Dear One, (yes, that means you)
This is a powerful week for me. On May 20th, 1990, I flew to Seattle to do a local talk show on trichotillomania. At the time, I owned and operated a small answering service with my dear friend and business partner, Dana. I had recently discovered others suffered, and had gotten into treatment at Stanford Medical Center in California, also starting a local support group – all in the hopes of meeting others like me.
Well, as a result of running an answering service that provided voice mail services, when I flew up to do the show, I took a voicemail # with me to offer as a “Trichotillomania Hotline.”
The show was Northwest Afternoon, and there were 2 other hair pullers and myself being interviewed. This particular show was live, and accepted live calls from viewers. Well!!! Once we started talking, the phones rang off the hook. Voices were piped in of people sobbing and laughing, stunned to find that there were others, people who understood. The big question was – “how do I get help?” At the end of the show, the station put onscreen the telephone # I gave them with the words – Trichotillomania Hotline. OMG!!!
Little did I know how my life was to change. In every way, at every level and for the rest of my life. My work, my living situation, my worldview were to get totally changed.
By the time I got home, I had over 100 people trying to leave messages in the voicemail. I was floored. About 600 calls came in over 72 hours. I spent the next few days attempting to call everyone back, and ran my phone bill up over $1200 dollars. It was the best money I ever spent, and transformed my life. After 5 days of this, something inside me melted away and I experienced a huge paradigm shift of awareness and motivation. It became crystal clear to me that SOMETHING had to be done.
That day, in total emotional overwhelm from interacting with so many like me, I lay in my bed and entered a deep contemplative state, experienced the most beautiful vision of my life, completely embraced by the profound awareness of indescribable Love, and it was from this experience that TLC was conceived.
There were all these people, with nowhere to send them, no doctors, no effective treatment, no shame reduction, no support, no coordinated effort WHATSOEVER to meet the needs of this suffering community. MY community. My own private experience was reflected in every contact I made, and together, we began to heal, one phone call at a time. Some of those people I am still in touch with to this very day.
Anyway, like I said, this is a very powerful week for me, and I am so deeply humbled to have been able to follow through all these years, in service of that initial dream. That dream, in simplest essence, was to lay the groundwork for real, significant change, so that no child ever again had to go through what I did and so many others.
We are not fully there yet – need to raise a lot more funds for all the programs we want to implement – but it is EVER so much better that it was 20 years ago today.
If you read this, and it touches you in any way, help TLC help us all! Get involved, be a TLC member and donor (there’s lots of research and outreach to fund!), become a volunteer, work on your own process of recovery – and know you have me as a resource. You can call me at TLC, or email me directly at christina@trich.org.
May all of our lives unfold with great lovingness and healing!
Love to all, Christina
