I very much appreciate all the insights and advice that have been offered, there is a great deal to contemplate and I am very grateful. Generally, the over-arching interpretations of my opening post that are woven throughout the replies I've received from you fine folks have provided me with some much needed validation that my point of view may indeed have merit and some of my own suspicions and conclusions about the true underlying nature of things have been well articulated back to me by a number of your insightful comments. I'm reluctant to take all that, though, and pin it to my chest like a medal of valor or something as I begin doing victory laps -- as tempting as that may be. The truth is, even if after looking deeply into this via a forum like yours combined with as much additional research and study as I can do, even if enough of all that does lead me to a point at which I feel confident that I'm on solid ground with my judgement, none of that would feel like I "won" or anything of the kind. Sure, it would be nice to know I'm not crazy, but that doesn't fix anything. The problem will not have changed or gone away just because I understand it better.

I actually sincerely care about this person and all I will have concluded is that she must be truly lost in a treacherous mindscape, the nature of which I struggle to fathom. The question then is not, do I stay for more abuse or do I protect my sanity and escape? The question then is, how do I rescue her from that hellish place she's lost in? Also, I wonder if I can reach such a realization at a deep enough level of conviction that it is well and solidly founded, how would that affect me and my difficulties in navigating that minefield? Surely I can acknowledge my own reactivity as an unproductive contributor to escalating conflict. Yes, I can get mad and defensive and I know without any doubt how this NEVER helps and only makes things worse, every time. What if I could learn to correct these reactive tendencies in myself? That would be something, and because at times the knee jerk reactions are so immediate... there seems to be no space whatsoever between the stimulous and the response, how do I ever get into that gap with any degree of conscious awareness before the reaction is triggered?

I must go, and will be contemplating all this as I am able. Thank you all again, I expect I'll be back in due course. Cheers