The only thing left to do is quit before they fire me. I need to keep my sanity and ego

I’m slumped in my usually comfy office chair. It’s not comfortable today, not this month. My office is on the second floor of a high-rise, my cubicle framed by bay windows overlooking shrubs and trees. No roses. My workmates, Debby and Riva, are both in their own cubicles, and the boss is not in. I’m supposed to be churning out copy for a gift wholesaler, writing product descriptions for the catalog. Except the words on my computer screen have become jittery squiggles. My feet tap, tap on the grayish floor. I’m going to cry. Again.

Sara, my therapist, suggested I ask my sadness to step aside for the five hours I’m at work each day. I could designate a specific time of five to ten minutes to be sad at home, to feel the sorrow and losses, so the little traumatized girl inside me is soothed. Then at work, sad will let me be.

I can’t do it. It’s much too hard.