I cannot honestly say that I know what you are experiencing. I have been single for 12 years so I do know what it is like to be alone. After reading through your thread, please remember that being with someone is secondary. Another person cannot bear the burden of that which you are placing on them. They cannot fulfill you or make your life complete, all they can do is add to your happiness but they can’t make you happy. People are only human. I know that one day you will meet that special woman. But even at that time, remember she is only human and there will still be disappointments, hurt, and also love. It’s all part of the package. It’s better to be alone than to be with the wrong person. Your life can be even more miserable when that happens.
I’m posting this with the best intentions and not to bring you down even further. Take heart. I’ve had many relationships over these 12 years that I thought was the right one, only to be disappointed.
Work on learning to love yourself, the hardest lesson in the world to do and easy to say.
Not to pick-and-choose from your nice post, but there is one thing that I want to express quickly:
Exactly right, excecpt my package has something wrong with it. It contains only disappointments and hurt.
You are so correct.
I’m not good at hugs, but I do appreciate a clear voice when I hear one. Una, you’ve got one of the clearest and most distinctive voices here at the SDMB. It’s like when I’m sitting there listening to a choir, and there’s one soprano whose voice just cuts through the whole thing, and it’s like the rest of the sopranos are just kind of singing along with her.
When you speak, the rest of us are instantly relegated to background noise.
Don’t ever leave. 
You’re right about the first part, but wrong about the second. Christmas is not the Joyous season it’s hyped as for a great many people, myself included. Only I wish you could change the last part to read “I wish Christmas did not exist.” The problem is not in the people, but in the rituals. They keep building up and never disappearing. It’s just too much. If, like me, you and “Christmas as Usual” don’t agree, save yourself and take a break from it.
I went cold turkey, no cards. No parties. No window lights. No tree. You probably just need to drop one of those to be in balance with your own self. Don’t let “Christmas as Usual” outweigh your own needs on the seesaw.
Thank you very much for the nice and kind sentiments, Duck Duck Goose.
I know, I know. This is a good way to deal with it, but I want so much to belong, it is hard to decide what exactly to do.
I have noticed my depression has been fading as Christmas fades away. There will be another downswing on New Year’s Eve (so mark your calendars, folks!), but it will not be as bad as Christmas. I’ve already prepared myself to try and feel better by spending New Years Eve on #straightdope with my friends, until midnight CST. I hope some people will join me there. Mortwight and Nephwrack are just not very good at cheering me up. 
hugs Una hard
Hey, if nothing else, the SDMB NYE gathering at Falcon’s will make a chat appearance. (Come on…it’s at MY apartment. What else do you expect!)
hugs again
Depression is a nightmare and it’s almost inevitably worse during the holidays. I, like the rest of the Dopers, sympathize with the hopelessness that is depression.
Have you sought professional help? Anti-depressants can be very effective for many people. It would be very cruel if you were to suffer if you didn’t have to.
Anthracite - while far from all of us know what it’s like to be clinically depressed, most of us here know what it’s like to be on the outside, with an emptiness in our hearts, looking in at the world of people who have others to be with and care about at this time of year. I have no doubt that the offers to share the season with you were genuine; I wouldn’t hesitate to make the same offer myself.
I’m glad you’re not planning on leaving us. Your intelligent and compassionate voice would be deeply missed.
Oh wow, Amy. I soooooo wish I could be there. 
Perhaps next year, once I free myself of my largest set of chains.
If nothing else, my Christmas gift for you will be there, so you can set it on a shelf and think of me…
Yes, continuously, and antidepressants are not helpful for my situation.
It was very kind of the many people to offer to have me spend the season with them. I only wonder about some because it is a large act of trust to invite someone you only know from online and the SDMB to come to your house for Holidays. I mean - the vast majority of people here have no idea who or what I am, or what sort of person I am. You yourself said you would not hesitate to offer. But how can you say this - can you trust someone like me, based only on my thoughts and feelings and emotions posted here?
Or perhaps it seems unusual to me for two reasons. First, I have a large difficulty truting people myself, and second, I still am used to being abused, and thus keep trying to see if someone is only trying to mock me, as opposed to making an honest offer.
Sigh. Hopefully next year, if I am still alive, I can take someone up on their offer. Or if my home situation changes, offer to host people here. Hell, I’d even pay for the plane tickets for several people I know to come here, just so I would not be alone and so very, very sad on Christams again.
Don’t I deserve one happy Christmas before I die??? Just one is all I’m asking for!
Like DDG said you have a clear voice. At the dinner table, you might not be certain to be fun, but you’re certainly worth the place.
A cheesy pop lyric: If you’re crying for love/ Then there’s still a chance you’ll get it. (Iggy)
You answered that one yourself, here, in a post that made me want to stand up and applaud:
We have a pretty good idea of who you are, and what you’re about. Like you said, there’s only so much you can fake, over 2000 posts. We have posters here who’ve crossed the oceans to be in the arms of someone they’d previously only known online. Compared to that, inviting you for dinner, even on a holiday, is a pretty small chance to take.
And whether or not you turned out to be a charming dinner companion is neither here nor there, IMO. I already know who you are; you would honor my table with your presence, period.
Hang in there, coalchick. And don’t wait until next Christmas to get together with your fellow weirdos here. Too bad you can’t make it to Falcon’s for New Year’s - it would be fun to meet you, after reading so many of your posts. But there will be other opportunities, long before another year has passed.
Anthracite – you have the right to bitch and moan. You have the right to hate Christmas and yourself (although I reserve the right to disabuse you of the latter). You also have the right to get your tummy tickled by my lips until you pee your pants. These are inalienable rights granted to you by me.
I have the right to tell you to cheer up. I have the right to be (as Lexicon said) tenacious and refuse to stop trying to make you feel better. Yes, it does indeed, suck to have a friend like me. Just think of me like a case of herpes; terminal, ever present and basically infectious. Like herpes I pop up when you least expect me and when you probably don’t want me. That is the joy of a viral infection of Byzantine.
So the Christmas presents are late; who cares? The day isn’t important. It’s the gift, the love behind it and just the flaming fact that you cared enough to remember. If they don’t like it guess what they get next year? That’s right. A visit. Show up in person without a gift but yourself. That will teach them!
Oh please! Chat is the crack of the internet. I don’t go in there anymore for reasons you well know. I don’t care if they talk about me or not and I don’t think you should concern your pretty little head about it either; why the fuck should you care what a bunch of people you don’t know say about you? Who cares!
And depression? Oy vay! Let’s talk! I’ve had clinical depression for years! It comes, it goes, but I’m still here. I’m stronger because of it. I know what’s really important because of it. I know who to suck and who to blow because of it (and I don’t mean that dirty like, unless it put a smile on your face and then I mean it just that way). Life sucks, get a helmet, as Dennis Leary said.
Everything you wished in a partner I got this year by having my mother here in my home (well, okay, no great sex but hey, it’s my MOM!) But we went shopping, giggled, watched movies and played scrabble until we just couldn’t think anymore. She came up with goyum (a Jewish word for gentiles and I conceded the game since that was so great on a triple word score! Love you mom!) So sometimes, we don’t need a lover we just need a friend, you know?
I’m glad you are feeling better. Sometimes we just need to vent all that pain and anger we feel. And then we need to regroup. So hey, here’s to another year of the Byzantine virus infecting you, Una!
Byz, as always, is right, Una. And, as you can clearly see, you have friends in abundance!
Plus, you have Byz to tickle your belly with her lips until you pee in your pants! Some of us would pay cash (much, much cash) for that privilege!
::evilbeth panting at the very thought::
evilbeth – phhhhhhhddtttttttt! Okay, your tummy should be just tickled pink! Now you tell Una how great that is; you tell her that Byzantine the virus is really “a good thing” ala Martha Stewart!
Really, Una, I have great lips that vibrate like you’ve never felt! Whatever vibrator you have it doesn’t even come CLOSE to the power in my lips! Truly, I’m so good that men forget their names when my lips even touch their neither parts… yes, I’m THAT good!
Una, as soon as a fully regain conciousness, I’ll describe to you what that was like!
I love you, Byz. You don’t know what I would give for a genuine Byzantine tummy tickling.
I’d give anything.
Una, I haven’t been checking threads for a while, but I want you to know that you may visit here any time of the year. If you give us a little notice, I’ll try to pretend that we actually clean around here once in a while, and if you drop by unannounced, you’ll see how we really live.
I vote that we have the first IRL meeting of ULVAN or the Posse at my house, if you would like. The Central Minnesota Dopers seemed to have an okay time here.
----:)/
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Dearest Una~
I am just checking in to remind you that you are loved.
By me, and from the looks of this and other threads, by lots of people.
(((Una)))
Scotti