From what I understand of the situation I think you are doing the right thing. It might be better to make you language more neutral though, that will reduce the stress on both sides. In my view, it's really hard to break the cycles behaviour. I'm pretty sure that I also suffer from co-dependency. I think that we tend to feel bad if we assert ourselves. But I think you should remember that all you are arguing for is fair treatment. It's very hard to establish proper boundaries when we are used to having few or none.