Profiles Lauren Lawrence, one-time student of a master's degree in
psychology who became a rapper known as Infidel.
By
Peter Doskoch, published on December 01, 1996
Lauren Lawrence was 10 years old when she first read Interpretation
ofDreams. "I really got into it," she says. "I always felt there was some
affinity between Freud and me." By high school it was as if the New York
native had hung out a shingle: "My friends always called me with their
problems. For example, if someone was ready to reveal their
homosexuality, it would be to me."
Still, when it came to her career, Lawrence chose to be a thespian,
not a therapist. She married the CEO of a Wall Street firm and they had a
son. Then, in 1986, Lawrence returned to her childhood passion and
secretly studied for a master's in psychology. "I had some friends--I'd
call them 'ladies who lunch.' I couldn't stand that lifestyle, so I went
back to school at night without telling anyone."
It was with the same stealth that Lawrence recently assumed her
latest occupation--rapping. She'd been exposed to hip-hop by her husband,
from whom she's now separated. "I thought it would save our flagging
relationship," admits the woman whose rap name is Infidel. "I also saw
that my patients were doing a rap, rapping about themselves. The idea of
rap is that you have something on your mind that you want to get out,
which is just like therapy. Both are very cathartic."
Now the world's only 44-year-old Chanel-clad shrink rapper is
awaiting the January release of her first CD and video, Terrorist Lover.
Oh yes, her 16-year-old son thinks she's the word--and some of her
friends are still speechless.
ILLUSTRATION
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