You can't force these things. If you keep listening to phish even though it all seems kind of blah, then you're going to really get burned out on them. Just personally, I usually rotate for a few months of phish, then a few of the dead, then a few of all other kinds of music.

You'll know when you haven't listened for a couple of months (or a few) that you're ready to come back to phish when your jaw drops at a jam or you find yourself genuinely enjoying hearing NICU for the 40,000th time. Then it's like rediscovering them all over again. That's just how it's been for me, but I wonder at the poster's undercurrent of anxiety and willingness to project dark forebodings about his relationship with phish. It's really not that big of a deal, and frankly kind of surprising that this hasn't happened before, as Dirksen points out.

One thing I will say is that for whatever reason I was on a non-jamband kick in 2010 and the shows leading up to Alpine (DwD-> WTU) I was really, really not into. Jadedvet mode, arms crossed, superior, generally an asshole. There were some fun moments I missed out on and didn't really appreciate the turning point in the band's development that DWD represented. Instead of enjoying WTU, when I realized what it was I immediately shut off the enjoyment of the moment simply because I realized it wasn't an "original" jam.

I don't know if it's related but I can't help but think that being in such a different musical place then probably didn't help. So while you can't really force it, give it a shot for a couple of weeks before the shows and see if you don't change your mind about hitting multiple shows. There's never been one I've seen that hasn't at least been worth the travel and money.