It's SOOOOOOOO nice to hear you are glad to have me back
It is very easy when gripped by fear to think you are the one with the monkey on your shoulder - but you are not!!!
I get frightened thinking I am like your W - I love being surrounded by animals!!!! My H being the no1 beastie of the lot - I guess his problem was he felt like the last beastie in the long line of them!!!!! Seriously, I think maybe I WAS like your W but I was lucky enough to 'wake up' and realise I needed help. Hang in there and I think there is a fairly good chance she will too.
For you, I think it is a question of how to deal with the down moments. I know that my therapist guy was great for giving me ideas. He was the one that talked me through the sleep routine, and like with you it was just a case of him reminding me of things I already knew but in my 'panic' just wasn't thinking to implement. He also told me that there was a difference in what you do to GET to sleep in the first place and what you do if you wake up in the early hours and just can't get back to sleep. just laying there tossing and turning and working yourself up into a stew is just fruitless; you may as well get up and DO something.
My therapist also taught me to deal with things in a slightly different way than I had been doing. If I had something bothering me he taught me to break it down into WHY it was bothering me and WHAT I could do about it. If it was something I could do something about it he then taught me how to approach dealing with it in bits. If it was something I couldn't do anything about he taught me to 'let go' and store it away for a time when I could review it again and then see if I could do something about it. He showed me that I was not responsible for everything as well. He helped me realign my thought processes. I think you sound pretty good at that anyways
Saffie me 46 H 46 M in 1986 D20,D18,S16,D13 H's A 01/05 to 07/06 H recommitted to M 07/06 renewed vows 09/06 Going from strength to strength
