God give me the patience and the strength...7

[Dawn of Hope]

TOH,
IMHO, it is VITAL for you to LEAVE HIM ALONE except when he contacts you or it is urgent for you to contact him. I think you know that, and I know it's tough, especially when you have the farm together, but stop contacting, stop initiating, stop questioning, stop spouting emotions at him, stop inviting him to be involved in your daily life and concerns if it isn't an emergency.

It is like anything else--a habit. Habits can be broken. You just have to work at it until you break the old habit and form a new one, and then you can let the autopilot take over. And you have to get right back at it when you slip up. Nobody does it perfectly on the first try, but if you work at it, you get better. It sounds to me like you need the extra-strength measures, which means a DETAILED and REHEARSED plan for dealing with him. In other words, you need to get very specific, and then practice.

Set aside a good chunk of time for this exercise: Write down some of the major situations/issues/fears that have caused you to do things you know are not in your best long-term interests, DB-wise. Think about WHY these things have derailed you--not just the obvious whys--go deeper. If it is fear, what are you afraid of? And why would that be a problem? And then...again, why would *that* be a problem? Keep asking these questions, working through the layers, until you get to the core. Once you have that figured out (and that is half the battle right there), see what you can come up with to help soothe whatever those fears or other negative emotions are. And then...figure out how you can stop yourself from going off the deep end when something flips your emotional switches. Find a thought or a behavior or a talisman or SOMETHING that helps you deal with those moments where you are tempted to throw DBing right out the window and over the cliff. Once you have that, PRACTICE going directly to your thought or behavior or whatever when you are calm, so that you develop the habit and it becomes automatic when you need it.

You can do this! It might take more work for you than for some people on this board, but if you have changed voluntarily at all through all this mess, then you can do so in a bigger way, and take yourself where you want to go. Remember: Discipline is remembering what you want MOST.

I hope that helps!
Peace,
Dawn