I was just trying not to believe that it was really happening. The life that I had known for years could not end so quickly, could it? It was mid-September and I had nowhere to go.

A meteor had come crashing down upon the life I had known, obliterating everything.

I kept thinking about how everything had been so right and normal yesterday – not literally yesterday but that's how it felt.

Then everything changed and I had not seen it coming. I would have done something surely if I had seen danger ahead or if I had known that life would become so extremely challenging.

It wasn't long after Lynn first stated that she might not come back to me. How could this be? I NEVER imagined a life without her. I also had not foreseen the problems I was having in my career. Who would believe that some fraudster - John Freifeld - would be able to do anything to hurt me or my career and reputation with my clients?

I heard those words echo through my mind. I was just remembering some conversation with Lynn not long before this time when I said "what can he do to me?"

No one who had not come in contact with Freifeld was complaining about my competency or performance as a psychotherapist. I did have problems and had noticed over the past month and a half I had not been myself or at my best. It didn't seem that anyone actually noticed that I could not still provide psychotherapy for them.

People were still calling me for appointments, but I had to close down my private practice.

The fact that there were grievances at all made me think that I better put all therapy sessions on hold for a while. I didn't know where to turn for help though. It had been a few months since I had an appointment with any of my previous therapists.

I then heard from Diane, Lynn's mother, that she was planning to sell the house she had bought for Lynn and me to rent.

I had to move out of our home.

It seemed like just a few weeks ago everything was perfect in my life and in the lives of Lynn and me. But it also seemed like it was during another lifetime. How can things fall apart so fast?

My mind went to that song by Don Henley called "New York Minute." It was just the first week of September of 2000. The lyrics went through my mind.

"He had a home

The love of a girl

But men get lost sometimes

As years unfurl

One day he crossed some line

And he was too much in this world

But I guess it doesn't matter anymore"

And then Don Henley sings

"If you find somebody to love in this world

You better hang on tooth and nail."

I had tried so hard to hold onto Lynn!

Then Don Henley says

"And in these days

When darkness falls early

And people rush home

To the ones they love

You better take a fool's advice

And take care of your own

'Cause one day they're here;

Next day they're gone"

Darkness was all I knew now.

And finally, the most poignant lines from the song read

"I pulled my coat around my shoulders

And took a walk down through the park

The leaves were falling around me

The groaning city in the gathering dark

On some solitary rock

A desperate lover left his mark,

He said "Baby, I've changed. Please come back."

What the head makes cloudy

The heart makes very clear"

I was that desperate lover crying out to Lynn "Please come back!" My head might have been cloudy, but my heart was so desperately clear in what I wanted and needed with every fiber of my being.

I used to think about this many years earlier after Celta died in a fire. I had just spoken to her the previous day. Now, with those words from Lynn that she might not come back, I was lost in darkness without a compass or guide.

Not long after that, Diane, Lynn's mother, announced her plans to sell that house. I had moved out already.

A meteor had come crashing down upon my life. The home we had known was being obliterated. My home!

On September 7, 2000, I was summoned by Diane to retrieve what I might want from the home. I wanted Lynn. I didn't want to see these boxes. Lynn wasn't even there. I wondered how she was doing.

The kitchen table was still there. The living room couch still sat where we had it along with the chairs. This is where we would entertain guests - our friends - and family.

I felt like I was dead - literally. I know that might sound hard to imagine.

When we experience stressors in life, our minds and bodies react in different ways. We might become anxious and the fight or flight response kicks in. It's like being on the plains of Africa and seeing a hungry lion. Our bodies need to prepare us to run. Something like that happens in response to any type of stress that humans face - we respond based on our thoughts as if we were in physical danger.

There are other responses like the freeze response which animals use as well. One might imagine an animal playing dead as a survival mechanism. We might also think of this as a turtle withdrawing into its shell and hoping not to be noticed by a predator.

Something like that happened to me on that day when I showed up to gather what I might want. I wanted Lynn.

I was so overwhelmed, and my body felt like it was shutting down. I went into the room where we had the computer and the bookcase. It was around the corner and not visible from the living room. I put my back up against the wall on the left next to the closet with the mirrors on it.

I slid down the wall and raised my legs up at the knees and stared blankly ahead. I was vaguely aware that Diane was frustrated and angry at me.

I was supposed to be doing something. She needed to sell the place. I was expected to act. But instead, I just stared ahead blankly. Like I was dead. I wasn't trying to be difficult or put on an act of defiance. I felt dead!

I could vaguely register that she had called my mother when I didn't respond at all.

Diane was either mad at me for acting this way or frustrated.

Everything I had known was here... This was our home. It felt comfortable for me and now it was being packed up and put into boxes.

Life as I had known it was disappearing like ashes from a fire. The love of my life - Lynn - was a reality that was fading away. It couldn't be. My home was being deconstructed and taken down as if it had no meaning.

I wasn't being told that Lynn didn't want me to keep visiting her at her mother's place.

It was too easy to deconstruct the life we had. Somehow, somewhere along the way, Lynn had lost her ring.

There had been no wedding and no official marriage certificate.

We weren't talking about what this meant. There were no goodbyes.

It was a reverse of the first few years but all in the space of two months.

Lynn and I never had to talk about "are you seeing someone else?" She brought up the issue of whether we were more than just friends, one year after we started seeing each other. But it was just a formality. Everyone and anyone who saw us knew we were more than just friends back then.

The engagement happened without actual planning. I mean it was just a part of us saying to each other, "I'm in love with you." I remembered how I had given her the ring and she was in tears – tears of joy – as I opened the box. I had been shocked because I had thought she knew I was bringing her ring over that day.

We had NEEDED to live together after that. As much as Lynn needed as much oxygen as she could get so had we needed to be together.

So, when Lynn said she might not be coming back, I didn't have to ask what that meant. I wouldn't ask or speak it!

No, no, no, no!

This is NOT happening! This is NOT happening!

What happened next, I don't remember. The next few days were dream-like. I was seeing the world as if I were looking through smoke, ashes, and fog. And all I could do is watch.