Twitter Trolls Outed My Porn Star Past. So I Embraced It.

I'd spent years running from my time as “Wendy James” and building a new life as a lawyer. But the truth is she'd been with me all along.

Illustrations by Lynn Scurfield | Edited by Lilly Dancyger

As I left the gym to go to work, I opened my phone and tapped a little red notification dot. It revealed an XXX profile link that an internet troll had left on my personal Twitter page. There she was, a girl I recognized, frozen in time 15 years ago. Her lips were a little “O” covered in pink frosted Lip Smackers that tasted like popsicles. I blushed, hung my head, and walked fast, staccato strides to get to my office. Yet another dude had created yet another fake profile account for the porn star I used to be. It wasn’t the first time this had happened, but this troll had found my real identity and linked the porn page to my personal Twitter account. It was the same account that I used for work at a tech startup with an all-male team.

I pushed the pedestrian walk button at the traffic stop 12 times in quick succession. Urgency clenched like a corset pulled tight. I needed to get rid of this fast. Once at the office I ducked int…