I joined an online Al Anon group to help me deal with past issues with my alcoholic ndad, and my ex/partner/i don't know who is an alcoholic/sex addict also and with our ex who is covertN. She is clearly triggering some worse habits in him, (he is drinking more, going from sobriety to drinking about every other weekend, also his communication style is changing more, taking on a lot of her habits.) Anyway, I was asking for advice on talking to him when he gets depressed and he is deflecting/starting fights about our past or about an unrelated thing like a bill or the house or the car and they told me about S.T.O.P.

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Sorry you feel that way.

That's your opinion.

Oh?

Perhaps you're right.

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The thing is, that Nex of mine (his current gf) used to use that all the time on me!! She used those terms often to shut down any bad feels I had, any arguments, any negative feelings about her. I am not a crazy emotional person. I have a special needs son and have anxiety myself and had almost two decades with this man (anxiety and depression himself), plus I work with animals, so if there is anything I am good at it's staying calm even when I'm upset. (Even when I have a screaming hissing biting cat in my arms.) I don't yell or name call or anything. And now I'm realizing just how much she deflected and shut down any negative emotion I had, even when it was completely justified and even when I was calm and rational about having an opinion or feeling.

I'm feeling echoes of all that again. The deflection and blaming me for being hurt by her behavior.

But this is a tool I need to learn to use to protect myself from getting pulled into fights with him. It feels so...dirty, using the same tool that was used to abuse me. And knowing that she is still using it on him. I'm having trouble both with my resolve to shut him and his instability out and the hurt that I felt when she used those tools to abuse me.

(Side note: He and I still own a home and car and 3 dogs and have 2 kids together, so there is no reasonable way I can cut him completely out of my life. Even if I wanted to.)