisher.com. I have a shop where you can get both of those things. But you can also see whether I might be coming to your area, um, for a musical show, um, and or, you know, my speaking in advocacy.

Jessica Willis Fisher: I think that, um, you know, I'm still finding my place, like what is the most effective use of my time and my story and my energies, and it's just always a yes for me when I get to share my story and or my music in a situation where people are directly getting involved with, um, prevention or fundraising or anything to kind of end, um, abuse, whether it be with women's shelters and women's issues and domestic violence, and certainly childhood sexual abuse, um, and abuses, uh, violent abuses. So I'm still learning so much about that. And, um, you can also, people can contact me through my website if they're interested in having me come speak somewhere or work together, um, to try to, to try to make that change. But I'm on all the socials as well. Um, and I just wanna thank you very much for, um, obviously this is just, this is one conversation and it's a broader part of all the work that you're doing and sharing with people, but I really appreciate you spending some of your platform and your time with me because really, that that's part of what we're talking about here is, you know, holding space for stories, listening, speaking, and I think that that's where it all starts and so much good can come of that.

Jessica Willis Fisher: So thank you for allowing that ,

Dr. Robin Stern: Thank you for coming and spending this time with me and for sharing your stories and powerful moments and so vulnerably and openly with, with our listening audience. Thank you. Thank you listeners, for joining us today. I know it was meaningful for you. And, um, please check out Jessica's website and her book, and her songs and her lyrics and, uh, heal yourself alongside of us. Thank you. Thanks for joining me for today's episode. I hope you found it helpful and meaningful. If you want to listen to other episodes of the Gaslight Effect podcast, you can find them@robinstern.com or wherever you listen to podcasts. And please leave a rating and a review. I also invite you to follow me on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter. This podcast is produced by Mel Yellen, Mike Lenz, and me. The podcast is supported by Suzan Petit Marcus Esteve and Imaginarium, also by Sally McCarton and Jackie Daniels. I'm so grateful to have many people supporting me and especially grateful for all of you, my listeners.