sounds very familiar of my ex ah's behaviors - in reading and understanding the disease of alcoholism/addiction what i found out was that he was trying to feed that "whole in his soul" - that low self-esteem that needed to hear he was not a bad person, that he was ok, that he wasn't as bad as someone else -
he would either do it this way or either he would put me down to lift himself up - it was just the frame of mind he happened to be in -
Thru my own recovery in Al-Anon, I learned no matter what I did - it didn't help him or fix him - he was still empty inside and still found a reason to use/drink.
Like you said - probably the best thing you can do is to keep taking care of YOU and be the healthiest person you can be for you!!
PINK HUGS,
Rita