Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself

by Crystal Hefner

When I went out to get in my car, it was dark. I started the car and shifted to drive and then realized—after ten years of racing home for curfew, of racing home before dark, I had no idea how to turn the headlights on. In my own car.

I was only valued because of my looks, that pushed me to be sexually available, and then punished me for being sexually available. Where did I learn that beauty is a tool to get ahead, and men hold all the power? How far back would I have had to go, to change my trajectory?

My dad made me feel loved.

another idea he had was a bracelet you wore on your wrist while surfing, that would release a big flotation balloon to save you if you got into trouble in the water. That’s what it felt like to have my dad around—a balloon that will keep you afloat in a rough sea.

Hef’s death had left me perpetually in shock, spaced out, and unsure.

You’d probably be a famous psychologist now helping people with all their problems.” I looked at him, and we both were silent, until we burst into laughter. It was the first time I had laughed since Hef’s death, and that little bit of laughter, even if it was at my own expense, felt good. It felt like hope, and it sounded like freedom. And maybe I would help people someday, but right now, I had to figure out a way to help myself.

But the more distance I got from the mansion, the stranger that whole world, that whole part of my life, seemed. Was it even real? Was that even me? I’d done so many things I shouldn’t have. I’d been through things that nobody should have to go through. The more time that passed, the more I realized how much it had messed with me—with my self-worth, my confidence, my ability to have normal relationships in life. I was having to relearn who I was. What friendships were. What love was.

The mansion itself hadn’t been the prison, even though I’d thought it was. The prison was everywhere. The images on social media, of impossible-to-attain physical perfection. In the media. In movies. In the pages of every magazine. The women walking around L.A. with their surgically perfected bodies. I felt like I could not escape the relentless message that you are what you look like.

Hef could be so shallow. Everything he valued was skin-deep. That world made me shallow, too. I’d forgotten how to look past the surface, how to go deeper, to where real connection happened. Losing Greg had made me realize just how painful deep connections were when they were gone. So had losing my dad. Maybe the trauma of those two losses had already primed me to live in a world that was only surface level before I got to the mansion. Either way, I was susceptible.

And while I knew now what I wanted—to live a life where my value was not entirely based on my appearance—I didn’t know how to do that. When I looked in the mirror, I found so many flaws. It was harder since my breast implant removal. I’d had no choice—they were breaking down, leaking toxins into my body, and slowly killing me—but I was so unhappy with how I looked.

For so long, I’d been pushing down my inner voice, that instinct that was trying to scream at me that things weren’t right, that I wasn’t okay. I slammed the door on her. I thought she would talk me out of opportunity and success, and that I would regret passing them up. She was trying to save me, but I didn’t see it. I think I silenced her so much that she went quiet. I lost track of who I was and what I wanted. To this day, I have to work very hard to hear her.

When the #metoo movement swept through social media, I scrolled through every post, hungry for the stories and the hope of recovery, of a better future. I felt so validated. I felt the shame melting away, for the things I’d done because I was backed into a corner, because it seemed like the only way forward. I felt more at peace with having such conflicting emotions surrounding my time in Hef’s world. So much of my intuition had told me, This is not good. This is not okay. But I’d ignored it, second-guessed it. I never trusted that inner voice. But she’d been right the whole time.

I read recently that women live longer, healthier lives the more close female friendships they have, and that makes sense to me now. That’s something I wish I had been taught as a young girl, something I wish I had read about in the pages of magazines that only told me how to lose weight and keep a boyfriend.

I learned I am so much happier in nature than I had ever been at a movie premiere or a party.

I learned something else I didn’t know about myself: that I was someone who wanted peace. I was someone who needed a sanctuary.

There’s no neat ending to this fairy tale, but that’s okay. I’m not looking for fairy-tale endings any longer. I am a work in progress.

I don’t have to have it all figured out, and sometimes you only know who you are by what you are not any longer.

Did I trust him in the way you’re supposed to trust someone in a marriage, when it’s just the two of you, when there’s mutual love and respect? No. Absolutely not.

But I could count on him. He was like this invincible umbrella I was under. If anything happened, I was protected under this powerful thing. Now, I am my own umbrella. And that’s harder, because life can be hard, but it’s so much better.

I hope wherever she is, she never found out the answer to her questions to Hef. What do you have to do to get in the mansion? You have to lose yourself, Mackenzie, you have to give up everything about you that makes you unique and special. You have to give up your mind and your opinions and any belief in choosing your own future. But mostly you have to get really, really small. So small you don’t leave a trace. So small you don’t cast a shadow. So small and so quiet that even if you are screaming you can’t hear it.

When Playboy announced Hef’s death, they posted a black-andwhite picture of him, his hands folded reverently in front of him. At the bottom of the picture they put a quote from him. “Life is too short to be living somebody else’s dream.” I’d heard him say that before, but never to any women.

But as I walked out of Iron Mountain and started the drive to my new home, I thought it might be the best advice I’d ever heard. Thank you, Hef. Life is short, but I’m finally ready to start living my own dream. It’s not the big, glamorous dream of fame and fortune I once thought it would be. My dream is simple. Happiness. Friendship. Love. Truth.

I’m finally ready to listen to the voice inside me that’s been there all along. That voice gets louder every day. So, yes, I used to only say good things, but now, I say whatever I want.