Sasha Alexander and Donald Bellisario are very open about why she left the show. "People don't realize that on a network show you make 24 episodes a year - that's ten and a half months a year, 17 hours a day. It's hardcore," said Alexander. "I had already started writing the last episode of the season and was getting ready to go to Australia to take a little break," Bellisario told the Chicago Tribune in 2005. "[She] came in two days before I was [due] to leave, and with tears in her eyes, she said, 'I just can't work this hard.'" Although Alexander was under contract with CBS at the time, Bellisario advocated for her and urged network executives to release her from the contract. “You don’t want to force someone to work when she says this is not what she expected it to be,” said Bellisario.