My heart truly goes out to Olympic gold medallist Rebecca Adlington, 25, who has apparently undergone nose slimming surgery at a top Harley Street clinic.
Rebecca was held up as one of the nation's heroes at the London 2012 Olympic Games but, once those magical two weeks were over, the sportswoman found herself thrust into the spotlight - and it was her looks, not her swimming talents, that were under scrutiny.
From upsetting look-a-like images to Frankie Boyle comparing her to "someone looking into the back of a spoon", the comments were cruel and heartless.
Rebecca even outed one Twitter troll, re-tweeting his abusive message for her 51,000 followers to see and saying that it was a "perfect example" of the abuse she had to endure.
The callous tweet read: "you shark fin nosed ******** , you belong in that pool you f***ing whale."
In 2013, the retired athlete eloquently expressed her struggle to come to terms with her own body image during her appearance on ITV show I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here! - and her tears were all too raw:
"Every day I look in the mirror and go, ‘God, I’m not pretty. I’v e got a very big nose’," she told the diary camera.
"That’s what most of the negative comments on Twitter are about - my nose.
"People say ‘Oh God you look like a dolphin’, or ‘I didn’t realise they let whales into the Olympics, but at least you should be able to swim faster’.
"I’d have it straightened. But I couldn’t float the idea of having a nose job before, because with swimming you only get two weeks off a year."
"Would I have it done now? I’d probably have it straightened. But it’s really got to suit your face."
Rebecca went on to admit that she found the criticism about her appearance the most challenging aspect of taking part in the Olympics.
She went on to add: "It was the hardest thing to get used to, I thought: ‘Why do people judge me for the way I look?’ It’s not as if I was trying to be a model.
"I always had a bit of an insecurity about the way I looked growing up. I knew that I wasn’t the most attractive girl at school.
"Even when I’d been on a night out, no boys would want to talk to me. So those comments hurt."
Rebecca also admitted that she found the criticism about her appearance the most challenging aspect of taking part in the Olympics.
She said: "It was the hardest thing to get used to, I thought: ‘ Why do people judge me for the way I look?’ It’s not as if I was trying to be a model.
"I always had a bit of an insecurity about the way I looked growing up. I knew that I wasn’t the most attractive girl at school.
"Even when I’d been on a night out, no boys would want to talk to me. So those comments hurt."
Like most watching the show, I found it easy to relate to Rebecca's pain. When I was an awkward teenager at school, I found myself the target of bullies for my looks - with some girls even posting a photo of me up on a website which urged the public to judge "mingers".
Yes, it was painful. Yes, it damaged my self-confidence. And, yes, it made me want to change my appearance and become one of the 'pretty' girls. But I was lucky enough to leave my insecurities behind when I left school - well most of them.
Rebecca, however, is not so lucky; she has been subjected to unrelenting abuse on Twitter… and it means she will never be able to escape the girl's changing rooms.
Twitter is, essentially, a playground for bullies. People log on, make a comment and it disappears into cyberspace - they probably forget about it shortly after hitting 'tweet'.
But, for the people targeted in these tweets, they do not disappear. They bore into their soul, create bruises where we cannot see them and erode their self-worth… and, while Rebecca appears to have was eventually been driven to plastic surgery, the repercussions can be far worse.
TV presenter Charlotte Dawson, 47, was found dead at her home in Sydney over the weekend, tragically becoming the "first celebrity victim of trolling".
At what point did it become okay for us to devote our time to identifying the weaknesses of total strangers? Why have we deemed it as 'normal' to viciously attack people on Twitter until they are left feeling utterly, utterly worthless?
Many might defend themselves, saying "it's just a tweet". And many have suggested that the celebrities should just delete their Twitter accounts and not let the bullies get to them - but why should the victims be punished for the bully's crime? That is as foolish a suggestion as those who say women should not wear short skirts in a bid to deter rapists - it is NOT the women who are at fault. The simple solution is that rapists should NOT rape. And, in this case, bullies should NOT bully.
More needs to be done to punish online bullying. Abuse is abuse, whether it takes place in the virtual or actual world, and action needs to be taken.
Will you be taking a stance against online bullying?