I found a wonderful post about loyalty over at http://pinkunderbelly.com (click on Loyalty on the right side. Nancy talks about feeling the loss of a favorite baseball player being traded and most of us can relate. I certainly can. Just when I get to know a player and develop an attachment to him (because he is a hunk or some other noble reason), he gets traded and the next new best thing comes on board. I wonder if a bit more loyalty from the teams to their players and the fans might be more important than the bottom line. Maybe our loyalty to the players should be considered.  

And in Nancy's post, this brings up loyalty of friends when your like suddenly tanks. Sometimes–just when we really need friends because we have had bad news of one sort or another–some of our friends slip back into the woodwork. I've done it myself when one additional thing seems more than I can handle.

So–how can we be there for another person when our own coping mechanisms are low? How can we extend ourselves when we are hanging on by our fingernails? Can we learn to be empathetic without losing ourselves in the process?