My Name is Elicia and I'm a textaholic.

Step one of any common Twelve Step Program is admitting you have a problem. So here goes… My name is Elicia and I am a cell phone addict.

Whew. I feel better already.

Regardless of setting, attire or company at any given time of day you will see attached to my hand or hip a shiny, silver, phone/pda/camera/nuclear-weapons-launcher. One day last week I actually challenged myself to walk all the way around my office building to talk to a co-worker and then visit the ladies room sans phone. I literally almost got the shakes. It was a sad sad moment.

The only thing that makes me feel better is knowing that I am not alone. I actually found an article online entitled Tech Addicts Need Textual Healing. When I stopped LMAO and actually read the article thinking it was a joke I realized it the "experts" were quite serious in their concern with the isolation of "textually active" individuals. It even went on to discuss "cell phone detox" and I was immediately reminded of my hurried trip to the little girl's room nervously thinking of my phone buzzing away on my desk. EEK! Have I been infected with some icky TTD? I thought I was being so careful hiding behind the light of my LCD touchscreen!

All jokes aside, I do believe that choosing electronic mail over a good 'ol face to face "Come to Jesus Meeting" can also have adverse effects on many relationships. Have you ever had something you've emailed, IM'd, blogged, or texted interpreted completely opposite of how you intended it??? I HAVE! It's amazing what some people can read into the words you've written. No matter how many cute emoticons you stick in there.

So why do I do it? Why do I admittedly prefer a chat session to an actual phone call 9 times out of 10? Because I'm a "get to the matter" kind of girl. If I need to know whether or not to bring a bottle of wine to dinner I don't want to go through "Hey, how are you? How's the family? I'm great. No, the house hasn't sold yet, but the realtor is dropping the sale price…" – I just want to know "white or red?"

I'm taking all of this into account and starting at step number one. Now that I've admitted that yes, I do have a problem, I'm slowly working on tearing down the digital walls that I've built between me and my loved ones.

BZZZZZZZZ, G2G I'm getting a text and need to reply. TTYL