‘Becky would call me a fat pig… but she was my thinspiration’: Anorexic sisters who COMPETED to be the thinnest are finally on the road to recovery
Younger sister Courtney was hospitalised after hitting a deadly five stone aged 17
SIBLING rivalry is to be expected in every family, but two sisters pushed that to the brink by driving themselves to anorexia in a quest to become skinnier than the other.
Courtney Grimshaw, now 24, was just 12 when she started to restrict her eating to be thinner than her “popular” older sister, Rebecca – then 14.
Rebecca used to tease her younger sister about her weight, calling her a “fat ass” and a “fat pig”, and driving Courtney to anorexia as a result.
Desperate Courtney, who weighed a healthy 9 stone 2lbs (128lbs) before losing weight, shed three and a half stone (56lbs) in the space of a year.
In a dangerous competition to become the slimmest, the Californian sisters exercised compulsively for hours every day and dropped their calorie intake to dangerous levels.
Before long, skeletal Courtney had pushed her body to its limits, and the girls were only eating 350 calories a day in their competition to be the skinniest.
Courtney said: “I planned on losing 5lbs but it got to the point where Becky and I were living on next to nothing.
“We were both competing to be the skinnier sister. Becky realised that what we were doing was dangerous but I was too far gone – all I could think about was losing more weight.”
Reflecting on her dangerous obsession, Courtney, now 24, said: “Becky would tease me for being chubby and call me a fat pig. She made me feel really horrible about myself.
“I always wanted to be like her. She was really pretty, she always had boys all over her, all of my guy friends liked her – they thought she was cool.”
Whilst the competition to lose weight made the girls bond at first, things quickly got out of hand and the girls found themselves exercising by playing intense six hour tennis matches every day, leaving them weak and exhausted.
Eating only cereal and dry bread, weight started to fall off the two girls, but Courtney refused to stop dieting – even as she hit a deadly five stone.
Older sister Becky realised the damage she was doing to her body when she dropped from 8 stone 13lbs (125lbs) to a tiny 6 stone 7lbs (91lbs), prompting her to stop the intense weight loss regime and eventually return to a healthy weight.
But for Courtney, the competition didn’t matter anymore – all she cared about was losing more weight.
She said: “When I looked in the mirror all I could see was fat. I was disgusted with my body.
“It got to the point where I was exercising six hours a day and eating next to nothing. We rarely ate together as a family so my parents had no idea what was going on.”
At age 15, Courtney’s hair was falling out and her skin became sallow, prompting Becky to start regretting the sick competition she had started.
Becky, now a 26-year-old dog sitter said: “It was like all of a sudden she had went from outrageously skinny to holocaust survivor.
“At the time I was a little brat and me and my brother would call Courtney fat and we would pick on her and a couple of years into her anorexia I was tortured by that.
“The damage was done and I hadn’t realised what I was doing at the time. For a long time I did blame myself and I still do.”
Courtney said: “She saw me go into a downward spiral knowing it was her fault.
“She would lie in my bed at night making sure I was still breathing, I really was just skin and bone.
“It was hard for me to accept her help because I did blame her for what had happened to me.”
By the time Courtney hit 16, she was down to a life-threatening five stone (70lbs), causing worried school staff to contact her parents and threaten that child protection services would admit her to hospital if she kept on refusing to eat.
Eventually, under the care of a doctor and dietician, Courtney began to gain weight, but still suffered from self-confidence issues.
After a series of booze-fuelled incidents, Courtney was sent to rehab at 17, leading to her gradually getting her life back on track.
Today, with the sisters closer than ever, Courtney hopes that her story will serve as a warning to other teenagers with body issues.
Now 24 and at a healthy weight, Courtney said she has forgiven her sister, and has ambitions of going back to school.
She added: “Without her my anorexia and addiction wouldn’t have happened but without her I wouldn’t have been able to help people and I’m proud to be that success story.
“I would go through all that torment all over again to make sure that other people get help.”