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came across a posting on the website Everything2.com called “How to Become a Better Anorexic.” The article outlined various dieting strategies to curb hunger pains, such as eating as much celery as possible because it contains no calories but causes your body to burn them as it is digested, or making sure the water you drink is as cold as possible so your body has to expend a few extra calories heating it. As well, this posting listed several links to pro-anorexia websites like Ana’s Underground Grotto, which encouraged girls to become anorexic by allowing other girls to post photos of themselves that highlighted their hipbones, ribcages, and, in some cases, spines. These photos were commonly referred to within the pro-anorexia community as “thinspiration.”
    Allison found that the physical pain caused by hunger was just as easy to accept as a constant in her life as the emotional pain that came with being overweight was before. Over the next six months she created her own account on the Angels of Ana website and frequented sites like the Art of Reduction, Thin2be’s Diary, and Hungry for Perfection. Although she had never met any of the people she communicated with on these sites, she felt they were her friends and she valued their advice and interaction far more than she did the guidance of her own family, who knew nothing about her treatment of food and eating.
    Allison’s mother, Liz, worked at Marie Callender’s and always brought home pies. As Allison walked through the kitchen, Liz said, “Honey, I got a peach cobbler,” which was Allison’s favorite. The smell of the cobbler was almost more than she could deal with as she walked through the kitchen. She could feel herself begin to salivate and a slight tingling sensation in the back of her mouth became apparent.
    Allison said, “Thanks, Mom, just leave it in the fridge and I’ll get some later. I have to go get started on some homework.”
    Allison’s father and brother said nothing as she went upstairs and logged on to Angels of Ana to look at pictures of girls who were thinner than she was and read postings about how to ignore cravings of favorite foods.
    A few blocks away, Brandy Beltmeyer stood behind her mother, Patricia, who sat in her room at her computer doing what she called her “weekly check.” This check consisted of Brandy being forced to give her mother the passwords to every website on which she had an account. Patricia would then log in to each of these sites, including her daughter’s Gmail account, Myspace page, Facebook page, and her user account on Syfy.com. Patricia would read through every interaction her daughter was engaged in on each of these sites and question her if she found anything that seemed out of the ordinary. This was all done to protect her daughter from Internet predators.
    As Patricia scrolled through the comments on her daughter’s Myspace page, she came to one, posted by a male user named DILF whose age was listed as twenty-eight, that read, “U R HAWT.”
    Patricia said, “Who is this DILF guy?”
    Brandy said, “I don’t know, just some guy. I can’t help it if some random guy finds my picture and thinks I’m cute.”
    Patricia said, “Well, I can,” as she deleted DILF’s comment. This garnered an eye-roll and sigh from her daughter. Patricia stood from her daughter’s computer chair and said, “You know this is to make sure you’re safe.”
    Brandy said, “I know.”
    Patricia said, “I love you.”
    Brandy said, “I love you, too.”
    Patricia left her daughter’s room and went downstairs, where her husband, Ray, said, “You clean up her Internet or whatever?” Since he was in high school, Ray had worked in a local sporting goods store that was originally owned by his grandfather. His older brother now owned the shop, and Ray was next in line in the event that his brother wanted to retire. They used the same bookkeeping methods that were popular with their grandfather. There had never