A t the beginning of the third grade my mother moved my brother and I to a new school. She did this often. With each move I attempted to blend in and fade away with the other children; but with a younger brother whose rebellious reputation was known in the tri-county area and a mentally ill mother this never seemed to happen. Each time I would gradually become known as the good student with the crazy mother and hellion brother. This meant I was never invited to sit with people at lunch, or play at recess. At our young stage of development we didn’t understand that mental illness was not something you caught; that my raving mother’s appearance outside of homeroom would not infect our teacher, or my classmates. I was blacklisted. Determined for this move to be different I decided to reinvent myself, to remove as much of my family as I possibly could. When I walked into my first class at this new elementary school and the teacher called out my name, “Elizabeth Johnson” I replied, “Act
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