From the Web of Deceit, flew that butterfly...xxx

Looking back on the past 10 years of my life, I recognise fully the extent to which I was entrapped within a stealthily spun web.

A web made of lies and manipulation and deceit. A web in which I had got myself so hopelessly enmeshed; a web from which there appeared to be no escape.

And within that web, a cruel little voice spoke to me. A voice which I still hear even now; a voice as soft and as cruelly ensnaring as the pale silk of a spider.

You see the thing is, Em. When you reach this healthy weight that Mam has set as your target..well, you are going to have to drastically reduce your intake again. Otherwise, you are just going to be huge.

No more toast and no more banana and custards. No more dipping into the peanut butter jar with a spoon. No more snacks and no more treats and eating six times a day. You might even need to start thinking about dieting...

Lies, lies, and yet, more lies.



Now I suppose it is a measure of how stronger I have become over the past few months; that I recognise these lies for what they are. Pure. Bull. shit. Since when did ED tell me anything that wasn't untrue? And even now, when I am near enough weight restored. Of course, this doesn't mean he is prepared to swallow his ceaseless fabrications.

He is nothing but a cruel, sly, and utterly merciless manipulator....

And for too long, have I believed, and obeyed, his lies.

So here is my plan. To keep sticking to my meal plan every day until I reach my target weight. And then, what will happen next? Will I immediately restrict my intake, just as Ed tells me to do?

But I was deceived before and I will notbe deceived again. For this girl has become wiser, and stronger. I am no longer the vulnerable, innocent little fly, which has been drawn, weak and defenseless, into the spider's web. No. Now I am a butterfly, a butterfly which is ready to spread its wings and fly. My wings are no longer clipped: this time, I will fly free.

And so when I reach my target weight...I aim to eat more or less the same as what I have been eating for the past few months.

Of course, I plan to make things alot less rigid - it's true to say I have been quite strict with adhering to my eating plan over the past few weeks and months -  but in terms of snacks and meals, I am going to keep things roughly the same. Because I like eating well, and regularly. And anyway, I know deep down, that just because this target weight is healthy, it doesn't necessarily mean that it is the weight at which is most healthy for my body. So I am going to be steadfast, and fight on. I'm hoping that in time I will know what is right and healthy for me. I think one of the best indicators I will have is my periods, which, at present, are still conspicuously absent.

Because I want to be free and to be healthy; to be strong. I want to be able to chase Benny across emerald green fields of soft summer grasses; leap wildly across the streams and brooks of the hills with their fringes of ox-eye daisies and lustrous clusters of marigolds. I want to be able to stand at the top of the great mountains and gaze upon the view stretching out in front of me. I want to be able to dance and travel and to learn and speak and feel. I want to be able to go out there, to see the world in all its sublimity, to feel its pulsating, ceaseless beat. To experience, to live, to love. To die knowing that I lived a life that I loved, and that behind me I left a legacy, a legacy that proved to others like me that there is always, always hope. xxxxx