Hi DDJ, you sound like a very, very strong lady! It sound like you've been doing everything right so far. I'm so sorry you find yourself here though.
I just wanted to reiterate what others have said about 'cake eating'. My H left 5 months ago and I've been too afraid of pushing him away further to put very strict boundaries in place about visiting our two children. I know feel he is cake eating big time! He comes every day and sits here for hours and even comes in when we're not in and eats our food and watches TV! He has started doing some relationship reconciliation exercises with me but even so, his cake eating is driving me crazy and it's very easy for him to just keep going on like this without changing anything I feel. I'm not great at advice but just wanted to hopefully help you to not make the mistake I have of letting my H call all the shots. As you say yourself, your H needs to know what it will feel like to be truly gone and only have certain specified access to your D.
As for getting through the nights, I agree, they're the worst. I got through them initially by staying up, even into the small hours, until I was so exhausted that I would crash out fast asleep when I did get in bed. Gradually I became more and more tired and found that I was getting to that sleeping point earlier and earlier. Now I'm back to my usual sleep routine unless H does something particularly upsetting.
Take care of you and your little one and keep posting, there are so many wonderful people on here to give advice!
