What can I say? What can I say that doesn't sound self-asbsorbed and fatalistic? I am sad. I am depressed. Perhaps that is the more accurate description? And it is hard to tell your friends because it seems selfish and foolish.

Maybe it is hormones?
Maybe it is the holiday season?
Maybe it is me? Maybe I am just one of those people that will never be truly happy?

I am working in the Philippines at the moment. I am tired, jetlagged and lonely. My friends and family are all far away. I need a hug. But things aren't that bad. After all, there are millions and millions of people that have it worse than me. I don't really have any real reason to gripe.

I just feel low. I think some of it is the economy. My boyfriend for the past two months has been complaining about his job. He feels overworked, overstressed and at the point of losing his job. I feel I have supported him emotionally for that time but it is hard to keep sustaining someone especially when you are drained yourself. I think I just figured that out.

Today, I am needing love and affection. He needs to give it to me. It cannot be all about him at the moment. He has "hogged" my resources.

He isn't a bad guy. I think it is genuine stress and he has been single for a long time. It is easy to just focus on yourself. He needs to learn to be the other half of a couple. Likewise, I need to be a little less needy. That is fair enough.

Things are hard. I hate my job and need a new one. I don't see many interesting ones but the ones I do see are not paid as well. That would mean a pay cut. That is not only attractive but I don't know if it is possible financially.

I am meant to buy a house with a few of my friends. They all have money and I don't. It means that my mortgage rate is quite high every month. Perhaps more than I can or should pay. It means telling them that. Not only would it disappoint them but it would disappoint me. I want to buy with them. I want to live with them. I want to share a house with them but I also want to just own something.

Which leads me to my next self-obsessed rant. All my friends on facebook have houses and babies. They are going to shows and having Christmas parties. It looks from the outside so wonderful. And here I am complaining about a nice guy and a job. It seems so indulgent.

And then there is the past. How did I end up in England? How did I end up 33 and starting all over? I was married. I married an Englishman and we moved to England. I got a job I liked. We bought a house and we briefly talked about having kids. It all went wrong. He cheated on me. But it wasn't just cheating. It was a long term affair. He had a girlfriend on the side and he kept our relationship going. But probably the worst part about it, and I do think that this is the worst, is that he convinced me that it was all in my mind.

It was beyond selfish, it was cruel. Who does that to someone else? You can cheat. I don't agree but many do. It can be a one off or something that leads to the end of a relationship but an affair that is sustained for years and one that makes the original partner feel de-valued is wrong.

This is what he did to me. He cheated on me for years. I saw the clues and I tried to address them but it was always my fault. I was suspicious, insecure, judgmental, etc. He always made it about me. I started to believe it after time. You don't know how to trust your own judgement anymore.

That is where I was. That is where I am. I used to be very confident. I used to just trust my instincts. I used to just say what I wanted. Not anymore. I feel fragile. I feel like a doll half the time that is about to break.

I try to hold it together and sometimes the chaos inside comes out in flairs. I yell at someone for something minor. But that is not the real tragedy. The real tradegy that is after years of therapy and self-awareness, I still feel one step away from the gutter almost every day. And I don't know if I can change that.

Here I sit on a work trip where many would think that I have a decent career and am relatively accomplished. Yet I close to sobbing because I am plagued half the night with nightmares of seeing my ex at a party or dreams of babies that I am convinced will never come.

I feel a mess. I don't want to be. I don't want to be for my self but also because of my ex. I don't want to continue to grant him this power. I want to be myself again. The self I was before I met him. The fearless, fun and confident woman.

I don't know if I can find her again or if she is gone forever. I have lonely days like today and she feels lost forever.