I am glad I found this site and have been reading HHH and various articles at random. This one caught my eye. It seems like I am alive because of Puzzle, but maybe that's a dumb thing to say. I am scared that someday I might be too sick to care for her. Or I have this vague fear that she might be taken away from me, the way kids get taken away from their parents by social service agencies. The only useful thing I ever do is to care for Puzzle. For a while, the high points of my day were my walks with Puzzle. We zoomed around everywhere. Then the rest of the day would really suck. Now, everything sucks. We don't zoom. I just trudge around, and a lot of time when I walk Puzzle or walk anywhere, I cry. It often feels like Me and My Dog Against the World. I have had four dogs and it has always felt like my dog knew me and understood me better than anyone. When I was a teenager I told my family dog my secrets once. I whispered into her ear. Another time when I was a teenager I went to babysit and the family had a gray cat. I spent all night crying and stroking that cat. When I was 21, I hitch-hiked across the country with my dog. If you were driving on the Interstate in 1979 and saw a kid dressed in rags hitch-hiking with a black-faced dog, that was me. Thanks for picking me up. After that, I came home and got my eating disorder. I live in low-income housing in an eight-story building. I've lived here four years now. The neighbors are mostly elderly and they are hostile, never welcomed me and don't know my name or Puzzle's. They gossip in the hall all day long. I've heard them say things about my weight. There is a lot of yelling and the TV's blare in the apartments all day long. I hear Wheel of Fortune for hours and the Pope on Sundays. It took a long time for Puzzle to adjust to being here, but when we're in our little space, we're safe. Julie