The Varnished Untruth (28 page)

Yes, and I didn’t really have to steam through my PhD faster than anyone else had ever done it . . . And yet, that’s what I made myself do. But I did really enjoy the process immensely. I loved all the material – well, except the higher-level statistics, which I found ridiculously challenging. But I especially loved the psychodynamic courses about childhood trauma, learning about personality and mood disorders, my hypnosis courses, and my studies in human sexuality. Actually, CGI provided a particularly good sex therapy training, and it was there that I first formed an idea that I might specialize in that field. It’s always a good idea for a practitioner to have a speciality and, after a couple of years, sex therapy seemed an obvious choice – along with hypnosis, trauma work and mood disorders, which also came to the fore as possible specialty areas.

I was fascinated by the field of sexuality and the psychology of sex. It seemed to me that it was a far less well-trodden path than many other areas of my studies – probably because many professionals were scared of it. It wasn’t easy to learn to talk comfortably with patients about their sexual problems, to put them at their ease and be helpful. First you had to be very comfortable with your own sexuality and get rid of your prejudices. In order to be a skilled sex therapist one has to be non-judgmental and, since most of us have been brought up in a society with negative attitudes towards sexuality, people usually enter adulthood with an enormous number of hang-ups. I was no exception (well, just look at my history!), but I worked hard and, after a good deal of extra training through professional bodies such as the American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors and Therapists, it was very gratifying to emerge as a well-trained sexuality professional.

But in your personal life – even before you began formal psychology training – you had already been learning about aspects of the brain and psyche, hadn’t you?

Yes . . . well Billy, of course, is a very unique individual and I was very interested to find out how he ticked . . . More importantly, there were a lot of day-to-day issues we both faced due to his learning difference and I wanted to know how to help him. I knew he was very easily distracted, and had some severe problems with short-term memory. For example, he loves to cook and, at that time, he particularly loved to follow Madhur Jaffrey’s Indian recipes. So he’d stand at the kitchen table and write himself a shopping list, then take off for the shops. The special places where you can buy fresh Indian spices were some distance away, but he’d get there and realize he’d left the list behind. That was in the days when he refused to carry a mobile (‘You take a wild beast somewhere on the Serengeti Plain and tag it, then set it free again . . . Only it’s no longer free, is it? It’s got a fucking tag on it!’– that’s how he viewed mobile phones). And I’d be there at home unable to study because I’d found the list and was worrying about when he would realize he’d left it behind, and how upset he’d be. And I’d be furious all over again that I couldn’t get him to carry a mobile (nowadays he’s the one complaining that he can never get me on the phone, and I grit my teeth and try to avoid saying, ‘Hah! Now you’re getting some of your own medicine.’).

So I started studying learning disabilities and Attention Deficit Disorder, and began to understand how the trauma Billy sustained as a child affected his present life, and the relationship between alcohol/substance abuse and both trauma and ADD. It was a revelation, although I had to tread very carefully and avoid appearing to diagnose him. That, of course, would not have been appropriate; although most psychology students find themselves looking at the people around them in a new light! I observed him and thought a lot about his unique challenges, and it honestly made me even more impressed with him, knowing more about what he had overcome. But if I ever said anything that sounded dangerously close to the mark, Billy’s immediate retort would – understandably – be: ‘Quit the psychobabble!’

But Billy finally decided to seek therapy for himself! This was triggered when he happened upon an American TV programme in which the well-known psychotherapist and author John Bradshaw was talking with a small audience about childhood trauma. When I caught Billy crying by the TV set, I knew he was ready to heal. A great therapist then helped him come to terms with the abuse he experienced as a child.

I had to face the reality of with my own psychological shortcomings. I finally understood that I’d had an eating disorder for more than twenty years, although now that I no longer needed to diet for filming, it seemed to be in remission. I had begun to go to the gym regularly . . . and was still reaping the benefit of erm, my first face lift. Inspired by the pressure to look good beside the thin, athletic, youthful-seeming blondes who inhabited my new town, I had sought out a plastic surgeon shortly after arriving in LA. He had also replaced my old silicone implants with more natural-looking saline ones, and performed some liposuction on my thighs. But that was before I began my psychological studies; otherwise, I might not have bothered.

Through my psychology course I learned to be a better parent, acquiring new skills and a better understanding of child development. I was already acutely aware of the mistakes my parents had made in putting too much pressure on me, for example, and not being warm. I tried to be as loving and tactile as possible, and did my best to see my children as individuals and love them for who they truly were . . .

And Daisy . . . she turned out to be a truly unique individual, didn’t she? Like Billy in so many ways . . .

Mmm. Daisy is a truly adorable creature – bright, funny and quirky. Nowadays she is very outgoing socially and just loves to tease me mercilessly. She adores small children and works as a nursery school assistant. I don’t usually talk about her publicly – or any of the children, really – but Daisy has . . . certain challenges and developmental delays in various areas – learning, eye-tracking and large motor skills. When she was around four we began to notice she did not achieve certain developmental milestones, but it was really only once we settled in LA that we found someone who could figure out exactly how to help her. We found her an excellent school for kids with special needs.

You’re downplaying all the worry and anxiety you and Billy had about her . . . all the time you spent searching for the right treatment, school placement . . .

I suppose . . . yes, I am. It’s never easy for parents to figure out how to help any of their children, and when you have a child with special needs there’s the added challenge of being an advocate for her, finding your way to services and the right treatment protocol. Of course, my psychology course was enormously helpful. I often joke that I needed to get a PhD in psychology just to understand myself and the unique people in my family . . . but it’s more or less true!

Now, our middle child Amy – there’s a natural born actress! She has not entered the field of show business but, honestly, she was a proper diva at three years old! She was sweet-natured, loving and kind, too, and she was a very placid baby, for which I was very grateful, since a lot of my energy had to be focused on Daisy. That’s one of the hardest things about having a child with special needs in the family – finding the balance of focus with the other siblings. That truth was brought home to me loud and clear by one of my patients, a woman who had a brother with severe special needs. She felt she had suffered greatly in a family where he had unwittingly sucked up an unfair share of available parental attention. ‘If he’s “special”,’ she said to me, ‘then what does that make me?
Not
special?’

But Amy has a beautiful spirit and continues to be a very caring person. She, too, had some challenges with focusing that made academic learning harder than it is for most others, but she has gone on to achieve excellence in higher learning – just shows you, doesn’t it, that people who struggle at school can be the ones who shine in tertiary education.

As for Scarlett – a chubby-cheeked, exuberant bubba who grew into a poised, teenaged ballerina. She is sweet and loving, with a sensitive nature and is a gifted artist. I encouraged Amy and her to attend ballet lessons in LA. Not only did it make their bodies strong with grace and good posture, but the discipline it once imbued in me was something I wanted for them. It was a good choice, I think. On weekends, when other youngsters were sulking around the city’s malls, they were rehearsing for performances with the American Youth Ballet – and loving it. OMG I just realized something. Do you know I actually dressed my three girls rather alike from time to time? Never exactly alike, but close enough! How could I have repeated that mistake? I must ask them if they resented it. What is WRONG with me?

Unfortunately, we all naturally parent by rote, and have to work really hard to avoid unwittingly making our own parents’ mistakes . . .

Anyway, well before we went to the USA, Cara had chosen to attend full-time boarding school in England. After leaving, she lived with us briefly in LA, then attended Glasgow Art School and emerged with a Fine Arts degree in Photography. After school, James toured with Elton John and other bands, then eventually settled in LA where he began to work in the film industry – in the props department. Unfortunately, like Billy, he struggled with one of the issues that commonly runs in families – substance abuse. In the early nineties I took him to the airport and told him: ‘Jamie, we’re going on a plane to a place called Hazelden. You won’t be back for many months but you’re going to get the best possible help.’ He did, and he has been sober ever since. He’s a gentle soul, whose mantra is: ‘I’d rather be fishing!’

Boy, there was such a lot going on within your family, wasn’t there? And after the first two years in LA, Billy was away a great deal, either touring or making movies. Can’t have been easy . . .

Yes, but it was nice to have the support you get from being in one place for a while. I made good friends among my academic pals and, being more home-bound at that early time in Los Angeles, I gradually got to know our neighbours. That was a new experience for me; in the past, I’d always been travelling too much for that. And what fantastic neighbours we had! I already name-dropped some of them. David Hockney invited us to his house and studio – just a hop, skip and a jump from us – and there it was: THE swimming pool! The one in all those amazing paintings! He was finishing a large picture of the Grand Canyon that was on its way to an exhibition in Paris. It was painted on many squares of canvas that I suppose made transportation easier. He told us he was sending the ‘canyon’ separately from the ‘sky’ – which wasn’t quite dry; Billy and I found that practical detail very amusing.

David was also into painting his ‘sausage dogs’, as I call them, although I believe they were dachshunds. He loved those dogs, and even had special car seatbelts made especially for them. His hearing was deteriorating but he didn’t want to wear hearing aids in what he called ‘old ladies’ knickers pink’ so he had the company make them in better colours – one red and one green. What an amazing man. Such purity of vision, and an utterly enviable artistic life. David had designed the sets for a production of the opera
Turandot
, and he had a full model in his studio. He played the music of one of the acts and moved the scenery and lighting around by hand to show us what it would be like. Someone told me he had devised a drive along Mulholland Drive all the way to the beach, with music that matched the view and mood at every point – what a brilliant idea! I longed to be invited on that ride.

Dwight Yoakam also lived nearby. Billy and I both really admire him as an actor. We found him to be delightful and intense. I am intrigued by people who are unafraid to let their dark side be seen in their art, like painters Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud, and actors Kevin Spacey, Chris Cooper and Steve Buscemi. Some of the characters Dwight has played have been downright scary and I love that. And he seemed so . . . multifaceted. One day there was a power cut up where we lived, which meant that our electric gates were stuck shut and I couldn’t get out. Dwight came wandering past when I was trying to force them open, and I asked him to assist by climbing over and helping me to push from the inside. ‘Sorry,’ he said in his southern drawl, ‘I can’t do that. I’m on my way to see my agent.’ I was a bit taken aback, but it wasn’t personal. He was wearing pale blue suede cowboy boots that would definitely have been ruined by that climb. The boots were set off by the skinniest jeans you’ve ever seen (they would probably have ripped), a pale blue shirt and matching, pristine cowboy hat. Oh yes, definitely not Mr Fixit attire.

Eric Idle and his wife Tania were our closest friends in the area. They are great hosts and continue to have wonderful dinner parties in their sprawling Spanish mansion. And Billy and I also adored getting to know Steve Martin; an extremely bright, cultured man whose writing I very much admire. He’s also an excellent banjo player, just like my husband. Unfortunately, I have never warmed to that instrument; in fact, it thoroughly irritates me. And I can be pretty scathing about it. What do you call a gorgeous blonde on the arm of a banjo player? A tattoo.

Since Billy refused to carry a cell phone, in those LA days I felt I never knew where he was; although it was usually at the cigar store on Ventura Boulevard or at McCabe’s Guitar Shop where there were musical concerts by people like Loudon Wainwright. Confession time: when I first met Billy, I pretended to like folk music more than I actually do. Heavens, I used to sing it myself and play the guitar, but all that mopey wailing has limited appeal. Billy, on the other hand, made no bones about the fact that he hated jazz – which I quite like – and is unimpressed by most pop music. I prefer the more lyrical rock music, so we both enjoy Eric Clapton, Elton John, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Phil Collins, David Bowie, Queen, Foreigner and Travis, but when it came to my favourites (mainly lots of female vocalists like Beyoncé, Mariah Carey and J.Lo), Billy was scathing. Chick music, that’s what I’m into. Toni Braxton’s ‘Unbreak My Heart’, for example. I still play that on our kitchen jukebox in Scotland and have a moody dance all by myself. Oh, and Andrea Bocelli . . . Fabulous!