The day was autumn crisp, the leaves, like scattered thoughts crunching under my feet. This was liberation day for me. The first day of freedom in fourteen years. I had been a prisoner of my past, chained to memories and feelings and thoughts that had literally made me crazy. You know that old joke, “Hey Doc, the experiment was a success but the patient died?” Well, in my case, it goes like, “Hey Doc, the experiment was a success, the patient lives, and she lives to tell her story.” I don’t want to tell it. I’d rather I didn’t have to, but I must. I was born on August 18, 1962. That makes me a Leo and that’s a good thing because I would need the strength and courage of a lion. I was born almost two months too soon. I weighed three pounds two ounces and had to be kept in an incubator for two months. My earliest memory is a hazy, fuzzy image of my Mother, I think she was changing my diaper, and she said, something like, “Oh Kay, then suck your toe!” I think she was giggling at me, and that made me feel good, that I could make her smile. My first memory of my father is two years later, when I was three, or four. We were in the back yard of our new house, and my Mom was gone. I didn’t know where she went, and I think that I asked my Dad. This memory is clear probably because of the sad, pain that I saw in his eyes, when he answered “She’s just gone away for a little while, She’ll be back soon.” I think I asked how soon, and he said, “I don’t know.” My Mom was gone, because she was hospitalized for Manic-depression, or Bi-polar disorder. I remember that during this age, my first memories of being touched by my father. I remember him sleeping in my bed. I also remember being gravely shaken by this occurrence. It was at three or four that I had a night trauma. I would be falling asleep and then the room would start spinning. I would always scream out for my Mom. I think once my Dad answered the call, but I refused him, I wanted Mommy! As I look back with hindsight, I understand what these dizzy spells were. They were panic attacks. I was having panic attacks because of the feelings that I held for my Father, and the insecurities about my Mother. This is the place that started the rift in my mind, the place where as the saying goes, “.. And there be dragons.”