My heart breaks for the people I love. For once in my life I feel that now I am somewhat stable... and everyone around me is falling apart.

I can't explain how I am feeling in any other way except to say that I am sad. But then when I think about why I am sad, I realize it has nothing to do with my own internal processes and conflicts.

I am sad mostly for my sister, who has found herself stuck in a hard place. She allowed herself to be tied down at too young of an age, and now she wants to break free. She realizes that her life has changed, and it will never be the same. She has a kid now. She won't ever be able to do some of the things she wanted to do. She has deep regrets about having a baby so young, and about who she had the baby with. She doesn't want to leave him because she doesn't want to hurt anyone. She thinks she is going to fuck up two lives for the price of one.

I told her, do you want to be that woman 20 years from now, after her kids fledged the nest, who stays alone at home all day in her big empty house while her husband lives 500 miles away with another woman? Do you want your kid growing up in a house with two parents that hate each other and don't even speak to each other any more? Because that hurts more than having your kid grow up with separated parents, which we see more and more to become the norm for kids these days anyway. I told her, don't be like mom and dad, who showed us everything not to be.

There are other factors at play, other things going on in her life right now that I will neglect to mention (as it is 7am and I really need to get moving to go to work), that make her feel as if she is in a deeper and deeper hole.

It is hard for me to know what to say to some of these things because I am a free bird and I have never known what it is to be otherwise. I don't have a kid, I don't live with my significant other. I don't have to worry about breaking apart an entire family if I am not happy with my life and seek to change it.

Like I said, my heart breaks for her. I hope she will find the strength to do what she knows she needs to do that big step that she is afraid to take. All I can do is listen and provide words of encouragement.

And go to work, so I can afford to continue to pay for my freedom.. shit.