My first encounter with psychiatry was when my father had his first episode of depression ,during the plague epidemic ,sometime around 1998.I remember him being very dull,was not going for work,would cry unnecessarily and incessantly.He also had a specific phobia for dolls,which would restrain us to bring any or play with any  dolls at home(at times he expresses guilt for the same till date.)I don’t blame him though as i did not really like playing with the DOLLS.He took treatment for the same,and also started practicing Yoga.One day i remember he brought a Barbie doll,that wore a white lace dress and kept it on the cabinet .He would purposely sit in front of it ,taking time out of his busy schedule , daily and i would observe him sweating ,flushing and fidgeting.my father possesses one the prettiest eyes I’ve seen ,very expressive big doe shaped eyes ,with long eyelashes, they would become blood-red,my mother would get frightened and plead him to see a doctor immediately ,I would watch him suffer ,baffled.The distress he felt was evident,still he would go through the same suffering daily,just so that i could play with the dolls.I would tell him time and again ,”no papa i don’t want to play with it”.But he would persist.I clearly remember he would perform different ‘asanas’ and try to make me and my brother laugh,we used to.Eventually medicines were tapered ,alcohol was resorted to and Yoga stayed ,so did the phobia ,within a month the lace dress barbie was thrown away from the window ,by my mother(as he would refuse to touch it).All this made me loath all kinds of dolls anyone could know of.I could not understand how can children of my age enjoy playing with these dead unreal appalling things,i could never,i will never.It made my papa suffer .https://archivesindianpsychiatry.wordpress.com/2013/06/26/224/