Cheaper Than a Therapist

Some people (like me) cannot tolerate the sadness of other people's lives. This condition is called 'hyper-empathy" and it can be debilitating. Reading the morning news is virtually out of the question for us, unless one is prepared to feel like shit for the rest of the day, which if you must know is getting pretty tiring.

Yesterday my grief over the collapsed condo in Florida, currently a concrete grave for roughly 150 of its residents, none of whom I know personally, really got to me. So to stop thinking about it I dyed my hair a crazy color which I now hate, and this has given me something closer to home to feel bad about: my head.

Therefore my suggestion for anyone who is negatively impacted by the daily news is to make a mess of your own life and stop worrying about things you can't change. As for me, I have to wait six weeks before I can color my hair again, so I'd say my $9.00 was a pretty good investment and much less than the cost of a decent shrink.