Foreword to Third Edition
"Seven percent of the A.A.'s surveyed are less than 30 years of age - among them, many in their teens." - xxii
The fact that there were people back in the fledgling years of AA who were this young just confirms for me that there is a genetic component to addiction. My great grandfather was a terrible alcoholic. It was eventually what killed him - which isn't surprising since having lost a leg while being hit by a train [while drunk] didn't stop him from drinking. Addiction is hard-wired into my DNA. And it isn't just food. I can be compulsive about anything - arts and crafts, video games, books, etc. It always seems to be that I get started doing something, and then I feel compulsively driven to keep doing that one thing. So everything is feast or famine with me. If I am in the mood to watch TV, I want to watch TV every night and every free minute of the day. But as soon as I want to read instead of watch TV, I suddenly am obsessed with reading every night and every free minute of the day. There is no middle ground - and it seems to be the same way with food. I either am binge eating or I am fasting/purging. I always tend to swing to the extremes.
". . . recovery begins when one [compulsive overeater] talks with another [compulsive overeater], sharing experience, strength, and hope." - xxii
It was the feeling of helplessness and hopelessness that brought me back to OA. What has been so bizarre this time around is that when my world feels overwhelming and I think I don't have the strength to make it another day, I go to a meeting and I feel like things will be okay. And it isn't just about abstinence, it's about my job and my marriage and my child - all the little stresses that build up until I think that I am going to break are gone as soon as I walk in that door. It is like I can finally breathe again. And the rest of the day or night (depending on the time of the meeting) I feel like I have the strength to keep going.
Foreword to Fourth Edition
"When the phrase 'We are people who normally would not mix' . . . was written in 1939, it referred to a Fellowship composed largely of men (and a few women) with quite similar social, ethnic, and economic backgrounds. Like so much of A.A.'s basic text, those words have proved to be far more visionary than the founding members could ever have imagined." - xxiii
The most bizarre aspect of OA meetings is the kinship I feel with people I never would have encountered in my daily life otherwise. I listen to speakers who are from completely different social, ethnic and economic backgrounds to me and I hear my own story. It's like meeting a family I never knew existed but who are so like me it is almost frightening. And I do feel a kinship with the people I talk to at the meetings. We're in this together, and there is a camaraderie, because I need them to recover and they need me to recover. At my first meeting, I had the distinct sensation that I was coming home.
". . . [OA]'s speak the language of the heart in all its power and simplicity." - xxiv
I love that I can be honest about my life when I am sharing at an OA meeting. There is something amazing about the anonymity that allows me to open up my deepest and darkest secrets. This is the place where it is appropriate to strip down the ego and the image and all the bullshit we put out to hide our disease. We can bear all and know that we are safe to do so. Not only do people understand the lows, they've been there themselves. There's a great quote I heard that goes something like this: "Of course we feel inadequate - we're comparing our everyday lives to other people's highlight reels." At the meetings we get to share the worst moments of our lives and discover that we're not alone. It is that honesty and that understanding that I think of when I read this passage.
The Doctor's Opinion
". . . suffered [compulsive overeater] torture. . ." - xxvi
God, how true this is. There is that moment when I've finished the box of Oreos or that carton of ice cream that I hate myself. Or sometimes even while I still am eating, because I look in that container and see that I have two more cookies, and it is with bone deep and gut wrenching despair that I pick up those two cookies and eat them. Because they're there. Because then the box will be empty and it won't be there to torment me any more.
And I hate myself every last second that the bite is going into my mouth, and every last second I chew that bite, all the way until I finish that box. And I despise myself for the weakness that led me to eat the box in the first place. I promise not to ever buy another box of cookies again. I swear that I have learned my lesson and I never ever want to feel horrible like that again. But somehow when I am at the store it seems like my arms and hands have a will entirely of their own as I put another box in my cart. And I hate myself for putting that box in my cart. And I hate myself for putting that box on the conveyor belt to be purchased. And the cycle begins again.
Not to mention the deep shame of it all. Sometimes I try to pretend I am having friends over - I make up a story about going to a party or having people over to watch the game. And when I go to drive-thru windows and am ordering enough food to feed an army I purchase multiple drinks just so the person at the window won't know that it is all for me. Yet there is still that pinpoint of terror inside when the cashier looks at me that they know. They are looking at my fat ass and they know that I just paid another five dollars for two extra drinks to try and pretend that all that food isn't going into my own stomach.
Torture is the best possible word for this disease.
". . . the body of the [compulsive overeater] is quite as abnormal as his mind. . . It did not satisfy us to be told that we could not control our [eating] just because we were maladjusted to life, that we were in full flight from reality, or were outright mental defectives. These things were true to some extent, in fact, to a considerable extent with some of us. But we are sure that our bodies were sickened as well. In our belief, any picture of the [compulsive overeater] which leaves out this physical factor is incomplete." - xxvi
This is the flip side to the discussion that was previously in the preface talking about how this is not just a physical problem but a spiritual malady. It also ties in to the findings that addiction is something a person can be genetically predispositioned to. At least one study shows that sugar can be as addictive as cocaine or heroin, including withdrawal symptoms if it is eliminated from the diet.
