The Creation of Paper Girls Burn: A Borderline Personality Disorder Memoir by Pippa Scott

“The author pulls no punches in revealing things that she’s done….Her frankness is refreshing….An indelible, sharply detailed life story that’s earnest and engrossing.Our Verdict: GET IT.” -Kirkus Reviews

I attempted to write Paper Girls Burn a handful of times throughout the last decade. It would go the same way each time. I would write maybe a few thousand words, then get overwhelmed and shut it all down. Looking back now it seems the story was not ready to be written.

Yet something changed for me following an excruciating heartbreak. I felt compelled to write again, and I would set a timer for twenty minutes, but I soon found myself writing for hours. I was able to manage the emotional overwhelm that cropped up as I wrote through scenes of hardship and trauma, and the story was now flowing out of me. At times, it felt as though the story was writing me. It was pure creative flow; I had my finger on the pulse of something exciting. 

Writing a memoir is obviously very different than writing fiction. There were many junctures where I faced a tough decision: Was I really going to share the parts of me that were the most shameful? Parts of myself that I have tried to disavow? But the answer was a clear, resounding yes from the start. This book demanded authenticity. If I was to tell the story of Paper Girls Burn, there could be no hiding. It required transparency. 

Most of my life I have struggled with a deep loneliness, the kind that comes from feeling deeply misunderstood. I had convinced myself that there was something deeply wrong with me and that the rest of the world could not relate. As I aged, I started to feel that maybe that sentiment was off. Yes, I still felt misunderstood, but I also realized that the times I felt the most connected with others was when they were brave and spoke their inside thoughts out loud. It then occurred to me that perhaps we feel lonely because we assume others do not have the same kinds of thoughts that we do, but when the performance is stripped away, we are much more alike than we realize. 

I have had a reoccurring nightmare for over a decade. The scenery and characters change, but the same theme persists: I am helpless, robbed of my voice and unable to prevent my own suffering. I search tirelessly for my white knight, but I keep looking to the wrong people, people who simply do not have the capacity to rescue me because they can’t properly attend to themselves, and then they abandon me. The nightmare reflects my reality; searching for my own healing in someone else began with my parents and followed me into all my relationships with men.

Writing my story helped me to slowly reconnect with parts of myself that I had given to others over the years. A type of reclaiming. Writing helped me to return to myself, and as cliched as that may sound, I had no idea so much of my inner pain came from self-abandonment. I knew I had crippling abandonment fears, but I had believed the pain stemmed from the men who kept leaving me. I didn’t realize it was from me fleeing myself over and over. Some of those nightmares have resolved and some persist, but they shine a light on where more self-work needs to happen. 

In writing Paper Girls Burn, I had to sit with myself from childhood to adulthood, and in doing so, I clearly witnessed my own story unfolding. I do not agree with some of my very maladaptive behaviours I cover in the book, and I still hold myself accountable for the work I needed to do to change those patterns, but now I also empathize with myself because I understand where those patterns came from. Writing my memoir offered me a zoomed-out perspective that was entirely new to me, and it promoted healing.

It was very important to the truth of my life to not end the book with, “And then she was fixed.” I am a messy woman, and that woman deserves more than a neat ending. The reality is I juggle multiple mental health disorders and some hours, days and weeks are more challenging than others. I also felt that readers deserved better, as I was tired of being sold the lie that if you simply did X, Y and Z, your life will magically transform forever. I still am the frightened child who wants to feel safe and loved. I still am the angry, depressed, anxious woman.

But I am also the woman who cares deeply, continues to work on herself and at times feels an anchor inside that I never believed was possible. To be able to claim that is a result of the most healing aspect of the book: I haven’t written a memoir about a protagonist who undergoes a full 180-degree transformation; rather, I have given myself permission to represent myself honestly, as someone who is many things, who is trying her best, and who is deserving of love.

To quote my book: “She was the most honest liar, the kindest bitch, and the most manipulative altruistic woman that ever lived.” Perhaps transformation really happens when we find peace with the different iterations of ourselves.

—

PIPPA SCOTT is a writer, singer, and an award-winning photographer. As a singer, she has performed on BBC TV’s Star for a Night, trained on Broadway, and studied opera under a renowned contralto. She spent over a decade working in the film industry in London, New York City, and Los Angeles for agents, directors, casting executives, and talent. She lives in Canada with her two children. Paper Girls Burn is her first book.  

Paper Girls Burn: A Borderline Personality Disorder Memoir

From a young age, Pippa Scott was made to feel damaged for simply being different. A highly sensitive child prone to emotional outbursts, she was sent away to a rigid British boarding school. Instead of taming her, the experience of abandonment and isolation intensified her longing for acceptance and comfort.

Set amidst the changing eras from the 1980s to the 21st century, Paper Girls Burn follows Scott as she becomes a young woman and increasingly turns to sex with sometimes cruel, occasionally dangerous men. Beyond her countless one-night stands, she becomes obsessed with men who reject her and chases belonging while she hooks up with a rock star in London, trains to dazzle on Broadway, works for jaded film execs in LA and probes the depths of Vancouver’s drag world.

At age thirty-five, Scott finds answers through a comprehensive diagnosis: borderline personality disorder with ADHD, OCD, PTSD, and depression. From there, she begins her journey towards healing and inner peace.

More than one woman’s story, this memoir offers reassurance to anyone who has been made to feel damaged for simply being different and yearning to be loved.

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Category: On Writing