No Substitution Will Do

I think I am a masochist. Why else, I ask, would I continue to do these same things, harboring the same feelings, causing the same reactions, the same pain, the same tears, the same chronic heartsick illness, and never for a single moment think of stopping?

It's like pulling teeth. You don't want to-- God, don't you want to. But what else can you do? Every time you pull a tooth another gets infected.

It would decidedly help not to floss with barbed wire. But, it's what your mother did, and you're her tax-deduction.