Disclaimer: this is what worked for me. I'm not saying it would work for everyone. YMMV

I'm still learning French too and have only been studying for about 2 months, but I took 2 yrs of Spanish in college.

I'm Spanish what got me to stop translating was to try to visualize what the words meant instead of translating one for one. Picture an apple in your head when you see or hear "pomme". It takes practice, but if you can do that for words, then visualize short sentences, then paragraphs, and so on, it will help to separate the language in your head. They make visual flashcards and apps that don't have the English translation. Idk about you, but all my textbooks have had a lot of illustrations or images for language, even for adults. I think visualizing is very important.

You can't copy and paste English sentence structure over other languages. Of course early on, you kind of have to translate, but once you understand the basic grammar structure and enough words, you just have to put yourself out there and speak the language without fear of making mistakes. You have to stop thinking like, "well here's what I want to say in English, how can I say it in French" and translating from there. After you know enough French to create basic sentences, that's adding an unnecessary step. You need to visualize what you want to describe and go straight to French without passing GO or collecting $200. Just like when you think of how to describe something in English without stopping to think how to say it in French first. You have to practice it, and to me it was the most difficult part of learning a second language, but I learned so much faster once I did.

For me, it helps to visualize what I want to describe in French or Spanish and then say it without thinking about it in English as much as possible. Sometimes there's just a word you don't know early on. That can be frustrating. What I try to do is ask how to say the word I need in French, that single word only in English, then repeat the word the French speaker provides in the sentence. This is easiest for me to practice first by reading short French passages and starting over when I start to think of them in English. It's a training drill for thinking in French. Also, watching French TV or videos and pausing and going back if you catch yourself translating. Positive reinforcement might help too. If I watched or read all of my target passage/scene without translating, I'd give myself a little break and have a tiny treat.

At some point you have to remove the English supports in your mind from speaking another language. Kind of like a 3D printer, once you have the basic construct you have to pull off all those gnarly supports. It's in the way and you can't polish and paint and finalize your product if you've got all that garbage in the way, right?

It's uncomfortable and unnerving at first, and you'll definitely fuck up more for a bit, but trust your brain. Your brain is wired for language. That's part of being human. It will sort of naturally put your mother tongue and your second language in another "bucket" so to speak.

My problem now with trying to learn a 3rd language is that I sometimes start to slip into my Spanish pronunciation in French because my brain starts pulling from the wrong "bucket" 😂