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Journalist turned escort Amanda Goff has revealed why she went public about her scandalous career as a sex worker – and talked about the overwhelming support she’s received after coming clean.
During a tell-all interview with the Seven Network’s Sunday Night, the 40-year-old former news editor made the shocking confession that men pay her up to $5000 a night to have sex.
The high-class escort, who goes by the name of Samantha X and has since released a book about her experience, says life has been “as ordinary as ever” since she outed herself on national television.
It would seem any nerves the mother-of-two had about returning to her regular canteen duties and facing the other parents at her children’s school this week was nothing more than a little anxiety, she told Melbourne’s Herald Sun newspaper.
“Hang on. Haven’t I just brought shame and disrepute to my community, my family and myself?” she asked rhetorically. “Haven’t I single-handedly taken feminism back 10,000 years, been responsible for all the married men in this country straying, and – oh, of course, how could I forget – wrecked my children’s lives?
“Seemingly not, or not according to the people I care about most – the school mums, my local community and, most importantly, my kids.”
Amanda declared that she’s not ashamed – and that apart from a few panicked calls from worried friends, most people have been supportive of her decision to expose her double life.
“Believe it or not, I didn’t wake up and think, ‘Hmm, bored today. I know! I’ll out myself!’” she said. “This was a very hard decision for me, as my publicist, agent, friends and counsellor all know.
“I have been a journalist for 20 years, and a sneaky one at that. I’ve hidden in bushes, illegally hacked phones and chased celebrities down the street. If I wrote my book under a pseudonym, you can bet your bottom dollar some triumphant reporter would one day have turned up on my doorstep.
“The people who are important in my life have known for months what I do, and we still get invited over for tea,” she continued. “I am not ashamed of myself, they are not ashamed to know me and my kids are popular and well loved.”
On whether or not she thinks she’s a selfish mother, Amanda agrees that a parent’s decision can affect and damage their kids but believes that one’s profession doesn’t define their parenting skills.
“Our children do not have to approve of our choices,” she said. “My children certainly would not have approved of our divorce, nor many of the choices both their father and I have made and will continue to make. But it’s not their life. It’s not up to them.
“What children need is unconditional love, stability, trust, nurturing and their parents’ time. I hope my children grow up to be non-judgemental, open-minded, authentic and honest adults. I want them to show kindness and compassion to others – and be the ones to come to the aid of someone crying in the playground, not kick him in the ankles for being weak.
“So, while I appreciate your concern, my kids are fine. How are yours?”
Just days after the controversial interview went to air – in which Amanda claimed she can not only save marriages but that men pay her three times the average weekly wage for a night of her company – her ex-husband David Basha revealed he was “disgusted with his former wife’s decision to publicly announce her identity”.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, the Sydney banker said, “It’s a disgrace. I have had to explain to my kids what’s going on. I’m worried about my family. I just really want to leave my kids out of this.”
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