If nothing else, Traci Lords’ autobiography serves as a warning to lonely single mothers: Be careful about the men you bring home.

In Lords’ case, her mother brought home Roger Hays, who not only sexually abused Lords, but turned her onto drugs and then manipulated the stoned 15-year-old into posing nude for Penthouse magazine.

Hardcore adult movies quickly followed. But Lords’ mother — thrilled at having a man around the house — pretended nothing was happening.

“I didn’t confront my mother about all this until much later in my life,” says Lords, from her home in Southern California. “Being molested by Roger and having Mother turn a blind eye was all part of the head trip that made me believe that there was something wrong with me — so wrong that I wasn’t worth saving.’’

From the ages of 15 to 18, the usually-stoned, underage Lords was hustled from porn set to porn set, partnered with men she can’t even remember. She became one of the world's best-known adult film stars, but netted a total of just $30,000, most of that going to drugs.

As Lords writes in her autobiography (she didn't use a ghostwriter), “I got high to forget, but after a while even that didn’t quiet the storm in my head or stop the film loop of my life from tormenting me with perfect memory. The sex dreams were the worst. They had become a montage of body parts and I could never seem to separate fantasy from reality. ... It made me crazy. I was losing my mind.”

After turning 18, Lords was taken into custody by the FBI in U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese’s war on pornography. Her relief at being rescued soon turned to outrage when she discovered the government (which knew her actual age) had been tracking her for three years. The FBI had done nothing because her films were leading them to an entire network of child pornographers.

“The government used me,” Lords says, anger in her voice. “Just like everyone else, they used me. My life had been so grotesque during those three years, I’d suffered so much pain, I was running from one horrible thing to another, and they just let it continue.”

After her arrest, Lords began a long climb to respectability.

“I was so young and so damaged, but I refused to be a washout at 18,” Lords says. “So I began reading books and newspapers. I went back to school. I went to a voice coach to learn how to talk. I hired an opera singer to teach me how to use my voice, and went to a ballet school to learn how to move. And finally, I went to acting school to learn how to act. After all, the only thing I had any experience at was the movie business — such as it was.”

Lords’ self-reclamation project paid off, although not overnight.

“There was this porn stigma following me around, so most people in the entertainment industry just slammed doors in my face,” she says. “But I just kept pounding the pavement, begging casting directors to give me a chance.”

Her persistence — and articulate, cleaned-up persona — paid off, and Lords soon landed roles in movies such as “Not of This Earth,” “Fast Food,” “Cry-Baby,” “The Tommyknockers,” “Serial Mom,” “Blade” and even recurring roles on TV series such as “Melrose Place,” “Roseanne,” “Profiler” and “First Wave.” For her starring part in Miramax’s soon-to-be-released “Chump Change,” the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival gave her a Best Actress Award.

Although Lords is proud of that award, she is even prouder of her volunteer work with Children of the Night, a halfway house that rescues child prostitutes from the streets.

“Those children can relate to me,” she says. “Some of them have told me that when they get depressed and think that they have no chance at all in life because of what they’ve been through, they remember how I’ve been able to turn my life around. They’ve read my book, and it gives them hope that they, too, can lead a normal life.”

Which is exactly why Lords decided to write her autobiography at the ripe old age of 35. She wants everyone to know that porn actresses lead a horrible life, that even the “best” porn film uses and abuses women.

“Any time a porn actress tells you she’s having fun, she’s just trying to convince herself,” Lords says. “I used to say that kind of crap all the time, hoping that if I said it enough, it might magically become true. It never did.”