September 20, 2015

Questioning Olympian Suzy Favor Hamilton about her story that bipolarism led her into work as a high-priced Las Vegas prostitute.

 Wisconsin State Journal aims some skepticism at her: "Are people accepting that your bipolar led to this hypersexuality?" She answers:
SFH: That’s the hard part for people to understand. How can that be a mental illness? And if I explain it like that, it really doesn’t make a lot of sense, but if I let people know that two months before that even happened, I was given the drug Zoloft and that brings on the hypersexuality, that particular anti-depressant. We all know that anti-depressants can do crazy things to people.
She doesn't absolve herself of responsibility:
SFH: No, I can’t say that the bipolar is to blame because I knew what I was doing. I can say that the Zoloft triggered the hypersexuality... I lost touch with reality in that I lost touch with being a mother, being a wife. None of that existed....
WSJ begins the interview by observing that SFH's book could be the new "50 Shades of Grey" and later asks if people are saying "there is too much sex in the book." That sounds skeptical of the mental-health angle, which, I'm sure, is useful in getting the author on daytime TV and giving cover to the kind of readers who don't like to think of themselves as consumers of porn. SFH says she was just trying "to show the destruction of the disease and the illness."

We watched her hour-long interview on Dr. Phil's show, which was quite bizarre. Here's a couple minutes of it, from the beginning:



Phil never got around to asking SFH what treatment she's had or is having, and she looks so strange, that we had to wonder whether she's on any treatment at all. How could he not have asked? He's supposed to be Dr. Phil. Where's the doctor part? Isn't that atrocious set supposed to be kind of like a psychologist's office? And what's with the ominous music playing continually in the background? I had the feeling Dr. Phil was also purveying sex for daytime-TV-watching women who want porn with deniability.

You can see even in that short clip that the interview was full of edits. Maybe they did ask her about her treatments and her progress and the answers weren't interesting or weren't believable. Stray extra questions: What's up with blurring the pages of Dr. Phil's folder of interview notes? Why is SFH, if she wants to come across as reformed and relatable, wearing her hair like that and why do her eyes glint so lasciviously every time she talks about sex?

ADDED: Here's the book, "Fast Girl," which seems to be doing quite well at Amazon. SFH has now moved from Madison, Wisconsin to L.A., and I'd be very surprised if this didn't end up as a movie. By the way, Meade and I met Suzy Favor Hamilton. Back before the scandal broke, we were walking around the Capitol Square at some festival or another, maybe "Cows on the Concourse," and she was involved in promoting a product — potatoes, I believe. We were just reading a poster, looking for bloggable things, and this man — a promoter of some kind (potato?) — insisted on introducing her to us. It was pretty awkward!

UPDATE: I've now read the book, and I opine on it here.

47 comments:

Sebastian said...

"Why is SFH, if she wants to come across as reformed and relatable, wearing her hair like that and why do her eyes glint so lasciviously every time she talks about sex?"

Operative word: if.

Also depends on whom she wants to "relate" to.

Didn't watch the clip, but, umm, could this be a tell?

Or is it just good marketing for someone who is keeping her options open?

Fernandinande said...

Favor Hamilton confessed that she deliberately fell on the track and feigned injury during the women's 1500m race at 2000 Summer Olympics after seeing she was losing the race and would not win a medal.[14][15]

averagejoe said...

"Why is SFH, if she wants to come across as reformed and relatable, wearing her hair like that and why do her eyes glint so lasciviously every time she talks about sex?"

Mr. Spatula? Paging Laslo Spatula!

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...

And why are her nipples showing?

averagejoe said...

LOL! Me and Sebastian saw the same pull-quote in that blog post.

SGT Ted said...

I was on Zoloft for 3 years or so to treat PTSD related anger and anxiety attacks. What it does is it flattens out your emotional responses, so they aren't as extreme.

It worked for about two years. Then it wasn't so good, as I started doing dangerous things, due to the lack of normal, emotionally related "danger" signaling that was suppressed by the drug. I didn't have the hypersexuality side effect, though.

averagejoe said...

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...
And why are her nipples showing?

9/20/15, 9:13 AM

Eyes glinting lasciviously, nipples showing... Laslo Spatula? Paging Laslo Spatula!

clint said...

Is it news that sex sells?

I guess everything old is new again.

fivewheels said...

Revealing what was in Dr. Phil's notes.

Fernandinande said...

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...
And why are her nipples showing?


I was wondering why she was on TV at all. Good nips?

Phil 314 said...

For Bipolar individuals starting anti-depressants can trigger a manic episode which can include hypersexuality.

Mary Beth said...

Why is California a better environment for her bipolar than Wisconsin?

I imagine they blur the notes so his questions will still come as a surprise to some of his viewers and to create a feeling that they are counseling/treatment notes. Mostly the latter, because why show them at all otherwise?

Ann Althouse said...

"Favor Hamilton confessed that she deliberately fell on the track and feigned injury during the women's 1500m race at 2000 Summer Olympics after seeing she was losing the race and would not win a medal."

Yeah, she vividly and openly described that to Dr. Phil.

ndspinelli said...

Must be blogger sweeps month w/ this blatant "tit"ilation.

Ann Althouse said...

"And why are her nipples showing?"

Yeah, we noticed that as we watched. It's a well-chosen dress, quite demure, no?

Ann Althouse said...

"Revealing what was in Dr. Phil's notes."

LOL. Thanks!

Laslo Spatula said...

She charged $600 an hour, with an extra $300 getting you anal.

Nipple pokes are free.

I am Laslo.

Laslo Spatula said...

"...and she was involved in promoting a product — potatoes, I believe..."

I would have expected cucumbers.

I am Laslo.

SGT Ted said...

Why is California a better environment for her bipolar than Wisconsin?

Because the crazy blends in better with the rest of the wierdos here.

fivewheels said...

"She charged $600 an hour, with an extra $300 getting you anal."

An Olympian charges extra for Greek?

jr565 said...

I think she's still a freak sexually. This is like when Belladona (?) went on TV and talked bad about her experience in porn then was back to porn a few months later.

Laslo Spatula said...

In the still she has the look of a Hot Mess that just washed up in a hurry.

Her purse smells of panties and lip gloss.


I am Laslo.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

I don't know about Zoloft specifically, but L-Dopa and other dopamine treatments are pretty well-known for having a similar side effect in a certain percentage of users--there have been some documentaries on people who developed compulsive gambling habits as a result of taking certain drugs.

This write up specifically mentions hypersexuality as a rare side effect: Pathological gambling and hypersexuality due to dopaminergic treatment in Parkinson' disease

Parkinson's Drugs Linked to Sex and Gambling Addiction

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

They keep the gossip tabloids right next to the supermarket checkout.

I've never seen displayed there a copy of "Popular Mechanics" or "Field & Stream."

But I don't go to the supermarket all that often, so maybe I've got a sampling error thing going on here.

averagejoe said...

Laslo Spatula said...
9/20/15, 9:45 AM
Blogger Laslo Spatula said...
9/20/15, 9:48 AM

Yay, Laslo answers the call! Whenever a blog needs a naughty comment or a pornographic story, wherever there are perky nipples and lascivious glints, he'll be there to provide a wry quip or a perverted tale of illicit fornication. He is Laslo.

CStanley said...

Hypersexuality isn't a side effect of Zoloft. As someone else mentioned, the issue is that SSRI medications can trigger mania in individuals who are predisposed to bipolar disorder.

It's worthwhile that people might be made more aware of this (too many people are prescribed SSRI medication without sufficient understanding of whether or not this might be an issue for them.) but it's a shame that the awareness has to come with the sensationalism of selling a book.

Bay Area Guy said...

Two words: crazy woman.

Laslo Spatula said...

Olympians Caitlyn Jenner and Suzy Favor Hamilton: one is being held up to be a freak.

I am Laslo.

MadisonMan said...

Laughing at Laslo's comment.

I would also exit Madison -- a very very small town -- if I were hawking a book such as Hamilton's, and if I had a kid.

Ann Althouse said...

"Madison -- a very very small town"

Really? I don't feel that way.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

I don't have anything to add to this.

MadisonMan said...

I am always running into people who know someone I know.

In the Coffee Shop I'm typing this -- I see one person I know, sort of, two people who I'm pretty sure know my daughter (based on what they're wearing). A friend of my son's ran by down Monroe Street. I think the same thing would happen if I were sitting in a Coffee Shop on the East Side. If I go out to eat, I usually recognize at least one of the server's as a cohort of my kids.

Maybe it'll be a different feeling once my kids' friends get old enough so as to be unrecognizable.

MadisonMan said...

Ugh. "server's" was meant to be "server's faces", then I got rid of faces, but not the apostrophe.

Bay Area Guy said...

Two more words: Sell books

Fred Drinkwater said...

SFH's eyes "glint" because she is being lit with 4 "dinky" spots, which are specifically intended to produce that effect. (Although her habit of widening her eyes contributes to the overall effect.)
In other words, your impressions are being manipulated, deliberately, by the studio.

Will Cate said...

Ann said: "And what's with the ominous music playing continually in the background?"

I especially loved the big BOOM at the end of clip right after she says "back to Vegas for more fun"

William said...

Did anyone ever ask if Warren Beatty or Hugh Heffner were hyper sexual or if their behavior were influenced by prescription drugs........Perhaps she felt prostitution was a way of expressing her true sexuality. Why are some forms of extreme sexual behavior considered brave and trail blazing and other forms are condemned?

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

An old whore getting renewed attention.

walter said...

Now that she's in LA, she can enjoy the catcalls the other post mentions.

"I was on Zoloft for 3 years or so to treat PTSD related anger and anxiety attacks. What it does is it flattens out your emotional responses, so they aren't as extreme."

Eh..those drugs can do different things to different folks.
Lost a friend to suicide shortly after he began Zoloft. The "paradoxical" effect was just beginning to be identified with teens. He wasn't a a teen by any stretch..but I doubt that it's limited by age.

dbp said...

The "threesome" is mentioned a lot and what I am curious about is whether it was a man or a woman? My guess is that it was a man.

What difference does it make? Plenty. My guess is that most men could get over any reticence about a threesome if the invited party was an attractive woman. Another guy? No. That would be a really tough sell for most guys--unless they like dudes too.

walter said...

Eh..she mentions in the clip she was always a very sexual person..exploring etc.
Maybe the potato marketing stint was some kind of Freudian slip: Did she say Idaho..a lot? Touching your arm?

"Why is SFH, if she wants to come across as reformed and relatable, wearing her hair like that and why do her eyes glint so lasciviously every time she talks about sex?"

Heh..
"Look at that face!"

roundeye said...

http://www.thehotcrazymatrix.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/6162239.jpg

rcocean said...

Good-looking crazy girl still drawing attention because she's still good looking.

Film at 11.

Interest will wane as rapidly as she loses her looks.

Big Mike said...

Suzy Favor Hamilton and Alan Webb were Olympic middle distance runners with this in common: neither could win a tactical race. I wonder what's wrong with American track coaches.

Yes, dopamine treatment can increase risk-taking behavior, and I don't know what could be more risky than to be a call girl unless it's being a call girl who lets her clients know her real name.

walter said...

"I don't know what could be more risky than to be a call girl"
If she is being characterized as a high end call girl, I suppose low end street walker would be more risky.

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