American author and former sex worker Charlotte Shane has spoken about the years she spent working as an escort for the super-rich. In her recently released memoir, An Honest Woman: A Memoir of Love and Sex Work, Shane spoke about her time as a teenage runaway, the two decades she spent working as an escort for the 1%, her relationships with her clients, and more.

Ahead of the publication of her memoirs, Shane also reveals why she gave up her career.

Charlotte Shane began working as an escort for the super-rich during George Bush’s presidency. “There’s a certain emptiness that comes with being an escort: showering, picking out an outfit, going into a hotel, leaving a hotel,” she wrote in her memoir, according to an excerpt published in the Wall Street Journal. In the excerpt, she talked about how when she “started escorting in the early 2010s, websites showed stock photos of jets and champagne and black American Express cards.”

Today, however, marketing has evolved enormously – and that is one of the reasons why Shane gave up sex work.

In a post on Instagram, she explained her decision to quit sex work. “The main reason I left sex work last time was not the actual face-to-face work, but the marketing. Nowadays, sex workers, even those who work on the ground and don’t have an OnlyFans account, have to act like influencers to promote themselves and that is too much in my opinion, regardless of the compensation,” she explained.

“It’s been wonderful not taking or posting pictures of my life (or pictures that might mislead people about my life). Not thinking about what I look like is a blessing. Not feeling pressure to own, wear or buy things to impress other people is a blessing. I feel like I have a chance to be my true self, that circumstances have never been more favorable to become whatever I’m meant to be and live the way I’m meant to live,” she added.

You can read her entire blog post below: