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Marni: Not just another teenage autobiography

March 19, 2010

by Nichole Carnell

It takes one question to realize Marni Bates is not your average college student. No, its not because she has an obscure stress disorder called trichotillomania which gives her the urge to pull out her hair, eyebrows and eyelashes. It’s also not because her autobiography has been added to New York Public Library’s “Stuff for the Teen Age” list for 2010.

The reason Marni Bates is not the average college student is her radiant confidence and wisdom. Not only has she come to terms with her trichotillomania, but she has been able to share with an exceptional amount of poise.

Bates’ book, Marni, is an autobiography featured in a series, Louder than Words, that narrates her struggle with “pulling,” as she calls it, her parents’ divorce and her relationships with her father and sister. Her book, which she wrote in her first year at Lewis & Clark, begins in middle school, when Bates says her struggle began.  Bates said that she was afraid for a long time to tell anyone about her pulling.

“It’s not so much the pulling but the shame, fear and self-loathing that goes along with it,” Bates said. A constant fear that left Bates feeling anxious in everyday situations including water, rain and wind.

“Hair was my drug of choice,” Bates said, and described her pulling as a release like popping your knuckles or back. “It feels so good,” she said. She said it was like an addiction, but that she can’t escape her hair.  Although she hoped to leave her shame for pulling behind, since she still “pulls,” she was offered the opportunity to write for the series and decided to take on the challenge. “Part of me has known that I want to be a writer,” Bates said. Writing the book ended up being very therapeutic, she said.  

Bates considers this book to be very different from what she usually writes (she plans to write one book each year).  “I write young adult fiction with happy endings,” she said, but said that it was “shocking” when she learned she had been hired to write her book.

“It was important to be as honest as possible with my book,” Bates said. Now that her story is out there, Bates said she has had a great response, and talking about it has become easier.

Bates says that her trichotillomania no longer defines her. She considers it more as a “quirk.”

“When you think that you are insane and unloveable, it’s hard to look beyond that,” Bates said, “and now I don’t feel like that anymore.” Writing her book and realizing that so many people share her struggles has been “a fascinating way to tell that voice to shut up.”