I have felt and sometimes still feel the way you do.
Here's what I've concluded. Abuse in any form with or without alcohol will tear a person down. I liken it to Pavlovian conditioning.
Sit dog. Good dog. Here's a piece of my steak. Tail wags.
Sit dog. Good dog. Here's some gristle from my steak. Tail wags.
Sit dog. Good dog. Lick the plate clean. Tail wags.
Sit dog. Good dog. Tail wags.
Sit dog. Tail wags.
I said sit dog. Tail kinda wags but still wags.
Get the hell out of the way damn it. Tail tucks between legs.
Look at dog. Tail wags.
Go to work. Dog sits by the window and waits for your return. Wags his tail when he sees your car. You're not even in the house and he's happy with that. No steak, no gristle, no verbal interactions and guess what, the dog will be happy and will become happy with less and less.
Please understand that I'm not calling you or us dogs. I'm simply a realist and I fully believe that things in life condition people to be who they are and what they'll accept. I believe in my situation that exposure to alcoholism and generally abusive people will condition me/us to accept less in life. So the primary driver, at least for me, is to recondition myself to be happy.