I've been overwhelmed with messages of support in the last few weeks - and not a little criticism, which is only to be expected. Something unexpected, however, is that while the people who support have shared amazing, individual stories that it makes me smile to read, those in the opposing camp fall into several tried-and-true patterns. In a way it's good - seeing the subtext of people's arguments against me is a useful heuristic for sorting out those not worth my time.

So here it is! Your cut-and-keep guide to what people say vs. what people really mean: post-coming out edition. Hope you find it useful too! I'm considering making a board game version of this and calling it Rosie Boycott Bingo.

• When someone says:
  "I have too much respect for myself ever to do that."
  What they mean is:
  "My self-esteem is so fragile that stepping outside the mainstream would mess it up for life."
  
  
• When someone says:
  "She's not even that good-looking."
  What they mean is:
  "This woman's choices make me uncomfortable but I don't have the intelligence to address that so will criticise her looks instead."
  
  
• When someone says:
  "See? Other people in her family have problems. That explains everything."
  What they mean is:
  "In spite of the fact that all families have difficulties, I'm going to pretend otherwise in order to make an ad hominem attack."
  
  
• When someone says:
  "Stories like this glamourise a trade that enslaves and kills women."
  What they mean is:
  "I don't actually know the difference between the separate issues affecting call girls, massage parlours, brothels, and streetwalkers, and I'm not going to bother finding out."
  
  
• When someone says:
  "I wouldn't pay £300 for that."
  What they mean is:
  "I think a woman's value, sexual or otherwise, is entirely based on her looks."
  
  
• When someone says:
  "I have similar factors in my life and didn't choose this route."
  What they mean is:
  "I am unfamiliar with the notion that free will more or less assures that people will makes decisions I would not have done."
  
  
• When someone says:
  "If she liked the job so much why isn't she still doing it?"
  What they mean is:
  "I don't believe people can, or should, change direction in their lives without self-hatred and regret."
  

Interviews with me out today on the Freakonomics blog and New Scientist and a review in the Irish Independent. I especially like the comment on the Freakonomics page: [s]eems like there are a fair number of people projecting their sexual demons onto this woman. "Joe Smith", I'm going to steal that one, hope you don't mind.

In an email from an associate today, this comment re: the gutter press. "Can't they do something less offensive for a living? Oh, you know like distributing packs of cigarettes at the local school yard? Clubbing baby seals, working for Sarah Palin..."

Reminded me of something we used to say, that inside most porn actresses is a failed real actress*. Inside every tabloid hackette is a not-very-bright girl who dreamed of being Kate Adie but didn't have the work ethic or talent to make it happen. Journalists my sweet Tallahassee ass. You are to historical record what my books are to fine literature. There is a lot of manufacture of consent occurring... money being thrown around to chase non-stories, when the people who hold real power are still making dodgy deals in the back rooms with no fear of scrutiny (and for a lot more than £300 an hour, you can bet).

*A gross generalisation of course, for which the most obvious counterexample is the fantastic Sasha Grey.

Please note all media requests should be sent to either my publisher or agent. Anything received via my workplace or my personal and work emails, &c. will be ignored as I would only have to forward it to them anyway. Please do not come to my workplace as this compromises the security of patients and staff. Thank you for understanding.

Now I'm not anonymous...

Looking back over my diaries is sometimes embarrassing, sometimes hilarious (often unintentionally so). After a page or two I'm right back there – living in London, keeping up a double life, with all the effort that entails...

Which is just too difficult to do long-term. I suppose I always thought that the part of my life I wrote about would fade away, that I could stick it in a box and move on. Totally separate it from the ‘real me’.

What it took me years to realise is that while I've changed a lot since writing these diaries – my life has moved on so much, in part thanks to the things that happened then – Belle will always be a part of me. She doesn't belong in a little box, but as a fully acknowledged side of a real person. The non-Belle part of my life isn't the only ‘real’ bit, it’s ALL real.

Belle and the person who wrote her had been apart too long. I had to bring them back together.

So a perfect storm of feelings and circumstances drew me out of hiding. And do you know what? It feels so much better on this side. Not to have to tell lies, hide things from the people I care about. To be able to defend what my experience of sex work is like to all the sceptics and doubters.

Anonymity had a purpose then – it will always have a reason to exist, for writers whose work is too damaging or too controversial to put their names on. But for me, it became important to acknowledge that aspect of my life and my personality to the world at large.

I am a woman. I lived in London. I was a call girl.

The people, the places, the actions and feelings are as true now as they were then, and I stand behind every word with pride. Thank you for reading and following my adventures.

Love, Belle

Wore a Victoria Beckham dress for the first time yesterday - the Derizet in black - and good lord, is that thing figure magic. Not sure if it's worth the pricetag, but if anyone has a spare grand around and happens to be feeling generous... a pair of red Louboutins wouldn't go amiss either...

Being something of a master in the art of compartmentalisation, and not a little prickly, most people seem to think me untouchable, a bit cold (or for those who don't hate me, 'reserved'). One tough nut. Certainly not the type to wear my heart on my sleeve.

But it is as much a cliche as it is the truth that appearances are deceiving. The person you think of as shy will actually talk your ear off, given half a chance. The most flowery, romantic love letters were written by absolute bastards. And under the shell of a cooly unemotional ex-prostitute beats the heart of someone who was only waiting for the right conditions in which love could blossom.

I'm not talking about passion. I am, indeed, passionate about T, hugely so. But if the last years have taught me nothing else it's that passion is usual, common even. It can be had by the hour if you're so inclined. You can fall for someone in an instant, for an instant. What this is, is something else.

So much has changed since last summer that I can hardly imagine, much less express, all of it. But I'll try. For the first time in years, I feel safe. No longer do I look in the mirror and see someone who puts up with emotional abuse because no one else would have me. I see someone who is free to choose to love and be loved, or be alone, whatever she likes.

I wake up in the morning next to someone who feels like... like nothing else. The road hasn't been easy, we've both had cold feet at different times, we've both questioned this. We both keep choosing each other.

I'm going to defer to a customary coyness in matters of emotion and say T hasn't changed my life, but rather, the way I think about my life. Since knowing him I have seen how to help myself be a better person - he showed me where the tools are - now that's worth a thousand times more than a rescue fantasy.

It may be my birthday this week, but my love, you're the one with the gift. Thank you.

It's a little bit sad - no, scratch that, it's sad on the level of old ladies buying half a cooked chicken breast in Marks's on Christmas Day, sad like a scoop with raspberry syrup AND a Flake AND hundreds and thousands that just slid out of the cone onto the floor, top-drawer, top-shelf, top-notch, sad - to admit that I get a kick out of the index of the Guide to Men (pity the preview doesn't include the flow chart! Ah well). But I do.

If nothing else, at least I am pretty good at amusing myself.