I love doing this show, but I confess there are times when I get so immersed in other people's dating and relationship stories that I neglect to reflect on my own journey and come up with a solid game plan for what to do next.

So it really struck a chord when I received an email from this listener.

So my name is Carrie.

I've been working as a psychotherapist for about the last 25 years, and I love what I do.

I'm passionate about what I do. I'm passionate about what I do.

I think it's been like a real privilege for me

because it's given me such an opportunity,

not only to do something meaningful with my life,

but I've learned so much from this job.

You wrote to me a while ago, and the first line really got to me. You said

you were bereft of hope. Let's go back to the headspace that you were in when you wrote that.

Well, first of all, I should preface this by saying I've been single, I'm using air quotes,

because in my mind that means not married in this context for almost 23 years. And so I've had a

tremendous amount of, let's just say, experience dating. Now, I've had several long-term

relationships in that time, but it's been a real struggle for me, finding a

lifetime partner. And so on that day, I had been seeing someone, and there are these really

interesting Facebook pages for women who are looking to gather information on who they're going

out with, to see if anybody else is dating them.

And I had gone on that page and noticed that someone was asking about someone I'd gone out with, someone much younger, you know, kind of inappropriately younger.

Oh, boy.

And I had had a conversation with a client of mine earlier who sort of shared a similar experience.

And, you know, I think just maybe that in context with this long history, yeah, I was feeling fairly down.

...