I took a week, but here I have finally finished my story...

Have you ever fallen off a see-saw and banged your head on the cement? I did at a very young age, but I still remember how much it hurt to hit my head hard on the cement. The sound my head made as it hit, the white searing pain.

I can also remember that while this happened at pre-school, none of the caregivers would help or comfort me, they were too busy chatting to deal with me as I lay there, as I walked to them and asked for help, too busy for me.

Have you ever been bitten by fire ants? Once as a small child I was playing with this really cool mound of dirt. Man did it hurt when all those ants swarmed me and bit me. I was in so much pain that while running home I decided to stop at a neighbor's house. A house that had a little girl my age, a house where I often played. I knocked on the door and the mother of my little friend told me that she didn't have time to deal with me, screaming and crying, hand red and swollen, because she was busy and not my mother.

Have you ever had your face slapped really hard? I can remember as a small girl, I was playing outside and so was some of the other children my age. One of my friends was learning to ride a bike, her little brother was learning to peddle a big wheel. The little brother on the big wheel was trying to go up a hill and not having a lot of success. He would peddle and still the gravity was pulling him backward on the hill. I gave him a gentle push to help him along. He screamed. The mother explained to me that he didn't like to be pushed. I watched for a while longer and when the mom wasn't looking and he was going backward down the hill despite his valiant peddling up the hill efforts, I pushed him again. He screamed, she slapped me, really hard. Wow, that hurt. I was only trying to help, to this day it is hard for me to watch someone struggle without lending a hand, you would think that slap would have taught me a lesson.

I have at least a dozen of these stories, the time I was punched in the face in Kindergarten by a third grade boy and both the teacher and Principal told me it must have been my fault, because he came for a good home and I did not. Teachers, dentists, doctors, social workers, neighbors, a police woman, I have stories about how these people all treated me as a small child. A small child whose mother didn't really have the time to pay attention to, bath, feed, play with or protect.

I was taken away from this home and put into foster care, adopted by a lovely family and after the age of six my life was even more traditional American than Leave it to Beaver. But, somewhere in me there still lives that little girl who everyone treated like trash. I think a part of me still blames myself.

This is the Epiphany I had last week when I was so mad at my dog. She like me had a previous life where she wasn't treated so well, and she like me still has a bit of the scraggly dog no one wanted in her. And sometimes this makes me really hate her. But, I guess it ain't really about the dog now is it?