Paid For: My Journey Through Prostitution by Rachel Moran

following eighteen months, between the ages of fourteen and fifteen-and-a-half. Whenever my stay in a hostel or B&B would come to an end, I would usually find myself homeless again. Near the beginning of my stints of utter destitution I lived a very solitary existence, not mixing with anybody, not approaching anybody, not asking for help, and, consequently, not receiving it. Sometimes I walked out of hostels, other times I was thrown out. I was never violent, but I was absolutely immovable when there were rules I didn't want to cooperate with; I was a very determined girl, and I had a mouth on me. Nonetheless, I cannot condone some of the reasons that were put forward for telling me to leave, like walking in with one shoe on because I'd just received a beating, or being found to have been hoarding tablets in a jar in my room in case I ever wanted to commit suicide. Suicide did cross my mind in childhood. The most obvious display of that was the time I had swallowed my mother's sleeping tablets. I was eleven at the time. It was 1987 and one of my abiding memories of the month I spent recovering in Temple Street children's hospital was Whitney Houston's 'I Wanna Dance with Somebody' playing on the TV in the ward. I loved the energy and the positivity of that song; it lifted my spirits to listen to it while watching Whitney bouncing around smgmg. It wasn't as ifI could forget who I was in the hospital though; I'd often be reminded by different things. One night, during the early hours, I woke up after having wet the bed and had to get up and tell the nurse. It was embarrassing and I was glad all the other children were asleep, but while the nurse was changing the sheets the girl in the bed beside me woke up and asked what was going on. I felt very humiliated because this girl was a few years younger than me and none of the other children ever wet the bed. I'd always be reminded I was a different sort of child at visiting hours. I received two or three visits in the space of the month, from my father, and he brought one of my sisters with him on one occasion. I never saw, nor expected to see, my mother. The other children's families were present every visiting hour and when they'd go, they'd leave behind big bottles of minerals and sweets and fruit and there'd often be cards and balloons. After a week or two one ofthe nurses realised that my locker was always bare and after that, I had a jug of diluted orange that she'd keep topping up from the kitchen. The difference between the other children's plastic bottles and my glass jug was certainly not lost on me. Nor was the difference between my hospital-issue nightclothes and the other children's pyjamas from home. I was very conscious of how different I looked and how different my bed looked compared to the other children's. I perceived my glass jug as a symbol of the charity I was used to from the St Vincent de Paul and elsewhere and unless I was very thirsty, I would nearly have preferred it to be empty. The nurse who put it there was a kind person though. I remember her well. She more or less took me under her wing and would bring me around with her while she was doing her work. I remember one day slapping her belly and laughing after she'd told me in a dismal tone that she'd reached ten stone and wasn't happy about it. I thought she looked lovely and was worrying about nothing. She'd give me sweets sometimes. I distinctly remember her handing me a packet of Cadbury Eclairs one day when she took lllt' out li1r a walk in the grounds; Cadbury Eclairs reminded me of her for a long time after that. I actually really enjoyed my time in the hospital and only got upset when it was time to go home. To this day, unlike most people, I find great comfort and reassurance in the smell of hospital disinfectant. When the day came for my father to bring me home, I'll never forget the shock I got on seeing my mother. She had always dyed her hair black but she'd nearly always have a thick strip