“Paris: The Memoir” proves to be a compelling story
Many people, including myself, had discounted thoughts when they heard that Paris Hilton was coming out with a memoir. It seemed like she had a boring life of growing up rich and staying rich. As it turns out, she had a lot to say in her 336-page book.
Despite the book starting in Hilton’s twenties, her story is quite clear: It is much different than the tabloids of the 2000s made it out to be. She describes her complicated history with school, constantly getting kicked out for being disruptive, absent and failing in her classes. Eventually, her parents enrolled her into a school meant for teenagers who were kicked out of every other academic institution, called CEDU, which was actually an abusive therapy program.
Since Hilton, along with other victims have opened up about their experience at CEDU, the program now has a bad reputation. However, back in the 1990s, not many people knew of the terror that children were forced to endure while at CEDU. Her description of that time in her life is as sharp and painful as a dagger to the heart.
From day one at CEDU, Hilton was given prescription medication to take, and after asking many times what the pills were, she was not given any answer. As described by Hilton, students were punished for coughing, crying or even looking at other students that were supposed to be shunned.
Hilton wrote about how hard it was to forgive her parents for sending her away. While she acknowledges that her parents are responsible for keeping her in CEDU, (despite the numerous attempts to run away and begging her parents to unenroll her), Hilton understands how effective the CEDU staff were at manipulating parents.
Hilton manifested her life from a place of unwanted vulnerability, which left an empty piece of her soul. “I was not surprised to check in and find that, overwhelmingly, the life I was living was very much the life I had visualized. What didn’t make sense to me was how I could be having so much fun and feel so little satisfaction… Maybe there was no such thing as enough, and my only salvation was to just keep grinding,” wrote Hilton.
I enjoyed the very few times she addressed her haters. It made me realize that you have nothing to prove to people who never gave you a chance in the first place. Hilton’s book read like a diary that was written to her Little Hiltons, which is what her fan base calls themselves. I knew next to nothing about Paris Hilton when I started this book. Now that I am through with it, I am glad I got to know her.
