I just need to go to a quiet corner and cry... but I can't. I keep trying, but nothing happens. I know everyone is telling me that the economy is bad, and it's happening to everyone, but I feel more alone in this than anyone. Since I was laid off, I have found NOTHING, just nothing. I can't help everyone around me... it hurts. They look to me with teary eyes as if I hold the miracle that will save them... It hurts.

Before now, I've always been the one to save them from whatever was wrong. I took them in when they had nowhere to go. I sat with them while they gave up on life, I got them back into school when they were expelled, and I even stood by them when they had wronged. I did too much, and now I have become their stability. Some have come and gone, only looking back when they need that extra push, but others are in their dire need, and all I have left is the crumbling pedastool they had imagined me on.

Now I need stability, I feel so alone sometimes that even their company can't make the dark shadows vanish. I've lost so much, and I can't take it anymore. I can't lose anymore family members... I can't take it. I feel like I'm slowly rotting away from the inside. A sickness that will never be healed, and it just gets worse.

There are ways I can help those who need me, but it means sacrificing everything for me. the easier way is to sell my artwork. All the pieces that meant the most to me, anything that really held my heart or the feelings within it. The other is to sell myself to the man who's always wanted me to be with him. Either way, I just lose more of myself, and any pieces I have left. I don't want to live in a loveless marriage for the rest of my life... But I don't want everyone to hurt either. If I do this, I'll save what's left of my family as well as those depending on me, even if it means they riddicule and despise me in the end. There is just no winnning, and there never really was.

I can't ask them to make the sacrifices I do. They just can't, and they don't understand how to. Besides, there will always be someone else for them to lean on once I am spent. I at least know that I tried. regardless of whether or not I failed.

I just need to cry... I need the release, that way things will be easier. But instead, I'm locked in a place where the rope just tightens around my throat with no sign of release.

I will come up with the money I need to save everyone, and I will do everything in my power to make all of this work for everyone, I WILL, I SWEAR IT. Just god please, let me release some of this emotional pain, just let me cry...