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Inside a Supermodel's Suicide
Han Mi-hee / Yonhap / AP Photo
Hours before she was found dead of an apparent suicide last week, Korean supermodel and Chanel muse Daul Kim reached out to a friend for a last boost of support. They talked about her depression, weight loss, and a fistfight with her boyfriend.
On the morning of Thursday November 19th, 20-year-old Korean supermodel Daul Kim reached out to an old friend via instant messenger. She was depressed, she wrote, according to a transcript of the chat seen by The Daily Beast. She and her boyfriend had just had another brutal physical fight. She’d punched him in the face; he’d yanked her hair. But she was afraid to leave him, afraid to suffer the agony of being apart. The last time they separated, she hadn’t been able to eat, dropping from 112 to 99 lbs. Her friend begged her to leave town, book a job, call her mother. No, she said. She’d miss her dog. She ended the conversation abruptly, saying she was going off to clean the house.
"Mad depressed and overworked, the more I gain, the more lonely it is," Kim wrote on her private blog on October 30. "I know I’m like a ghost."
A few hours later, Kim was found by her boyfriend, hanged in her luxurious apartment in Paris’ 10th arrondissement. She’d said she felt trapped and mentioned thoughts of suicide in the IM conversation with her friend, a transcript of which was shown to the Beast. The French authorities say they believe the death is a suicide but are still investigating. The 5’10 stunner had just shot a Chanel handbag campaign, and Karl Lagerfeld was calling her his new muse. Alessandra Bertoldini, her agent at Next Models in Paris, said Kim’s mother was flying to Paris to see her daughter that Friday. Next’s Web site posted a headshot of Kim with the eulogy: “Rest in Peace/Smile down on us/We will never forget you.”
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Cameron Smith
Kim's death shocked the fashion world and the nation of South Korea last week. She had just broken through to the uppermost echelon of top models, had just dyed her hair platinum, and was finally booking the biggest jobs. News spread swiftly last Friday, inspiring tearful tributes in most major newspapers and some soul-searching in the fashion business. Kim's family closed her blog to anyone but registered users this week and voiced concerns, echoed around the blogosphere, that her death may not have been suicide. Suspicions center around reports of Kim's allegedly abusive relationship with her boyfriend and concerns over the swiftness with which French authorities declared the death a suicide.
There were signs of trouble in the young model’s life for some time. Despite a meteoric rise, posing for red-hot designers like Dries Van Noten, Alexander McQueen and Maison Martin Margiela, Kim used her widely followed blog, iliketoforkmyself.com, to express desperate and dark emotions. The macabre title of her blog—one of the first photo posts is Kim with a fork in her head—had nothing to do with self-harm the model claimed. “I’m definitely not depressed,” she wrote. “And I don’t want to kill myself. I don’t want to die.”
Kim complained constantly of insomnia, exhaustion, missing her mother and the overwhelming pressures of being an in-demand model. Her often-rambling, stream-of-consciousness blogging is a roller coaster of mood swings. One of the first entries on iliketoforkmyself.com announced: “My life as Daul was so sad and lonely. Join me in my solitude in another world.” But later she added: “KIDDING. I’m fine. Just tired.” The mood of her entries stayed dark.
August 22: “I need to learn how to stop destroying myself and be nice to myself.”
September 25: “I wore high high heels and short short skirts to hide my depression.”
October 26: “So many times I almost jumped but didn’t.”
October 30: “Mad depressed and overworked, the more I gain, the more lonely it is. I know I’m like a ghost.”
November 15: “Oh but how lonely it is. Then and now.”
And finally, on November 18, Kim’s last post: “Say hi to forever.” She then posted a video for the song “I Go Deep” by British musician Jim Rivers.
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Paul Schrodt is a writer living in New York City. He has contributed to New York magazine, Radar, and Esquire.com.
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felloffatree
Such a tragedy... nicely written Peter Davis!
DakLak
Another young woman sacrificed on the altar of Haute Couture. What a waste of a human life.
My sympathies go out to her family and her country.
Jessica150
I seriously doubt that her suicide had anything to do with Haute Couture. She sounds like a young, unhappy, emotional, and very depressed woman who did what many women think about and some actually do. You can't blame it on the job. Mental illness at that level strikes randomly, without regard to social class or profession.
Shura17
Being unhappy and emotionally unstable is debilitating enough for a 'normal' person. All that on top of a job that puts you forth as a product of haute coture and beauty and sexiness would do nothing but exacerbate the problem.
Condolences to her family. The fashion world can go fork itself for being utterly useless and malevolent.
amowls
I'm pretty sure "fork myself" = "fuck myself." It's a play on words.
ssmythson
So sad... I hope this brings awareness to the non-glamour aspects of that world. Love Davis' work, cool to read someone who actually writes about that world, give their take on it. Good story.
Teuthida
It's sad on a certain level, but it's not a "tragedy."
Boo Hoo. My supermodel life in Paris is horrible!!!!
Spoiled woman who had everything except the emotional maturity to realize how blessed she was by fate.
Not much sympathy here.
ashleyschmashley
You disgust me. Show some fucking respect.
mickeyitaliano
If you can not fathom what depression does to someone, I would refrain from your catty comments. Regardless if she was a gene pool lottery winner, that just does not equate when you suffer from the daily ennui and sadness that accompanies depression.
andygirl
Bravo!
Barbara416
Bravo mickeyitaliano!!
PinkoLefty
I'm not entirely sure of where my position would be on whether or not this is a tragedy. Fundamentally I think that people are responsible for their own decisions and actions. I don't, however, think that is the important question raised by this. It's definitely a sad situation and it's my belief that the fashion industry has to take some share of the blame.
At 112 pounds and 5'10" she was starting off underweight. At 99 pounds, she was actually in physical danger. To have an industry that takes young women like that and puts them on a pedestal as icons of beauty is unconscionable. To do that at the same time as the young woman is separated from any existing support system is positively negligent. Couple those conditions with an abusive partner who probably represented her entire social world and you've got a recipe for disaster. If someone had simply loved, respected and fed her properly she'd probably still be with us.
Perhaps Lagerfeld could make some slight amends by resolving to hire exclusively from models of healthy weight and making sure that their agencies make mental health professionals available to these young women isolated in that surreal, superficial environment.
andygirl
From one who used to work in fashion and left, I can say that models who do not succumb to the pressures of the industry are very lucky indeed. This is tragic and all too common. We hear of it now because she was on the rise, but all too many models suffer depression, anxiety, eating disorders, etc and we never hear about it. Many of these girls are extremely young and come from very poor families or even third-world villages. They are thrust into a world where your value, your human worth, is based on your appearance. It is difficult to not lose your sense of self, to not feel like a commodity one day and worthless the next.
Sure, they have money. They have fame. But they aren't prepared for how to deal with that. And moreover, they aren't equipped to handle the emotional stress and psychological damage that monetizing your face or your body can do.
neroves1
I live in an apt. were the girl who lived here previously hung her self as well. She was Korean and also successful, with big boy friend problems. She hung her self on Christmas. Adderal is a serious medication, from my own experaince it can cause severe depression. Its not a drug for keeping up.
glenndale
I have been in Korea for seven years and suicide is an epidemic problem. People kill themselves if they get in too much debt, their marriage is bad, if they do poorly on university entrance exams. There was one little boy about 10 years old who killed himself. He was upset that he studied more hours than his father worked. Heartbreaking. So much pressure and no way of venting. I have taught adult students and they would come into my class and talk about all their problems. I felt like their counselor. They really can't "burden" others with their problems. It's crazy.
DougRyan
Very sad -- 20 is so young to be thrust on the world stage. So sad she didn't have someone she could trust to "have her back" when the world demanded so much of her time. BTW - Well written article Peter Davis.
tumbleweed
I can feel empathy for the poor woman. She may have been emotionally immature but depression doesn't care. It strikes at random. The illness runs in my husbands family. His mother had it in her later years, he has it and our daughter has had it for years. His mother had no idea what was wrong with her she just suffered through it. My husband and daughter have taken medication for years for it. They both do fairly well as long as they take their medication.
qatarsystem
Important information : Boyfriend is Guillaume Chaillet, founder & director of Pressing PR agency in Paris
she stayed at his place and they shared the rent of the loft. The terrible story took place there
There were many sordid stories when they were together
He did not show up during memorial
overdue
While obesity in on the rise in the US, Sainte Anne hospital here in Paris has opened two (2!) new wards for treating young anorexic patients; one for teens/young adults, another for pre-teens.
So no, she's (was) sadly not alone in her state of physical and mental health.
Thank you.
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