Crystal Hefner was married to the Playboy founder from 2012 until 2017.
“At the time I thought I was on top,” she said. “I thought, ‘Wow, if I just like everything that he likes and do all the things that he wants me to do, then I’m the favorite.’ And I was, but I just lost myself in the process.”
Hugh Hefner (left) died in 2017 at 91.
Hefner proposed to her on Christmas Eve 2010, and she felt conflicted over the idea of marriage.
Crystal explained that she initially accepted the proposal and later broke off the engagement just five days before their initial wedding in June 2011.
She told how she ran back to her relationship with Dr. Phil’s son, Jordan McGraw, for a brief period before returning to Hefner.
She and the sex publisher finally reconciled and tied the knot on Dec. 31, 2012, and she became his third wife.
“I realized I was dealing with a really big power imbalance,” Crystal said. “It seemed like a world of success and fantasy, but everyone’s having to sleep with an 80-year-old. There’s a price. Everything has a price.”
The former Playboy Playmate of the Month also divulged how restrictive the lifestyle at the mansion was for her and the other Bunnies while under Hefner’s roof.
She added that he would give each of his “girlfriends” an allowance that he handed to them in neat bills.
“Our nail polish couldn’t be anything but some neutral color, no French manicure,” Crystal said.
Crystal even remembered an instance when Hefner would make a note to her when her natural brown hair would start to show by her roots.
“So I’d have to go bleach it and it would burn my scalp and I’d have blisters,” she recounted. “But for some reason, I thought this was all normal and that’s what it meant to be seen as beautiful in Hef’s eyes.”
she added that he would give each of his “girlfriends” an allowance that he handed to them in neat bills.
She revealed that she once had “a conversation with Hef and he let me know: ‘Once I go, when I’m gone, please only say good things about me.’ “
“I kept that promise for the last five years. After going through a lot of therapy and healing, I realized that I needed to be honest about my time there. The book is about healing from a toxic environment.”
While her memoir is full of jaw-dropping anecdotes about her life as a member of the illustrious Playboy Bunnies, one story centered around Hefner indulging on Viagra — until the very end of his life.
The erection-inducing pharmaceutical eventually caused him to go deaf in one ear.
