If I didn’t work, I didn’t earn—there is no paid time off when you’re a sex worker. Sick days meant no money, so I cammed as much as I could, sometimes seven nights a week.

Some nights I made $900, some nights I made $25. Some months I made $6,000, others I made just $1,500. One month I made over $15,000, while a few months I barely made anything. My total income depended directly on how much I worked, how much energy I put into my shows, and—especially—how much time I put into maintaining my relationships outside of business hours.

Over all, in my year and a half as a cam girl, I earned over $100,000.

Step 4: Keep My Clients Happy

Building relationships with all my viewers was critical to maintaining an engaging room, but with some, my relationships were much more complicated. The bulk of my income came from “whales”—regulars with deep pockets and generous spending habits. Whales often tipped large: $125, $200, $300 at a time. Their tips had the potential to grow my income and stature in the industry, but they often tipped unpredictably, sometimes for nothing in particular.

Generally whales wanted more—emotional care-taking, private sessions, access to my personal life. If neglected, they would leave, and the loss of their support could cause my rank on the site to plummet. Whales took up a significant amount of my time, and I couldn’t incorporate them into my standard income calculations. If I didn’t build a relationship with a big tipper, if I neglected them, or if I failed to figure out what they liked fast enough, they’d quickly move onto someone else.

Step 5: Learn My Lesson

Camming taught me how to run a business. I learned to be entrepreneurial, to make a living off my creativity and self-expression. I learned about tax law, self-employment, digital marketing, the importance of a savings account and the difference between gross and net profit. I learned how to take a risk on myself.

More than anything, I learned how much work it takes to make porn and to be a successful sex worker. I learned that everything the movies taught me was fake: no rich clients fell out of the sky, no one mailed me piles of jewelry “just because,” no one gave me a million dollars for a smile.

Being a cam girl was the hardest job I’ve ever had. So, the next time you find yourself enjoying the content that sex workers make, compensate them—pay for your porn and tip your strippers well. Sex work is work. And, as it turns out, hard work at that.

Isa Mazzei is a screenwriter, producer, and the author of Camgirl. Follow her at @isaiswrong.

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