Warning: This Post is Depressing. Read with Caution & a Side of Zoloft.

I just cannot come up with enough lucid thought to fill a blog these days. I must say, this only seems to add to my mounting depression. I used to look forward to blogging as much as I looked forward to sitting in my overstuffed, oversized, Restoration Hardware "chair-and-a-half" at the end of a busy day, with a glass of wine and my thin crisp Triscuits & Kaukauna port wine cheese. Now, the wine has turned, the cheese is gone & the crackers are stale. Even the guinea pig (yes, we have a guinea pig) recently peed on my chair. Everything I love is turning to crap all around me, and I feel like I am helpless to stop this slide down the slippery slope on the giant crap mountain that I formed.

So, I am learning how to fake it. Everyday, I am faking it more and more. I'm not even sure if people notice it...I mean, I am sure that the fact that I have all but dropped of the face of the Earth gives it away somewhat, but I'm trying to fake even that. I am working hard to "be there" for others. Working hard to get up in the morning and get dressed, get the kids dressed, go to work, smile and chat when I don't want to...And in spite of all the effort, I almost never see people anymore. I stood next to someone I have known for years, in line at a store, and never even noticed them until they asked me the dreaded, "are you okay"? And I wanted to cry. I wanted to cry and say, "no, I am not okay. I am sad and I am alone and I feel loss so deeply that it has cleaved my soul in two"...But I didn't. Instead I faked it. I faked like I was so lost in my own little trite world of nonsense that I just simply didn't recognize her "with that hat on". But in faking it, I spared her. I spared her the burden of knowing the real reason why she hasn't seen me in a while. The real reason I have lost so much weight. The real reason I am faking my life. It's my burden, after all...Not hers. I did this to myself and now I will pay the price. The currency is guilt, and I am a wealthy woman, indeed.

I know I should feel comfortable talking to my friends. I know I should be able to talk to my family. And they have all reached out to me...I can feel them reaching all the time. Yet when the phone rings, or the e-mails come, I just can't bring myself to open up and "burden" them. I am tired of crying and I am tired of explaining, and I am tired of feeling the burden of the weight on my heart. I have always had a very, very bad habit of ignoring things until they go away, and I am falling into those bad habits like a ton of bricks...But I don't want to ignore you, and I don't want you to go away...Please keep trying and please keep reaching. I promise, at some point I will reach back. I just hope that when I do, you aren't too far away...