At the beginning of the book, Deborah has no grip on reality. All her fears had combined to make a schizophrenic hell where she is hated in both the world of Yr and Earth. She has many horrific fantasies. As a young child, the bars on her crib partially blocked her vision. As her disease developed, imaginary crib bars blocked her vision while she was experiencing the after effects of collision of the two worlds. She believed that soon after her sister first was born and arrived at their house, she attempted murder by trying to pitch her sister out a second-story window. She believed that it was true until a therapy session towards the end of her passage through the hospital. The doctor then realized that in the story, Deborah was not tall enough to take her sister out of her bassinet and not strong enough to carry a heavy baby while opening a window. The story was purely fictional. Her sickness created and bound her to a false idea of her power.
Deborah moves around the hospital, from Ward C to Ward D (isturbed.) Moving to a healthier ward was a sign of only temporary improvement. After she was first accustomed to life on the Disturbed ward, she felt much more comfortable and partook in the unusual friendships and customs amongst the patients. After three years of work, her doctor, Dr. Fried convinced her that Yr was merely a surreal fantasy created delusional imagination. From that major improvement, everything progressed. She visited her family, moved into an apartment, received tutoring in place of high school, and did remarkably well on her SATs. After she decided that she would remain on Earth and renounce her Yr citizenship, she permanently recovered.