The First Paragraph of My Life Story...

– by Laura Starbird

My life didn’t begin when I was delivered by emergency C-section after my mother hemorrhaged while scrubbing floors.  It didn’t begin when I started kindergarten and had my first full-blown panic episode when my mother tried to leave me there.  My school years were not a beginning either because of constant harrassment from other students and even some of the teachers until I left at sixteen because I couldn’t take it anymore.  No, my life began in my thirties when I admitted to myself I have mental illness, from both physiological and psychological factors and sought out the help I desperately needed.  With the help of therapists and years of treatment I gradually grew and learned and started to become the person I was perhaps meant to be.  Today I live alone with minimal fear.  I come to the Center for Wisdom’s Women several times a week to take part in activities I enjoy, activities that allow me to use my natural abilities to create and achieve things I never thought I could.  Several months ago I started volunteering at the animal shelter, a long time dream of mine.  I love caring for the animals and watching them be adopted by loving, new pet parents.  It gives me a feeling of having a purpose in life and a reason to get up in the morning.  I’m no longer young but not old either.  But maybe I’m finally coming into my own as a person and I cherish it.