Okay, so you know this is dysfunctional.

Here's how my dysfunction worked. See if resonates for you: I found it exciting if a man kept me in a tailspin. This often involved his having a lot of girlfriends; if he was also desirable to other women, that meant that he was a prize for me to have, right?

Or, I'd choose to believe lies about why he was unemployed and pay the freight. Drugs and alcohol were often involved in his -- and probably my -- inconsistent, selfish, dysfunctional behaviors.

When I got myself straightened out, I had a huge attitude adjustment -- I realized that love does not require me to feel like I'm on a roller coaster, never know what to expect from the man, have to work hard to please him and keep him. I had a strange definition of love, and I was addicted to a bad kind of excitement.

It is hard for me to understand my old mind-set, but my inner wires definitely were crossed in the days when I thought that being in love = this sick kind of excitement.

Please work with a T, or go to al-anon or emotions anonymous, and keep going and going until you "get" it, whatever the particular "it" is for you -- and it may well be something different from my "it."

Best wishes for recovering from your addiction to this man.