Yoga Girl

I was only thirteen the first time I had to be driven to the emergency
room with alcohol poisoning. I had taken the red line subway back and
forth (the end of the red line in Stockholm was not the best neighborhood
for a passed-out thirteen-year-old girl at the time), had thrown up all over
myself, had been robbed, and finally was found by a friend who called my
mom. I remember hanging my head over the toilet, thinking I was going
to die. I was also thirteen when I got my first tattoo, simply as a response
to my dad saying “over my dead body” after I’d jokingly told him I wanted
to get one. I didn’t even want a tattoo, I just wanted to do the exact
opposite of what everybody expected of me. I started spending time in bad
parts of Stockholm. inking of it now—I was so young! I was just a
child. But I was determined to be destructive, and there was nothing my
parents could do to stop me.
At fourteen I got high on something bad, thinking it was weed, and
ended up walking from Hornstull to northern Lidingö (if you’re from
Stockholm, you know how far this is). It wasn’t until I woke up the next
day with my sheets stained with blood that I realized I’d been walking
barefoot. In October. is was also the age I was when I told my mom I
hated her for the first time. I started stealing alcohol from my parents. I
quickly figured out how to replace vodka with water in the bottles no one
ever touched, and when I got caught doing that and my parents
completely stopped keeping alcohol in the house, I got a fake ID.
At fifteen I went to Spain with a few girlfriends. We partied for a week
straight, and one night someone slipped something in my drink at a bar in
Puerto Banús. e doorman put me into a taxi and called the security at
our house to make sure someone would let me in, as I’d lost my purse and
my keys. is was the first of three times in my young teens that I got
drugged (probably with the intention of rape). I was always incredibly
lucky that nothing worse happened to me than excessive vomiting and
hangovers that lasted for weeks. I finally learned to never accept drinks
from anyone (not even from bartenders) and to always order bottled
drinks, covering the spout with my thumb.