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04/20/2022 08:30 AMFormer TV journalist Erin Logan doesn’t gloss over some gritty details in her new self-help book, Reporting Facts and Running from the Truth—A TV Anchor’s Struggle to Find Self-Worth Beyond a Job Title.
Next week, Erin will be in Branford for a local book signing event. From 2011 to 2015, Erin called Branford home while working with News 8 New Haven as a TV news anchor/reporter.
“When I look back on my whole journey as TV news anchor, when I was working at Channel 8 and living in Branford and had all my friends around, I would say that was the time I was happiest,” says Erin. “I should have thought to myself, ‘I don’t have a bad life! I have a good job, I have nice friends, I like where I live, and life is good.’ But instead, I was still running from the truth and thinking I had to have a better job.’”
April is national Stress Awareness month, notes Erin, who will be back in town for a special book signing hosted by friend Isa Bolotin at Bolotin’s Branford shop, Loved Boutique & Resale, 847 West Main Street. Copies of Erin’s book will be available for sale at the signing, set for Wednesday, April 27, from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Erin’s visit is part of Bolotin’s seventh anniversary celebration “pop-up” shopping event.
For Erin, it’s also another important show of support from Bolotin, who figures into one of Erin’s favorite chapters of her new book, “Distractions That Do You Good.”
As a customer since Bolotin first opened her Branford retail venture, “...I would go in and browse as a way to de-stress,” says Erin.
In 2015, Erin was in the shop at a time when she had just experienced “a really bad break up.” As someone in the public eye, she was feeling the crush of what others must think about her engagement ending in a break-up, as well as the toll the break-up was taking on her sense of self-worth.
“She noticed a sense of sadness in me,” said Erin of Bolotin. “She said, ‘What’s wrong? You look really upset.’”
The question led to a growing friendship. Bolotin also encouraged Erin to engage herself in something Erin loved—her flair for accessorizing outfits with statement-making earrings and necklaces. Bolotin invited Erin with her to a costume jewelry show at New York’s Javits Center and gave her help in learning how to source quality wholesale products. Erin established her Lure by Logan costume jewelry line of pieces, which can be seen at shoplurebylogan.com. She’s also partnered with Bolotin to assist in charitable causes with proceeds raised from special event sales.
“Rather than sit home being depressed, she encouraged me to do something positive,” says Erin.
That combination of taking action and philanthropic giving shines through in the work Erin has taken on to help other women develop their sense of self-worth in a world reverberating with unwelcome dictates about their looks, their ability and what they have to contribute.
Erin’s first effort to assist other women with issues of self-esteem was to develop her REVIVE program, which she offered as a free series of workshops sponsored by local businesses.
Her latest effort has resulted in her new book, which she co-authored with her dad, Don Logan. She says she’s always had the support of her parents, married now some 45 years.
Don would always ask Erin if she could say she was truly happy in all aspects of her life, she says. He also viewed her tendency to take on more as a way to avoid finding that happiness.
“My dad argues, ‘What is it that we need to be distracted from?’” she says. “If we are that unhappy and internally sad, you need to carve out some of that time and do something to figure out why you’re not happy. You’re just putting a Band-Aid on it by doing all of these things. You are not addressing what is wrong and why you don’t like yourself.”
To learn many of those things about herself, Erin credits her work with certified professional life coach, speaker, and leadership trainer Wendy Perrotti. Erin met Perrotti through REVIVE, after bringing in Perrotti to lead its workshops. Through her personal work with Perrotti, Erin summited a mountain of self-doubt that had been facing her since high school and throughout her years in front of the TV news cameras.
“I needed somebody that would hold me accountable, make me realize my strengths and my weaknesses, not really judge but be firm, and make you do the work,” says Erin.
That result of that work is apparent in her book, which Erin describes as a story about “the importance of perseverance, getting knocked down, learning to love yourself, and most importantly living in the present.”
She began writing the book in June 2020, during the pandemic, and had it wrapped up by late October 2020.
“When COVID hit, that’s when we all started to live in the present,” says Erin. “That’s when I realized I could get this book written. I just needed to find the time when I felt at peace with myself as a human being.”
In producing this book, Erin also mustered up the courage to accept and move past one highly visible mistake. She shares that experience as touchstone for others who may need encouragement during a dark time.
The cover of Reporting Facts and Running from the Truth helps tell the tale: among three photos of Erin is one in which she is noticeably disheveled. It was taken in 2010 in South Bend, Indiana, following police response to a civil dispute between Erin and her then-boyfriend, a former NFL player, a dispute that had been heightened by drinking. No charges were made, but news of Erin’s arrest for acting out toward a female officer during the incident made the tabloids. Erin’s three-year role as a news anchor with WDNU in South Bend, Indiana, ended prematurely as a result of the negative media coverage.
She notes a former boss from another station, with whom Erin had stayed in touch, remained as supportive as ever but did tell her he felt this incident could sideline her dream to work in bigger markets including New York City.
“He said, ‘I don’t see that happening now, based on this,’” Erin recalls. “And that always stuck with me, because I know that he really thought highly of me as an employee and as a person. So I referred back to that often, as a way to show [him] that I can do something bigger and to prove him wrong. Instead, I should have been thinking of better ways to live a well-balanced life.”
Erin had just two weeks left on her WDNU contract at the time she was let go, but instead, she let the firing fuel into thoughts of “they don’t like me; I’m not good enough.” What was happening, again, was that Erin was allowing her job title to define her.
Less than a month after she left WDNU, Erin was hired as a street reporter for WLNE in Providence, Rhode Island. While she had to start on a lower rung than that of her previous role, her new boss recognized her hard work and professionalism beyond the sound and fury of the South Bend controversy.
“When he hired me, he said, ‘I know this is a “rehab” job for you. I know that you’ve come here to prove yourself, but nobody’s going to care [about the South Bend incident] in a year,’” says Erin. “And they didn’t. But I continued to care. I should have just let it go, then and there.”
A little more than one year later, Erin came to work at WTNH/News 8 in New Haven as the weekend evening anchor and as a member of the investigative unit. Again, her work ethic soon spoke for itself, and she stayed on from 2011 through 2015.
Looking back, Erin recognizes she very much enjoyed her work in New Haven, and was happy to be residing in Branford. Still, she was living with self-doubt and felt she needed to prove she could do more.
“I realize now I should have been thinking about work-life balance. I liked my job and I was liked—I had three different contracts there, with three different bosses. I liked where I lived, and my family was only an hour and half away in Massachusetts,” says Erin, a native of Leominster, Massachusetts.
Upon completing three contracts with News 8, Erin next went to work at Fox 61/WTIC in Hartford as a news anchor for a year before moving up into one of the biggest markets out there, working as a reporter at WCBS in New York City for a year. Her last TV journalism role (August 2018 to April 2020) was as an anchor/reporter with WOIO in Cleveland, Ohio.
Sharing Her Story
Even as a high school student, Erin remembers putting an enormous amount of pressure on herself and looking to others for approval.
“In high school, I was chubby. So I took it upon myself to go to the gym, and [to the practices] of all my friends who made the better cheering team than me,” she says. “It felt horrible for them to be on the better sports teams and for me to be second-string. That’s why I would go to the gym with my cousin, and really made it my mission to lose some weight.”
The stigma of being overweight as a middle school and high school kid can be devastating, she adds.
“If you’re not an athlete and you don’t have a niche in something, you really feel lost in the shuffle,” she says.
Fast forward to a fitter Erin in her later high school days, “and all of the sudden, I’m prom queen, I’m homecoming queen,” says Erin.
Still, she recalls, she was far from being happy about gaining this type of new attention.
“I just felt that I was more irritated that I wasn’t good enough when I was 30 pounds heavier,” says Erin.
One thing Erin always recognized in herself was her academic prowess.
“I was smart. I got straight A’s and special honors,” says Erin. “I think I used that as a way to make myself feel worthy, in my own mind.”
Erin targeted Syracuse University as her college of choice and was accepted. Early in her college years, she wasn’t thinking about going into TV news.
“I was a little bit torn. I loved public speaking and my cousin, when I was a senior in high school, was a state senator in Massachusetts,” she says. “So I thought a lot about [studying] law and public policy.”
When she was advised to take a speech/communications route toward earning her degree, she began to get interested in broadcasting. After graduating from Syracuse magna cum laude with a B.S. in communication, Erin enrolled directly at Boston University and earned her master of arts in broadcast journalism two years later (2002).
These days, Erin is back in Boston. Since August 2021, she has been thoroughly enjoying her new role as a public speaking instructor at Boston College. The new author and seasoned jewelry line creator also continues to do some work in front of the camera for regional TV commercials. She also speaks to women’s groups, most recently in Stamford.
Erin is hoping that her book will help others.
“I truly think it would help so many people who are constantly doubting themselves and letting others dictate their self-worth.”
Reporting Facts and Running from the Truth — A TV Anchor’s Struggle to Find Self-Worth Beyond a Job Title (Page Publishing/2022) $20, is available at bookstores everywhere, or online at the Apple iTunes Store, Amazon, Google Play, or Barnes and Noble.