telephone line that I can vent without anyone knowing?

Simply a Rose to brighten your day,         And maybe lessen the cares in your way;         And also, too, to help you to know,         That in knowing you, many others grow!

  Well, I was going to suggest using Fun Mail and picking someone whom you could use as a sounding board. However, I checked your profile and see that you have four friends who share this account. Therefore, your Fun Mail privacy would not be available.

Accordingly, I’d suggest that you change your password on Fun Advice and then tell your friends that they have to get their own account. You then would have privacy in your Fun Mails.

  Fun Mail a “sounding board”!

I would assume that you can’t talk about what you are going through with anyone because it is too personal and you don’t want others to know about it in relation to you.

The solution, then, might be to pick someone on Fun Advice whose advice you like and Fun Mail them. (You can check out the quality of someone’s advice by clicking on their name; going down to their recent advice, click on view all, then click on the questions that might interest you and view their answers.) Explain to them that you are having problems and want to have someone to use as a “sounding board” and would like to know if they would be willing to be your sounding board. Fun Mail is basically private, so you shouldn’t have any concerns about your privacy.

Although there are many users on Fun Advice who would be qualified, I’d suggest the person be an Advisor, for two reasons: First, most Advisors have several hundred or even thousands of Answers under their belt which can really give you a perspective about them; and second, you can simply click on the Advisors link at the top of the page and view a list of the most recently active Advisors with information about them AND a total of their Answers. (Don’t contact them by that “Ask me a question” link. That’s public. Instead, click on their name which will take you to their Profile page, then click on the “Send me Fun Mail” link on the left side of the page.)

You also have the ability to Fun Mail anyone (Advisor or otherwise) by clicking on the “Send me Fun Mail” link near the top of the Answer under the person’s name.