Crystal Hefner is on a path to therapeutic. After 10 years dwelling within the notorious Playboy Mansion, the previous spouse of Hugh Hefner — they have been wed in 2012 till his loss of life of pure causes in 2017 — is making a recent begin. She’s relocated from L.A. to Hawaii, the place she’s renovated a house on the Large Island. She additionally has a memoir due out in 2024, Solely Say Good Issues: Surviving Playboy and Discovering Myself, that may remember to ship shock waves by Hollywood. As Hefner tells Us completely, talking by way of Zoom from her idyllic Hawaii home, “Nobody is protected.”
Hefner was simply 21 when she met Hugh at a Halloween celebration on the mansion. Days later, he requested the Arizona native to maneuver in with him and his different girlfriends, 18-year-old twins Karissa and Kristina Shannon. “Moving into, I used to be a deer within the headlights. It was like I simply acquired the golden ticket for the Willy Wonka [factory],” notes Hefner, 37. However finally, she provides, “it began crumbling down.”
During the last a number of years, dozens of girls have come ahead with horror tales of their time on the Playboy Mansion. A number of fashions and former girlfriends accused Hugh and his circle of mates of sexual assault, claimed the journal mogul was a grasp manipulator and described life on the mansion as a jail, full with relationship guidelines and a strictly enforced curfew.
Hefner was nonetheless dwelling there when Holly Madison’s scathing 2015 memoir, Down the Rabbit Gap: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny, was launched. “I bear in mind getting the E-book so I might kind my identify and simply see what was mentioned about me,” she laughs. “And [Holly] mentioned one thing minor in there about how, like, I ripped some stickers off a mirror. However I bear in mind the mansion being upset about it. It was when girls had much less of a voice.”
“It took years for me to know what I went by and the bubble that I used to be in for therefore lengthy,” Hefner says of life within the Playboy Mansion. Tracey Lyn
For Hefner, it was solely after she started seeing a therapist following Hugh’s loss of life that she might begin to unravel the trauma she’d endured. “Remedy actually helped,” says Hefner. “You begin backtracking and [noticing] totally different behaviors. I’m like, ‘Oh, that’s gaslighting. That’s narcissism.’ It took years for me to know what I went by, perceive myself and likewise perceive Hef and why he did sure issues. You realize, there’s a narrative behind every little thing.”
As she delved into her previous, Hefner says she started the method of “deprogramming.” On the mansion, “Your worth is what you appear like,” she notes. “I used to be rewarded for being codependent and feeling like I used to be nothing with out Hef and had no worth of my very own. You’re rewarded for not having a lifetime of your individual outdoors of the individual,” she continues. “I’ve discovered loads about self-worth, self-love, advocating for your self and wholesome relationships.”
Hefner’s additionally relearning learn how to have feminine friendships. “The ladies on the mansion have been very catty. You may give somebody $10,000 to not be my good friend anymore, and they’d take the cash,” she shares, noting that out of the “1000’s” of ladies she met there, she’s stayed in contact with “perhaps 5.” Whereas a number of of them, together with Women Subsequent Door stars Holly, Bridget Marquardt and Kendra Wilkinson. have brazenly mentioned their time on the mansion, Hefner says she has a distinct perspective. “I wasn’t one in all three girlfriends on a present. We have been married; I used to be there with Hugh till he died.”
Crystal (with Hugh in Could 2013) initially referred to as off their engagement in 2016. They wed the next 12 months. Kevan Brooks/Admedia/Sipa/Shutterstock
For Hefner, the writing course of was cathartic. “After I learn the primary manuscript, I simply burst out crying at first paragraph as a result of I felt like I lastly have a voice, and that is it,” she shares, including that the toughest chapters to write down have been these on intercourse and loss of life. “Everybody assumes [I was] some dumb younger lady who grew to become a part of [Hugh’s] girlfriend entourage, and, you realize, ‘She’s an fool.’ However now I’ve a reasonably clear understanding of what I went by and what went on, and it’ll be obvious within the e-book.”
Though Hefner notes this isn’t a salacious tell-all, readers are in for some heavy bombshells. “There are arduous tales and those who have damage me, they usually’re in there,” says Hefner, noting that though the names of quite a few girls and celebrities have been modified, she’s not letting anybody off the hook. “The tales are very detailed, and there are issues which have by no means been spoken about earlier than.”
“Constructing in Hawaii was a means of discovering out what I need and who I’m,” says Hefner. Tracey Lyn
Finally, she hopes her memoir will assist different girls. “I want I had this e-book once I was 21 earlier than going into the mansion,” Hefner says, including that she believes her late husband would respect her sharing her perspective. “I hope that being such an advocate for freedom of speech, that [Hugh] can be an advocate for me telling my story. Girls’s voices are getting louder, and that’s actually vital.”
Nowadays, the licensed realtor is busy flipping homes in Hawaii and L.A. (the place she nonetheless owns a house) and venturing into the NFT area with First Ape Wives Membership, a digital membership go to a world of journey facilities, together with reserving upgrades and resort bonuses. It’s a far cry from her life simply six years in the past. “I wanted a change. I take a look at images of once I was on the mansion, and it seems like I used to be sporting a fancy dress,” admits Hefner, who had her breast implants eliminated in 2016. She’s dipped her toe into the relationship waters since Hugh’s passing and says she needs to get married — “I’m undoubtedly a romantic” — and have youngsters sometime. “I get to spend time right here in Hawaii and journey and hang around with individuals who have my greatest pursuits at coronary heart,” provides Hefner. “Life is sweet.”
