[Meri] says the self-mutilation began with the branch of a tree. Then came the razor, the burning candle, the hammer. "Killing myself was not the reason for cutting. Killing the pain was," she writes in her book. At the time, Meri thought she was the only one in the world who did this.

After emergency trips to the hospital and failed attempts at therapy, Meri fortunately found Michael Silvia. A psychotherapist and licensed independent clinical social worker, Michael helped her to understand that she had learned not only to dissociate from her pain but to release it in self-destructive ways. He understood that at the root of Meri's depression, anxiety and many other symptoms, there was an emptiness, a sense of abandonment. And he never once abandoned her. Even when she tried to jump out his office window, he worked with her through 10 years of therapy until she was finally ready to walk out his door and begin a new life.