By sharing her story, she hopes to shed light on an otherwise romanticized industry. There are no reviews yet. Be the first one to write a review. Books for People with Print Disabilities. Internet Archive Books. I was a center attraction, a main feature at the club. Your worth as a dancer is measured by how well you are able to hang upside down and spin from atop the ten-foot pole. It was equally important to know how to work the floor, gyrating and pulsating to the music in front of the customers who lined the stage.
I was a champion in both areas. I racked up back-to-back table dances, where I would cuddle and caress the upper bodies of the patrons. Some were strangers, but many were regulars. It became my signature move. I was good at what I did and was paid accordingly. This was something I did often—private dances for the Arizona Cardinals players and bachelor parties.
They sent a chauffeur to fetch me from the mall. I walked up to the brand-new, two-story home, which stood directly in the center of a welcoming cul-de-sac. I rang the doorbell. I could feel in my stomach how nervous I was about who would be answering the door.
The door opened, and there stood Kool G Rap, an oldschool rapper. My first impression was that he was unattractive. I could barely stand to look at him, but he was charming and funny, and within no time, made me feel very comfortable. I cannot recall a lot of what happened that night, but I do know I never did dance for him. It may have been his twohundred-and-eighty-pound frame or the reassuring bass in his voice.
He was twenty-seven at the time, and little did he know, I was only seventeen. The very next morning, I was awakened by the sound of his booming voice, laced with his trademark lisp. My eyes were barely open and I could hardly remember who or where I was. I gave him the name I had been using as a dancer, Yizette Santiago, since I was sixteen.
It seemed plausible because I had the state ID, the Social Security card, and the W-2s to prove it, and they all stated that I was twenty-one years old. Once I got myself together, I realized that G was on the phone with an airline booking tickets to New York for later that night. For us. But there was something else he wanted. I was strong then. I had been on my own for a while, making my own money. It was difficult for me to let anyone tell me what to do and even more difficult for me to give someone a title of authority.
But somehow, some way, I finally broke down and said it. It drove him wild. It was the dead of winter and the room was ice-cold. The sounds of the city swirled below; the blaring horns of taxicabs and the ear-piercing whistles of people trying to catch them.
There was heavy snow on the ground and I could hear the tires of the cars below grinding into it. I missed this city and there was nothing sweeter than having sex in it. He was hooked. Two weeks later, we were back in Arizona.
We lived in a posh, new neighborhood in a twenty-five-hundredsquare-foot, four-bedroom house on about an acre of land. The first and second stories were connected by a grand spiraling staircase and the house was blessed with skylights throughout. I was beginning to become used to my new home and all of the rules that G insisted upon. He had a definite way of doing things, and most importantly, a definite way that he wanted me to do things.
We bumped heads almost immediately. The first time G hit me, I should have left him. He had been on the phone with another woman. While he spoke on the handset downstairs I went upstairs and unplugged 53 the great escape 54 confessions of a Video Vixen the base from the wall. I found his behavior disrespectful and had had enough.
Yet I was expected to cook four times a day, clean the entire house, and do the laundry. On the day I disconnected his call, I heard his heavy footsteps storming up the staircase.
I had a smirk on my face, expecting a bit of confrontation and a quick resolve, but that is not what he had in mind. As I sat on the edge of the bed waiting for the argument, which I was sure I would win, he entered the room from my right, stood directly in front of me, and with his left hand slapped me off the bed and onto the floor. As a matter of fact, I had come to expect it. So there we were. From that first slap to the face, I was subservient, which was just the way he wanted me.
I should have left; I should have grabbed my things and headed out of the door. After all, I barely knew him and had been on my own before. But I was tired of running. I had nowhere else to go. My father had already told me that I could never come back to his house. That was the rule for all of his children. G gave me that out. He gave me a home, and soon his family became my family. Admittedly, I stayed with G for all the wrong reasons, and our relationship would only go from bad to worse.
G did, however, shower me with gifts and trips during the first few months of our relationship. While I had been around some of the wealthiest men in the city, I was still very much a tomboy. I was not as worldly as I would have liked to believe I was, and G was the first to open that door for me.
He educated me on the cut, color, and clarity of diamonds and the most precious of stones. We ate well every day. Lobster tails, colossal shrimp, and the choicest cuts of beef and lamb. We drank Cristal champagne with our orange juice in the morning and all throughout the day. I was made to ditch my oversize jeans and tees for dresses and skirt ensembles. G taught me a lot about being a woman, but he taught me to be an unsure and abused one, too.
Amid all of the perks of being with one of the most 55 the great escape 56 confessions of a Video Vixen renowned pioneers of rap were a number of disadvantages and dangers.
I was not allowed to wear makeup and was not allowed to do anything too drastic to my hair. All of my dresses and skirts, though feminine, had to be loose-fitting and past my knee. I was also not allowed to talk to any of my friends on the phone, and if I did, he would become angry and even jealous because I was giving attention to someone other than him.
The beatings continued and worsened as time went on. Once, I prepared a lunch of shrimp and linguine and made the horrible mistake of leaving the tails on the shrimp.
I served G his favorite dish and proudly retreated to the kitchen with a slight smile on my face. The rule was to always serve him first and then go back and serve myself. But as I loaded pasta onto my plate, G let out one of his many taunts to which I had become so accustomed. Who the fuck leaves tails on fucking shrimp?! Trembling and praying that I would do it right this time, I scraped the unused portion of his lunch back into the pot and began to remove the tails from the shrimp before re-serving him on a new plate.
I was sure that I had gotten it right this time and would be spared his wrath. Again he yelled and called me stupid and worthless. As I stood in the kitchen, clutching my nervous stomach, he rose from his seat and walked toward me with his plate in hand. He rested his plate next to me on the counter with his right hand, and just as soon as he did, he slapped me with his left. What the fuck is wrong with you?! Once he noticed the scaly crunching in his mouth, he spit the food back onto the plate.
When I went to make him a fresh plate, I had scraped the food from his plate into the pot, to keep it warm, while I picked all the shrimp out to remove their tails. I then re-served him the same linguine and the shrimp he had spit out. Any simple mistake would set him off. The stress of the physical and verbal abuse had taken a toll on my body and spirit. G called me skinny and ugly, and had no problem telling me how unattractive I was to him since the weight loss.
Life at our house was torture. It was common to see me with bruises up and down my body. Still, I protected him. On one occasion, we were playing a video game in the living room. He was sitting on one couch and I was on the other. During the game, he began to call me a stupid bitch. G had a way of looking at me with disgust that turned my stomach, and sometimes I would just throw up at the outset of an argument.
He gave me the look, and at that moment I tried to be brave and fight back. I wanted to be tough, just as he had been to me. I wanted to let him know that I, too, was a force to be reckoned with, but all I could do was throw the game controller at him. That I showed any kind of mutiny was reason enough for what happened next. Within seconds, he rose from his seat and punched me in my right side.
It must have been a kidney punch, the type that boxers receive, because my body crumpled to the floor. I was unable to stretch out. I was suffocating, and if he had hit me one more time, I feared I would die.
He picked my stiff body up off the floor and tried to administer CPR, then opened the front door and began to yell into the street for help. One of our neighbors was a nurse, and she administered CPR. The ambulance arrived a few minutes later.
Once I arrived at the hospital, the nurses and doctors asked me how I had cracked my ribs. But I backed up his story. I protected my Daddy. It was as if I suffered from a case of Stockholm syndrome during which the hostage somehow becomes enamored with the captor, and even begins to identify with the captor, as a defense mechanism born out of fear of violence.
Even the smallest acts of kindness by the captor are magnified. These symptoms occur under tremendous emotional and often physical duress. This behavior is considered a common survival strategy for victims of interpersonal abuse and has been observed in battered spouses and abused children. Though I needed to get out of this dangerous, extremely unhealthy relationship, I sided with G and returned to that house. Once we returned home from the hospital, I found it hard to even walk.
I turned on the water in our glassed-in shower as he lit the fire in the adjacent double-sided fireplace. Sharp pains ran all through my body, and as I stood under the water, I began to cry as I realized that I could not raise my hands to wash myself. G heard my sobs, and in his charming way, he disrobed and joined me in the shower. I was not allowed to check the mailbox after a while because he thought I was seeing someone around the corner, where the community mailboxes were located.
I was also not allowed to learn how to drive, to hold a job, or to further my education, beyond receiving my GED. On the few occasions when I got employment at the local mall, he called my job constantly, and I frequently called home, feeling guilty for leaving him alone. Come home. I took a full bottle of prescription painkillers and was rushed to the hospital, where they made me drink charcoal to neutralize the effects of the medicine.
I wanted out of my life, one way or the other. I looked enviously at the women in these videos, their bodies perfectly voluptuous while mine was gaunt and disgusting. Their faces were all made up, and mine was plain, with only the shine of lip balm on my lips.
Their clothes were tight-fitting, and mine hung loosely from my sticklike frame. I wanted to be there, wherever they were. It was my greatest wish, to be beautiful and strong and free. Kool G Rap began and sustained his career in the eighties and 61 the beginning of the end 62 confessions of a Video Vixen into the early nineties. When we were together, it appeared that his peers and even his students would surpass him. He was big at a time when there was no SoundScan, the tool that is used to track record sales.
He never had the privilege of knowing just how many records he had sold, whereas his younger counterparts were going platinum-plus in the mid- to late nineties. For now, I would remain in the nightmare called my life. There were multiple abortions and miscarriages. I staggered to the bathroom and, after locking the door behind me, fell to my knees and continued to cry over the toilet. I prayed to God to save me.
I begged Him to give me a child who would be strong enough to live inside me and endure the abuse. I promised Him that if He would answer my prayer, it would be my motivation to leave. My existence alone was not enough. I needed another reason to save my life. I knew that having a child would bring me back to health and give me the strength to live without G.
I prayed to God for that chance. Later that night, my son was conceived. Before too long, G and I were at it again. Get out! I stayed with friends for the next two weeks until G allowed me to come back home. I was made to sleep in the guest room, on the floor, with just one blanket and one pillow.
I was not allowed in the master suite at any time during the day unless I had been summoned to have sex with him. It was mostly oral sex. Apologize to your Daddy. On one occasion, it went on so long, my nose bled. It was supposed to be my way of taking responsibility for whatever I had done to make him so angry. It was always my fault, and I was always made to apologize. The pregnancy proved to be a difficult one.
I was constantly sick and unable to stand even the sight of certain foods, especially meat. I was also severely anemic and found it hard to get out of bed to shower, much less to perform the daily household chores. Still, I was made to cook and clean and carry on 63 the beginning of the end 64 confessions of a Video Vixen as if everything were the same.
The rule was that G should never have to cook his own meals or do anything else around the house as long as there was a woman living with him. One day, we were in the midst of yet another battle when he had ordered me to leave the house.
He packed up most of my things and had them waiting by the door. I was about three months pregnant at this time, and it was the middle of the night. Where will I go?! So, at his command, I thumbed through the Yellow Pages and found a shelter with an open bed that would pick me up from the house.
I continued to cry and beg for him to just let me sleep there, even offering to go back to the guest room and sleep on the floor. He denied me. Yet, while I was waiting for the shelter to come get me, G had one more order to place and that was for me to make him a steak. So I stood there, making his steak, crying and shaking, still begging to stay.
I became nauseous and began cooking and throwing up simultaneously. Just a few moments after I served him his perfectly cooked steak, my ride was at the door. I was then hauled off to the homeless shelter in the seediest section of downtown Phoenix, my designer bags filled with designer clothes and shoes.
There were about ten other women in the room to which I was assigned. There was only one shower, where up to five women could bathe at a time, with no curtain to shield their bodies from anyone walking by.
I had only twenty cents in my purse and managed to borrow a nickel from one of the homeless women who was a permanent resident of the shelter. With the twenty-five cents, I called one of my best friends, Cecily, and she took me home with her the morning after I arrived at the shelter. I was lucky. I had somewhere to go. The other women at the shelter had nothing.
There was so much despair and hopelessness around me. I could feel the hopelessness. Eventually, I returned home to G and to all of the awful things that came with living in his house. Throughout the rest of my pregnancy, the abuse continued. During my fourth month, it became almost physically impossible for me to have sex.
It was extremely painful and would also make me nauseous. I can remember him yelling at me after sex because the crying made it difficult for him to reach orgasm. Again I was being a bad girl. As a result, oral sex became more prevalent in our relationship. My mouth and neck were in constant pain. There was no way I could ever refuse him. It got to the point where just the smell of his skin would make me throw up, and I could not serve him anymore without making him feel unloved and unwanted.
G would make me pay over and over again. In my seventh month of pregnancy, G had been called away to New York for work. Not long after his arrival in the city, I was awakened by a call from one of his friends.
G had had a grand mal seizure in the limo on the way from the air- 65 the beginning of the end 66 confessions of a Video Vixen port. G had told me that he had a preexisting condition that required brain surgery. He also mentioned that on another occasion he had been rushed to the hospital after he had been sniffing cocaine with his friend, singer Bobby Brown.
He told me that the last time he did cocaine was actually just a few weeks after we met. The cocaine was given to him by the assistant of one of my NFL friends, a linebacker with whom G had also become friends, not knowing of my past sexual relationship with the athlete.
His neck was sore and he had bitten his tongue, which was swollen and tender. It softened my heart to see him so fragile. It was the first time I had ever seen him actually need me. I held his hand and helped him out of bed; I helped him get dressed and put on his shoes. We walked out of there together, and anything that had gone wrong in our relationship was no longer a factor. The house was a disaster.
There were roaches everywhere and everything was falling apart. I was shocked, thinking about how well G and I lived in comparison to his own mother. Still, I loved being there with his mother and the rest of his family.
She would place her hands on my stomach and feel my son moving. She would cry and talk to him in her sweet, tiny voice. G was away from the house in the recording studio for most of our days there, so his mother and I lay in bed, watching The Young and the Restless, game shows, and talk shows. She was extremely ill and frequently had to use a wheelchair to get around. She needed help getting out of bed and down the stairs.
She had many pains in her life, but her son and our unborn baby brought her renewed joy. For the most part, things were going well at this time.
G and I had not fought in a while and were getting along. But the peace in our lives was only temporary. The look on his face was almost innocent, as if he saw no wrong in what he had just told his pregnant wife. I blew up and jumped out of the shower. He followed me around the house as I yelled and he yelled back.
He made it seem as if it was all my fault and that because of me, he had to have another woman. The fight continued downstairs, where his mother sat in her wheelchair. She worked herself out of her chair and began to confront her son. I had worked myself into hyperventilation and severe stomach cramps. Without much warning, I collapsed, and his poor, sick mother tried her best to hold me up when she herself should have been in her wheelchair.
G, 67 the beginning of the end again, was not concerned about either of us and stormed out of the house. I could never win with him, and no matter how much wrong he had done, his mother would never completely side against her son. How could she? He was the only breadwinner in the family and everyone depended on him for support. He had stopped taking the Tegretol that had been prescribed by his doctor to help control his seizures.
He said that taking the medicine made him feel like less of a man. During the first week of January , his seizures returned. I was nine months pregnant at the time. G had been in the hallway bathroom, and while he was sitting on the toilet, the seizure hit. I heard him falling off the toilet and shaking against the tub.
I jumped out of bed and ran to his side. His eyes were rolled back in his head and his tongue was hanging out and locked between his teeth. I quickly called , grabbed his Tegretol bottle, called his mother, and unlocked the front door. I then ran back to wipe his ass, flush the toilet, and pull up his boxers so he would not be embarrassed when the ambulance arrived. Once they had him on a gurney, I got dressed and grabbed a set of clean clothes for him to wear when he left the hospital to return home.
All of this was done in a matter of minutes. No matter the abuse and the trauma I suffered on his watch, I still took care of him. Over the next two weeks, I nursed G back to health. He had a cocktail of medicines which had to be administered every three hours or so. I made sure he took all of them on time, even in the middle of the night. I would set my alarm clock to wake me up at eleven at night, and at two and five in the morning. Select 'OK' to allow Oath and our partners to use your data, or 'Manage options' to review our partners and your choices.
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If Karrine decided that she wanted to write a book as a cautionary tale to young women and girls, then she should do it selflessly, fully aware that she would not be placed on a pedestal for this act. She went from being a drug addict and a victim of abuse to a multi millionaire.
A mother Steffans simply hated moved her to Florida and eventually forced her to relocate to Arizona to live with a father who had abandoned them years earlier.
I knew then that this was not reality, that she was hopeless, that she could never make things right. A paparazzo hiding behind garbage bags outside claims that Sutherland was about to relieve himself on the trash — that is, until the lensman jumped up and started snapping.
Jun 11, Sarah rated it really liked it. This book reads like it was written by an elementary school student who is writing a fanciful report. Karrine spends so much time glorifying the lifestyle as an excuse for her continuing to be in it, that she completely misses the point of why she even wrote it.
Some might even be crazy enough to love him as an artist. And yet there is no chapter devoted to her rehabilitation from drugs, if indeed she is off them, and for all the praising of her son as her saviour, he only gets a few words here and there, as she constantly abandons him for months with babysitters and uses him as an excuse to prostitute herself when her showbiz pimps refuse to let her freeload.
Glass vases filled with marbles crashed all around us as he began tossing linens from the bed. By sharing her story, Steffans hopes to shed light on an otherwise romanticised industry and help young women avoid the same pitfalls she encountered. But alas, we take the free sample and are forced to chew a full pack of gum to try to extract the gamey lingering aftertaste.
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