casey legler, welcome to hardtalk. thanks for having me. having just written a rather extraordinary memoir of your early life, the first 21 years or so of your life. it is raw, it is full of pain and it exposes some of the very dark places in your own life. how hard was it to write? um, first i just want to say that it's great to be here. i told you before we started that i'm a huge fan but my wife is a massive fan and i've done, i've done, you know, vogue covers, features, and this is what we've been most excited about so thanks for having us. i grew up watching. it's great having you here but i fear some of what we talk about is going to be quite tough. yeah, and i knew that coming in which is one of the reasons why i agreed to it because i do ask a lot of my reader. five years ago, i truly sat down and decided to write this short memoir about growing up in girlhood as a young olympian, as a young addict in the ‘90s, and what that was like for me. let's look back at the 10—year—old casey legler, raised primarily in france. although your p