This is the autobiography of Anna Michener, who suffered physical and emotional abuse behind closed doors at the hands of her parents and grandmother. She was made the scapegoat for her family's many problems and was institutionalized in mental hospitals more than once. At the age of 16 she found a new family and her own voice and wrote this text as an early step toward recovery. The account is of growing up under unspeakable conditions, not of mature reflection but rather an immediate account of unhealed wounds.