This is dedicated to...

I've got some friends who are authors. I went to Marianne's book signing back in November. I bought a book and asked her to sign it for me. I told her to make it out to "eBay winner." We all had a good laugh.

I bought a book from another friend today and he offered to sign it. Not knowing my little joke, I said "Sure, just make it out to 'eBay winner.'" I caught him off guard, but fortunately he knew I was kidding before I actually had something made out to "eBay winner."

It was good to have a nice laugh like that. It's been a while.

I had a super long day with a lot of people. It was hard towards the end as I was getting tired and a little (okay, a lot) cranky and trying to keep everything together. It's okay because I needed to get back into being a semi-social person instead of the recluse I've become since my depression got worse.

I was talking to my doctor the other day and mentioned that this is really the first time in my life that I could be depressed without worrying about having to keep it together artificially because someone else's needs had to come first. I wonder if that's why this one seems so much worse than I remember the other episodes being. Perhaps it's not that it's worse, but I'm feeling it more.

This one's different because I'm not angry at myself for being depressed or for being flawed. I'm still trying to be loving and gentle with myself and accept that some of this is hard wired in me. I'm trying to be patient in realizing that our efforts to treat this aren't going to show immediate results, but eventually I will feel better.