to bond.

"Joan's internal world was far different from her external one. While everything outside seemed rosy, inside she felt only blackness. Her days began with a blackness inside so deep she could see it. Each day she pulled herself from bed, her chest aching with depression. All was vanity. Husband, children, friends - they meant nothing to her. In fact, people terrified her. Underneath their nice words she detected poisonous hatred...

What was wrong? How could she outwardly have it all, and inwardly feel so desolate that she would try to kill herself? During her weeks in hospital, the reason became evident. Despite the many people in her life, she was alone - isolated. Cut off from divine and human contact, Joan lived in an earthly hell.

Joan was suffering from a depression so deep that she did not want to live. But depression was not Joan's real problem. Something in the last thirty-five years had prevented Joan from being able to connect with God and with other people. Somehow Joan did not accomplish one of the basic tasks of growing up. She failed to learn what some infants in the right environment catch naturally. She failed to do what she was created to do. She failed to learn how to bond."

- Changes That Heal by Henry Cloud, p60-61 (emphasis added)