Thank you, WC, for your sensitive post. I'm glad you have a husband who encourages you. Someday, he will go through an illness of some kind. You will remember him being supportive of you, and your heart will want to reciprocate. You are that kind of a caring person.

My boyfriend did used to care for me in ways. He liked to cook and did do most of the cooking for both of us. If I was sick, he would even bring breakfast in to me on a tray. I thought that was wonderful of him.

I am finding it hard to believe that the last time he got a nice dinner together was in January of 2012. And he already wasn't doing too well at that point in time. This is a long time that I've not had him to care for me. This makes me cry now to even put these words down. He needs so much help, as he couldn't make a piece of toast or pour a bowl of cereal.

I guess in 2014 he was still heating up simple things because I did leave him alone for a week, while I went out of town, due to tragedy in my family. But when I came back, I saw he had been living off of cookies and cups of Jello pudding. So I haven't left him since then. That's four years of daily caregiving. I stopped working in 2012, so I figured it was good that life gave me a new job. But now I'm faltering. I'm irritable with him at times.

He never did understand much about depression. I can't really turn to him to feel comforted. On the other hand, he is not demanding, but patient. It annoys him that I'm not keeping the apartment up as nice as I used to. It disappoints me too. But I can't seem to make myself do what I know I need to get done.

We are watching the evening news now, but he is actually asleep in his chair. I feel awfully alone. The attendant was here all day, so I just stayed in bed. Somehow I have to get out of this morbid, paralyzed frame of mind. I see these hockey players on TV who've been horribly injured. People go through worse than I'm going through and manage.

At least I'm out of the bed now. I'll take some fish out of the freezer for dinner tonight. I expect I'll get the dinner made. The more I get done, the better I'll feel about myself. I have to not act crabby toward him like I did last night.

Even to give up caring for him and get him into a nursing home would be an undertaking that I don't have the energy for. It would result in me being even more alone, too.

I think any psychiatrist I tell all this to is just going to think, "Well, since you didn't plan your life out better, this is where you are. Too bad for you."