It was just three simple steps.
Three. Really, when it was that easy, who wouldn't do it?
Eat. Purge. Repeat. Three steps towards perfection. Every demigod cabin has a sterotype. Aphrodite's was beauty. Children of Aphrodite are supposed to be perfect, right? Tall, slim model-like beings with natural grace and charm. Just like Mom.
She knew she wasn't perfect; she was as far from it as you possibly could be. She was short in height, had wide hips, and a chest way too big for her liking. Small blue eyes were hidden behind glasses to improve her eyesight, and thick hair that could never decide if it was blonde or brown hung limply around her shoulders. She hated practically everything about herself.
She wasn't stunningly beautiful like most Aphrodite girls were: like Piper or Silena or even Drew. But that didn't stop her from trying. She came up with "her little trick." Just three steps. You eat as little as possible, vomit as much as possible, and then repeat whenever you could.
First comes the eating. At dinner, she puts a few things on her plate, makes it look like a normal portion so people wouldn't get worried. She sits down and begins to stall. She avoids eating by telling a story to her friends, twirling her hands in the air to distract from her completely full plate. Some nights she strikes lucky and gets a hungry friend who wants a second helping, so sIe manages to give them half her meal.
The rare times she does have to eat something are torture. She can practically feel the calories soaking into her skin as soon as she puts the food into her mouth. She chews the food down until it's practically nothing, so it will hurt less coming back up. It almost hurts as she swallows though, because her body is resisting.
Next comes the purging. She sprints back to the cabin, turns the shower on high to mask the sound, and proceeds to make herself sick. People think this is easy, but it's really not. How much self-hatred does it take to actually force yourself to throw up? But it was all for a good cause. She was tired of being fat, of being ashamed of her body. So what she almost fainted in the sword arena yesterday? So what she felt dizzy practically all the time and her stomach ached because she was so hungry? That just meant this was working.
And finally, she repeats. Over and over again. She weighs herself every morning and is delighted when she sees the number going down. But that didn't mean she could stop. No, she had to keep going. She'd do her little trick for as long as it took. She still wasn't perfect, but she was getting closer. Closer to being just like Mom.