Chapter 30 marks one of the most trying periods in my life, as I struggled to maintain my sense of self while being trapped in a system that controlled every aspect of my existence. During this time, while I was fighting to hold on to whatever fragments of my identity and independence I could, my mother decided to write a memoir. Instead of offering support or showing any real concern for my mental and emotional state, she chose to capitalize on my struggles. She wrote about watching me shave my head, a symbol of my unraveling, and described how I had once been “the happiest little girl in the world.” However, the reality was far more complex. The pain I was experiencing was not something she tried to understand or help me through—it was just material for her book. She didn’t seem to grasp how deeply I was suffering; instead, she used my breakdown as a narrative for her own benefit, selling her book and promoting herself, all while I was drowning in confusion and despair.

As my life spiraled further out of control, my mother’s actions felt like a public betrayal. When her memoir was published, it quickly became a media sensation, with my mother making multiple appearances on morning shows to promote it. I had no control over the narrative she was sharing, and each appearance only deepened the isolation I was feeling. On every TV screen, my videos and images of me with a shaved head were being broadcasted, while my mother explained how she had spent hours wondering what went wrong with me. Meanwhile, I was stuck in a place where my personal struggles were being dissected for public consumption, while I had no say in how they were portrayed. Instead of offering me the care and understanding I so desperately needed, she used my pain to sell books. The entire situation felt cruel and heartless, and the public’s insatiable demand for sensationalized details only intensified my anguish. It was a constant reminder of how little control I had over my own story, as it was being rewritten by others for their own gain. My suffering was not treated with the respect it deserved; it was treated as an entertainment spectacle.

The emotional toll of my mother’s behavior was compounded by her attempt to turn everything about our family into a public performance. She shared stories about my sister’s teenage pregnancy in a way that seemed to garner approval and applause from audiences, as if it were something to be celebrated. The audience’s reaction, clapping as she recounted my sister’s struggles, felt completely inappropriate and misplaced. It seemed as though my family had turned everything into a spectacle, with no regard for the real pain and complexities behind our lives. To further the public drama, my mother would discuss the personal struggles I had faced, seemingly without any understanding of the emotional damage it caused me. Her memoir became a way for her to capitalize on our family’s pain, furthering her public image at the expense of my privacy and well-being. Every appearance she made, every interview she gave, added another layer to the suffocating feeling of being exposed to the world in a way that I had no control over. The exploitation of my most vulnerable moments felt like a betrayal of the highest order, leaving me feeling even more isolated and disconnected from those around me. What hurt the most was that my mother, whom I had hoped would protect me, was now contributing to the narrative that was slowly destroying me.

The pain of seeing my life broadcasted for others to consume only deepened as I realized how little control I had over anything. I wanted to scream, to tell everyone how much I was hurting, but the system in place, with my father controlling every decision, prevented me from doing so. My mother’s portrayal of our family and my breakdown only reinforced the idea that my life was not my own; it belonged to the public. The sense of helplessness I felt during that time was suffocating. The idea that my private pain was used as a commodity was something that I could never have imagined before it happened. My personal battles were not mine to face in private; instead, they were put on display for the world to see, without any regard for the real human being behind the story. The media, the public, and even my own family saw me as a character in their narrative, one that could be exploited for their benefit. It became almost impossible to differentiate between the real me and the version of me that was being sold to the world. The emotional toll this took on me is something I can never fully explain, as the entire experience felt like I was being forced to relive my most painful moments for the sake of others.