Well, I've finally decided to ask for help. It's really not my nature, in fact it's kind of a weakness. If you asked me about anyone else, I would say everyone needs help sometimes, but my attitude has been everyone but ME. I was to the point of contemplating suicide rather than ask for help, and I realized that's just crazy. But then, I AM crazy. I'm just very hard on myself and I always have been. I was always the high achiever in the family, but I've basically been downwardly mobile since I was 30 and now I'm 54. 54, no job, no money, depressed.

So my brother offered to lend me money and I took it. I signed up for food stamps. I'm going to try to get rent assistance. I got a medical assistance card today, which is great because now I can take ALL my meds, not just the ones I could afford like before. I applied for unemployment and disability. I haven't given up on finding a job. I fill out applications online every day. It's just that I haven't gotten any offers except 100% commission jobs. Well, been there, done that, and it just didn't work out. When I don't get sales I don't get money and then I get depressed. I just need a regular income.

It turns out that the people I've kept in tough with from work haven't found jobs either. It's been 6 months. We aren't in a recession. We're in a depression and millions of people are living it. They're even laying off 500 teachers in AISD. 500! There are people called 99ers. Those are people that were on unemployment for 99 weeks and then dropped off the rolls, so they don't even count as unemployed anymore. Officially, 10% of the workforce is on unemployment. When you count the number that have exhausted their benefits, the number is closer to 20%. TWENTY PERCENT!!! What, as a country, are we going to do?