A benefit of growing one’s vocabulary is that words are sometimes discovered which identify esoteric feelings and experiences. Here’s an interesting one:

Gaslighting or gas-lighting is a form of mental abuse in which a victim is manipulated into doubting their own memory, perception, and sanity. Instances may range from the denial by an abuser that previous abusive incidents ever occurred, up to the staging of bizarre events by the abuser with the intention of disorienting the victim.

My most expensive life lesson will forever be about narcissistic Peruvian mafia princesses who like baseball and how they are experts at this deleterious form of personal treatment. I learned that some people simply get a charge out of discovering and then enacting whatever it takes to crack another person open.