I wanted to become a model in the first place because I wanted to refute everything they said in the fashion magazines about what perfection was, about what beauty was. It disgusted me, I knew I’d never see a model like me. I was born with syndactylism. Trying to fight all odds, I went into modeling. Luckily, I had the right face for the right cosmetic—an eye makeup—and the firm hired me without knowing I had anything wrong with my hands or feet. They were quite shocked when I walked in.
I was never allowed to do runway modeling and they kept me away from the press. I couldn’t wear the whole package, the high heels, the sheer stockings, the bright pink nail polish. I was a good head shot and that was it. The nights I felt fit to kill were the coldest nights, the nights I could keep my hands in my pockets and wear boots.
I only did the modeling to get through college where I majored in broadcasting. I landed a job as one of the first women disc jockeys at a radio station in Kansas City. The radio career helped validate my attitude about myself. It was a relief to succeed in something I did well.
For years in grade school and high school, I had been the class clown, using my disability to get people to laugh at me. I wasn’t a real comic so I only degraded myself. But I wanted to be liked, to be someone the guys would want to date.
When I was about sixteen, I discovered that a couple of the guys I had dated were calling me lobster claws behind my back. I was devastated for about a year. And then I decided I was going to start liking myself, and at the same time I became a liberated woman. I became an outspoken student activist with a strong drive for a career in the news.
So after my success in radio, I wanted to break into television.
I had been courting this TV station for a year. It was a network affiliate with a good reputation, especially in the news department. In the beginning, they wouldn’t even look at the video tapes I had of myself the standard way to audition in TV. Eventually, they did look and eventually they did hire me. Everyone felt it was a big risk.
At first on camera, I wore my prosthesis—very life like—looking hands which fit like gloves. I wore them on camera about two weeks. Wearing the prosthesis had been one condition for hiring me.
After the first two weeks, my boss came up to me and said, “You’re improving so quickly but you’re not moving. Are you bothered by the fact that you’re wearing your gloves?” And I said, “Yes.” Then he said, “Take them off.” I was in seventh heaven. I thought I had finally made it.
But that reaction was nothing compared to my feelings about the first letters we got after we got rid of the gloves. A woman called me and said she had two sons who were born without arms. She’d been very unreconciled to it until she saw the show. She said I was an inspiration. I thought, this is hokey but I’m going to cry. I knew I had made it.
All along I’ve wanted recognition on camera. I wanted the world to encompass me and love me and say, “You’re OK. You’re pretty. We like you.” That was my motivating factor for being on television.