Mental health and sex work

Part 2: Do you feel better by hurting me?

Welcome to part two. Fuck intros, let’s just get into it. 

When I was in Turkey, my mother popped. Picture this: 33 year old me who is, after a lifetime of misunderstandings, delighted to be spending quality time connecting and relating to my mother. For all the love we share, we’re still oftentimes strangers because we don’t share a tongue and because of our fraught history. 

Now imagine she explodes and you feel like a 13 year old girl again, completely out of your depth, watching someone you love most melting down. Now, this was quite visceral for the both of us because it was so extreme and so unprompted. She’s not a sex worker but she gave birth to one so I feel she qualifies as relevant to this piece. In short, she lost her mind. I haven’t seen her that way since I was a teenager. She screamed, shouted, slammed her fists, tried to hurt herself and I had to physically restrain her to stop her. I couldn’t understand how someone at her age (mid 60s) could act out so childish. I was a bit vicariously embarrassed on her behalf, to see someone so much older behaving like an impudent child.

Turns out mental health ages like fine wine and it’s a timeless sport, it never goes off. In my attempts to hear her out and deescalate her mental health explosion, I understood perhaps 50% of what she said because my Turkish is broken (much like my head, much like my heart). That was a real shame, sorry mum. I wish I could understand Turkish, and by extension her, better. But from what I gathered she had some valid points.

I remember saying to her: ‘mum, you do yourself a great disservice, for what you say has merit, but the way you deliver it makes it impossible for anyone to receive, understand or integrate that information.’ I didn’t say it like that because my Turkish is terrible so imagine that in the poorest version of English imaginable. It sounded a lot more dumb and less profound. Language and family - that’s a bridge we will cross another time. I wish she raised her grievances, her very valid grievances, any other time before she popped. We could have really listened to her then.

The next day, she pretended nothing happened and just went on with her day, her tail between her legs. That was her way of taking accountability and responsibility - not bringing it up and making a scene again. We should be so grateful in her eyes. She’s from a different generation, so we forgive her.

A lot of sex workers pop. Just like my mum. Except, we’re not in my living room where I’m pinning down your arms to prevent you from striking out at myself, others or yourself. Instead I’m on the social media apps rabidly scrolling through posts and refreshing pages, catching glimpses of your state of mind as you’re descending into a dark place. I’m grinding down my teeth feeling utterly hopeless and helpless for what is very clearly a mental health episode. What should I do? I have only the slightest slither of the madness overloading this sex worker's mind to work with. I don’t know how I will be perceived if I try to help. Friend? Foe? Enemy? Frenemie? New doubles partner? Your perception is warped and I would be a fool to believe you’d recognise my intentions for what they really are. Trust me, I’ve connected with enough mentally ill people to learn that compassion is treated suspiciously for it’s deemed unfamiliar. 

And anything unfamiliar must be bad, right? We are creatures of habit and experiencing something like unconditional compassion can feel like a trick.

Besides, who helps freely nowadays. That’s not very capitalist, time poor, money greedy, privileged high end escort of me. Very suspicious. That behaviour doesn’t make sense! But are you starting to make sense of the mental health crisis experienced by sex workers yet? Is it ringing true to you now? Is the winds of cognitive dissonance searing your ears too? Maybe the inkling is there, you’re gaining an image I’m illustrating, like a game of Pictionary but for words. Maybe this all sounds like the rambling lunacy of a mad man. You would be correct on both accounts.

Sex work and mental health. We know most sex workers are mentally ill (I dare say, most of the general population too, to some degree). We deal with it in our own way. We understand it hurts others, we understand it hurts ourselves. But what happens if a sex worker’s mental health is aimed directly at you. And by you, I mean me. Imagine you’re me. What if the crosshairs of their angst is zeroing in on you, and there is no restraint in how they express their feelings and thoughts. What if they shape and wield their mental health into a weapon, what if it all makes perfect sense in their mind to point it at you, and there’s no space for you to voice your reality. What if you’re the villain in their story, what if you’re the antagonist of their reality. 

Who's to say you don’t deserve it?

What do you do? What do you say? While you try to figure that out, know that there’s a crowd (dozens? hundreds?) kicking back and helping themselves to popcorn. They wistfully watch the shitshow unfold from the safety of their own space, anticipating the thrill that could be transmuted into much needed dopamine.

Someone said I should write. So that’s what I’m doing. I’ve been the main character in a number of sex workers mental health episodes. I’m sure I have other cameo experiences, less significant roles, in other mental health episodes. I never auditioned for these parts, but there I am, a figure of the public taken out of one context and moulded into a new, personalised version of another’s context. I’m fashioned into the perfect antithesis, one that represents everything the aggrieved lacks, and everything that they fear. They can distort my image to their heart's content, until it is crystal clear, to them, why I’m the bad guy. I fit like a glove, white as an empty canvas, there’s so much of me that anyone can pick and choose which parts to assemble. You could easily shape me into an evil person because I make mistakes and I make them very frequently and unabashedly. 

But I move on. Not everyone does. Not everyone can. And therein lies another reason to dislike me.

Now, before I continue, I’m not suggesting I am not without my flaws or that I can’t be bad. I’m not a saint. In fact, I have reams of flaws stacked somewhere in my long list of failures. But there’s a difference between ‘Estelle makes mistakes from time to time, has behaviour not fitting of a woman of her stature, and hurts people’ and ‘Estelle is a conniving manipulative conflict driven exploitative snake who preys on vulnerable sex workers and everyone needs to be aware of the danger she poses to the community’. One of these statements is true and rooted in the reality of being a mentally ill sex worker. The other is rooted in the reality of a mentally ill sex worker and therefore true to them. One is farfetched. The other is a bit more on the nose.

But don’t ever repeat this because you too might find yourself accidentally auditioning for a role as the villian for a sex worker's upcoming, much anticipated, critically acclaimed, mental health episode. Do you see how stories can change if the arrangement of words is laid out differently? Your Honour, I can say in my truths of truths, I have made mistakes and I’ll continue to do so, not because I’m malicious, but because I'm fallible. It doesn’t matter how much I grow, or advance or gain privileges in this lifetime, I am severely, permanently, mentally ill and disabled. That doesn’t change because of privilege, but it can be managed. I can prevent it from getting worse for a long time - but not forever. It is inevitable that I will make mistakes and hurt people. In fact, it’s highly likely considering my brain will rot sooner than most. It’s just a part of this gig. And because of that fact, I never wait for things to happen. I make things happen. 

Because I know my days are numbered. I make the most of what I have. I don’t care if I bite off more than I can chew, I’d rather choke to death than starve to death. I’d rather I try my best and make mistakes than never try at all because I’m afraid I might make mistakes or fail.

I have been targeted a number of times because I exist as a sex worker who isn’t afraid to put herself out there and try to change things, and I don’t disguise my mental health. At most, and you’re all most welcomed, I merely make it more presentable and palpable. I am pretty honest about my mental health and who I am and that makes me an easy and vulnerable target. Because you can take anything I’ve said or done or poorly managed, probably due to my mental health, and say ‘here’s the proof.’ I have all the bits broadcast out. You can fashion me into a role model or a dumpster fire. Like build a bear, you too can pick out your version of Estelle. 

You could say, I’m kind of asking for it at this point. If I’m aware of how people can use my mental health against me, then surely the wisest thing is to simply not put myself out there. But I refuse to make myself smaller, and I refuse to go quietly and I refuse to entertain this idea that I can’t achieve great things because I’m disabled and severely mentally ill. I’m sick, not dumb. I am limited in my capacity, not in my ability to impact the world. I reject the notion that I deserve to be cast as anyone's villain because I dared to exist. The oceans of lunacy belong to me as much as they belong to you and I’ll sail for as long and as far as I please. Get in or get out of the way.

Do I deserve to have my ship sunk simply because you don’t like me, the way I ride these waves or that you got knocked along the way? If you asked the voices in my head, the answer is yes. If you asked my soul, the answer is no. And if you asked god, well, we’ll find out eventually, whether I made the cut for a good or bad person. Maybe leave the moral judgement to the universe; god most certainly doesn’t need any footsoldier humans peddling morality out on their behalf. They’re more than capable without your input. You are, after all, only human.

In a court of law, one metric of culpability is measured by lunacy. Trust me, this isn’t a court of law, rather a kangaroo court for our circus of an industry. You’re all my monkeys, you all have the potential to be problematic. If you’re not problematic already. Check your privilege, for if you have a single one, then you’ve already auditioned to be the main character in someone else's episode. Gosh it’s so hard to be faultless in this ruined world, isn’t it? I don’t think there’s any way I can truly be virtuous and still live within the grid.

But I don’t want to be any character in an episode, let alone a villain, of all things. I don’t even really want to be a leader, or a public figure of any measure. It’s a cost I pay, if I want to see changes in the world, I have to put myself out there. Do I see any others racing to fill in the void? You can’t say this industry is a victim of stigma, discrimination and vilification, while simultaneously claiming there is no need for sex workers to step up and do something about it. Doing something differently, a bit more openly, does that mean I lose my right to be flawed? Does it mean I deserve to be crucified for every single mistake I do and it hung out over me every five years, as if it’s relevant to the here and now? Is that why nobody tries anymore, no one that’s genuine at least? Are you telling me, collectively, you’d rather foster a community that judges rather than one that grows, reflects, changes, regresses, and builds up? I love accountability. I hate it when it’s used against me. I love mistakes. I hate it when I’m reminded of them as if it’s evidence of a pattern of behaviour that I’m a malicious person, rather than a mentally ill one. Perhaps leniency is only for the less privileged… someone not like me, because I’m so privileged and therefore very eligible to be the villain. No grace period for the likes of me. Is there such a lack of candidates for the bad guy that your best candidate is the disabled, severely mentally ill, Turkish, marginally privileged gay, cunt with the motor mouth?

Mind you, I’m one of the few people I’ve met who doesn’t share a language with their family. Can you speak the same language as your parents, because I sure as hell can’t. Not that I’m keeping score of my privileges, but if anyone else is, and I know that someone is, jot that one down because it’s significant. 

If someone is lacking a sound mind, and if they’ve decided you’re their object of obsession, there’s really not much you can do. You can’t assange their feelings because they’ve already coloured you badly. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of psychosis. And you think you can defend yourself? By speaking your truth? You idiot! That’s not how the kangaroo court of this industry works, you should know that by now.

Reactions are the lubricant that keep these episodes flowing for many more seasons. Reactions are the stepping stone to colour an ugly picture. I’ve fallen for this trap many times. You see, when one person's demons bait the other person's demon, you get something called a reaction. That reaction is now used as a justification, evidence that you are what they think you are. It feeds further reactions, it emboldens the next move, but you’re ultimately responsible for the initial reaction, for you fell for the bait. You must take responsibility for doing so. Are you really going to leave this series before the season is over? What are you, Netflix? Finish the story, don’t end the story being the bad guy and call yourself the bigger man for it. 

You could call this Substack a reaction. Lube me up baby. Take the bait and leave a comment.

I’m guilty of taking the bait. Of contributing to further episodes. Those were my PMDD days, and those days are over. At least, I like to think so. But for those who are still on their mental health journey, and haven’t figured out the medication and lifestyle regime that makes life bearable, they are prone to reactivity. Should I ever be successfully baited, and sometimes I am, then we’re all hooked.

Because I take everyone down with me as much as I take everyone up with me.

Now everyone’s descending into madness, popcorn is flying everywhere but none of us are enjoying the ride. Not really. What a flop of an episode. I think we all felt something from it, but I don’t think it’s what we wanted and I don’t think anyone is better for it.

I have my djinns prepped and prepared to argue all day and night about my character, my privileges, the injustices of the pocketless dress, the politics of the right left and diagonal, the rail lines, the law, morality, what is money, the existence of the Bermuda triangle and what have you. My djinns are dressed in suits, as lawyers, ready to go, but what’s the point? No one enjoys this show anymore, it’s dated, it’s old, it’s hostile, we’re tuning out and we’re realising very little comes out of it.

Maybe we get a tad bit of dopamine from these episodes. If you get onto your hands and knees there’s some scraps on the floor you can lick up, if you’re desperate enough. Are you? But hey, there’s always a bright side, what if this series has a happy ending? If we reconcile, a double booking may be on the horizon! We all like money, don’t we? Who says this isn’t a modern day love tale in the making? We really need that money for our medicine, don’t forget, because we are very, very mentally ill and navigating the public health care system is expensive. I see you, my little popcorn munching gremlins, sitting on the bleachers, too cowardly to say your piece because it’s bad for business. Get real. Since when has business been good since 2017, honestly? Come on. 

I try to help others who were once me as best I can. I get demonised for it, for not suffering anymore. Mentally ill sex workers who see mentally ill sex workers who actually did it, who broke free of this prism, can incite a lot of jealousy and hate. And I really should be used to it by now. The internet loves unpacking the contradictions that assemble my identity. 

I love that I’m getting free rent in your head but honestly, I’d rather just exist without the judgement. Because how much can I take? Despite the goodness of the day, the security of my circumstances, my health remains a fragile thing, so how much can I take before I break? Should we test it out? Try for a Guinness Book Record? Shall we take a pound of flesh all at once? How much slander, accusation, misrepresentation, ludicrous, out of context character defilement can one mentally ill person tolerate from another mentally ill person before they snap.

I don’t know the answer. But we are well on our way to find out. 

If that day should ever emerge, I have a feeling everyone will suddenly, miraculously forget every one of my mistakes and somehow magically remember how good I was. How much good I did. How many people I helped. How selfless I was. How far went for others. Why do we pay more homage and respect to the dead, than when they were alive? I find that odd. I hate the dead for leaving us and so I treat life with respect. Is that so hard, or odd, for others to do too? 

Why are you only very, very sorry for the things you've done when there’s nothing left to do? Why do you only get your act together when it’s too late? Why couldn’t you be sorry, be sympathetic or give a shit when people were alive and struggling? If you dare to come to my funeral, and you console each other and wipe away your tears, and ask each other ‘how could this happen, how could we lose another?’ I promise to all the gods, my ghost will haunt you and your bloodline.  

There’s a lot of sex workers who have perished to their mental health and a lot of you did fuck all before its showtime for you to grieve. Go ahead, jump onto your ship of perspective, set sail into the red sea of lunacy, but if you collide and crash with another, do take a moment. Do an inventory check. Can we fix it before we decide to break out at each other? What do you gain by unleashing onto another mentally ill sex worker? Perhaps look up, and aim your anger to the crimson skies, to the systematic clouds that are purposefully designed to block the sun, to make it too dark to see where you’re going. Your enemy isn’t on your playing field, why the fuck would they stay in sight? Why the fuck would they be within reach? They are not your neighbours and they don’t live at the same frequency as you. They keep their distance because they know they’re guilty, they know what’s coming and they’d rather avoid the consequences.

And you just fall for it. Think. Stop acting so stupidly. You’re mentally ill. You’re not dumb. Take a step back and stop acting like you are. Stop reacting to what’s in front of you and zoom out to see the bigger picture.

If the stars had anything to say it would be to simply laugh at us. 

Sex work and mental health. It’s a bit of a shitshow, it can get bloody, it’s messy and nowadays it unravels live on our little palm sized screens. What a sad state of affairs our industry has been reduced to. Are we really so invested in hurting each other that we don’t care about the damage that’s done anymore? In what world are other sex workers the correct punching bag to go for when we have politicians, academics, rad fems, religious zealots, honestly a never ending line of haters who’s job, passion, calling in life, purpose, goal or journey is to end you. Specifically you. They would love to send both you and I to our graves, they wait with baited breath for the day and they’ll use your death as a reason why our industry shouldn’t exist. 

But I suppose they’re not close enough to punch, but you know who is? A sex worker. The one most visible person. Does it make you feel better to lash out because you couldn’t get a handle on your own shit? Was it too difficult to reframe your reality that you did a subpar job and went with the easiest route to externalise yourself into. Do you feel better after your episode, after finding that much needed character to fill in the role of bad guy and justify all your bullshit? Get real or get out of the way.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like going to funerals of sex workers who had mental health issues anymore, man. Everytime I go, I understand why, but I still wonder why they couldn’t have tried harder to stay. It’s not fair, if I have to stay, and suffer as I do, surely they do too. But of course, their reality is very different from mine and I would never judge them for being shipwrecked, for not having the means to repair their ships. The only thing I really understand is that I too am running out of supplies to repair my ship of perspective and I really hope I see a lighthouse soon to resupply. 

If not, I’ll meet the workers sunken in the crimson seas and we’ll catch up on all those years we missed. It’s been too long, Grace. I really miss you, Pip. Show me what’s good at the bottom of the sea. 

The only unsubscribe button I’ve found, diving into the wine red, deep sea, is on the ocean bed. But there’s no turning back once pressed, once you hit the waters, you’re lucky if someone finds you before you drown. It’s a wretched deal being a sex worker and mentally ill. But don’t mind me, I’m just sitting on my ship's plank, taking my morning meds and wondering, as always:

Death? Can you please come any sooner?

Until then,
Estelle Lucas