Guide for Anyone Married to a Soapaholic

I have been watching the same soap opera, The Young and the Restless (Y & R), for thirty-two years. "Hello, my name is Agnes and I'm a soapaholic." I became addicted right out of high school. I worked the evening shift in a nursing home, so I had all afternoon to get my daily fix. Back then cable TV and video recorders were just starting to emerge, not to mention there not being any Internet. If you didn't have the money to buy a video recorder, you had to either watch it at broadcast time, rely on a friend who had watched it to fill you in, or wait until the next day for the newspaper's recount.

I had watched other soaps through the years, but I have faithfully followed Y & R, dumping the others. In my twenties I started a new day job and knew I had to purchase my own video recorder. Each afternoon I could not wait to get home to get my fix. Some days were very disheartening as I had forgotten to set the timer. But all was not lost because shortly there after, the Internet came into my life. If I missed setting up the VCR, all I had to do was log on and read the daily update, but I had to wait until the next day. Not good. After that Tivo, DVRs, and Directv came into my life, along with its season pass to schedule recordings. What more could an addict want. Just like a VCR, not only could I record Y & R without commercials or fast forward through them, but now I could keep previous recordings to view over again. It just couldn't get any better.

My husband and children soon learned not to bother Mom when her soap was on. That was the golden rule. Mom is in the soap zone, stay away. That was until recently, when my husband, Jim, started watching Y & R with me.