“Hey, how are you?  Good, you?” The words roll off your tongue to the passerby with your best fake smile as your thoughts are quickly jerked back to the pulsating pain.  At this point, any version of the truth would leave you on the brink of tears or with the feeling of burdening someone with an explanation of how you really are, neither of which you have the energy for right now. 

An important piece of maintaining good mental health is understanding of what you need for the establishment of healthy personal boundaries.  Boundaries are guidelines that define how we interact with others, how we allow others to treat us and how we take care of ourselves.