Are Indian Moms The Original Gaslighters?

There’s a different kind of emotional whiplash that comes from arguing with an Indian mom. You begin with a simple concern “Why didn’t you tell me about this earlier?” and end up questioning your entire sense of reality. Suddenly, you're the ungrateful child, the reason for her blood pressure, and somehow also the reason your father’s hairline started receding in 2007. Welcome to the world of Indian mom gaslighting.

Now, before we go any further—no, this isn’t a takedown piece. This is a love letter disguised as tough love. Indian mothers are often the backbone of our chaotic families. They are the CEOs of Sacrifice Ltd., often managing households, in-laws, kids, and unsolicited WhatsApp forwards—all while dealing with their own unprocessed trauma. But let’s be honest: sometimes that trauma gets projected onto their children, packaged neatly in emotionally manipulative phrases that sound like wisdom. 

The Gaslight Glossary: Top Hits by Indian Moms

1. “It’s for your own good.”

This phrase is the Rolls-Royce of Indian parental gaslighting. Whether it’s being forced to drink haldi milk or being told you can’t go on that school trip because “good girls don’t roam like that,” it’s always justified as being for your benefit. The implication? If you resist, you’re clearly too immature to know what’s good for you.

2. “You’re overreacting.”

Translated: Your emotional response is inconvenient to me, so I will now dismiss it. Cried because your cousin got praised while you got ignored? Overreacting. Upset that she went through your stuff and laughed about it with your massi? Overreacting. This phrase ensures that the focus never stays on your valid feelings—it shifts the attention to your reputation for being “too sensitive.”

3. “After all I’ve done for you…”

Ah, the best one. This one is pulled out when you question anything—a curfew, a rule, or her tone. It usually ends in an unsolicited monologue about the labour room, the sacrifices made during schooling years, and that time she didn’t buy a new suit so you could have a better school bag.

This isn’t just a mom thing; it’s a generational script. Many Indian mothers never had the space to express vulnerability or anger in safe ways. They weren’t raised with “boundaries” or “therapy.” Instead, emotional suppression was considered strength, and control was love. So, when they repeat these patterns, they aren’t trying to harm, they’re loving in the only language they were taught.

Intergenerational Trauma Has Vagina 

Let’s zoom out. Most of our mothers were raised in environments where obedience was equated with virtue. They were discouraged from questioning authority, especially male authority, and expected to tolerate everything with a beautiful smile. Emotional intelligence was considered a Western luxury, not a parental requirement. So they coped, internalised, and in many cases, unknowingly passed it on.

That’s how trauma travels in Indian families—not in big, dramatic explosions, but in quiet phrases, subtle invalidations, and the tight control of emotions.

It's the massi who shames your body weight at a wedding because "she means well," or the chachi’s and tai’s who tells your mom, "Don’t pamper the girl too much, she’ll become spoiled."

The result? Generations of women who learned to mistrust their instincts, belittle their feelings, and question their worth—while serving hot parathas with a smile.

The Humour in the Hurt

But let’s not get too grim. There’s absurdity in the madness too. There’s comedy in the way Indian moms treat you. There’s poetry in the way they yell, “You don’t help with anything!” and then snatch the broom out of your hand because “You don’t know how to do it properly anyway.”

The contradictions are rich, hilarious, and sometimes, a survival guide. Humour has always been a coping mechanism in Indian households: An emotional air freshener to mask the stink of generational silence. 

Moving from Gaslight to Guidelight

Here’s the hopeful part: our generation is talking about it. We're labelling things. We’re going to therapy (and hiding the bills from our parents). We’re learning that love doesn’t have to come with guilt. That disagreement doesn’t mean disrespect. That being close to your mom doesn’t mean being emotionally fused with her. 

Many of us have had those breakthrough moments—the heart-to-hearts at 2 a.m., the soft apologies couched in awkwardness, the “I didn’t know better” that breaks years of resentment. Because, beneath the gaslight, there’s love. Unevolved, but real.

Indian moms may have been the original gaslighters, but they were also the original protectors, providers, and purveyors of unparalleled strength. The answer isn’t to villainise them—it’s to evolve with them. To teach, listen, unlearn, and relearn. To make space for softness, both in them and ourselves.

If you're lucky, your mom might not say, “I’m proud of you” directly—but she’ll save every article you’ve ever written, even though she understands very little. She may not understand your random crying at night, but she’ll make tulsi chai and sit beside you silently. Love, in Indian households, is rarely spoken fluently. But it’s still there—in chapatis, in scoldings, in sacrifices.

So, are Indian moms the original gaslighters?

Maybe.

But they’re also the original warriors.

And now, it’s our turn to help them disarm.

With truth. With empathy. And a little bit of humour.

Views expressed by the author are their own.