"In all probability, we shall never be able to touch more than a fair fraction of the [compulsive overeating] problem in all its ramifications." - Alcoholics Anonymous, page xxi (last paragraph of the forward to the second edition).

Although originally written about alcoholics, this statement is so much truer for compulsive overeaters.  I look at the people around me and I see so many who belong in program.  I've heard it said that everyone belongs in at least one program - the question is finding their drug of choice.  It takes only five minutes on any webpage to see the obsession people have with dieting and their weight.  So much money and energy goes into eating disorders and their ramifications.  There is so much suffering. 

When I think about how many cities have next to no OA presence, I am horrified.  The other week my usually packed Thursday night meeting was next to deserted.  One person shared that she was horrified to see that there were so many empty seats.  Just a casual stroll through a store suggests that there should be people pounding down the doors to get recovery.  Yet this program is only touching a small fraction of us.

I can only stop and pause and be insanely grateful that I was chosen to be in these rooms.  Really, I can only see the hand of God in moving me into OA.  I never would have found my way here on my own.  It took quite a few nudges to get me into the room and quite a few more nudges to get me to stay.  The life that recovery has given me is so much richer than I ever imagined it could be.  My feelings are deeper, my connection with my son is deeper, and my awareness of how my actions affect others is deeper. 

But for the grace of God, I'd still be quietly eating myself to an early, lonely, unfulfilled death.  When I see an obese person walk down the street I'm filled with a simultaneous sense of sadness (I once was told that every pound of fat is really a pound of pain) and relief that I get to be one of those people that doesn't have to let the pain rule my life and determine my future.

Finding a Higher Power, Part 1

When I came into program I didn't have a higher power let alone a Higher Power with capital letters.  It isn't to say I didn't believe in God.  Being an atheist involves a certain measure of faith.  While it is impossible to concretely prove the existence of a Higher Power, it is also impossible to concretely disprove the existence of some Higher Power.  So the act of being an atheist is as much an act of faith as the belief that Christ is the Son of God or that Buddha obtained enlightenment.  And faith was something I was fresh out of.  So I was indifferent to the notion that there was a deity out there, but one thing I was most certain of was that any deity that might exist most certainly wasn't interested in me.

So I needed some sort of starting point.  I have met people who have chosen non-deity Higher Powers, such as mathematics (no matter how much you dislike the outcome, 2+2 does not equal 5), the laws of physics (gravity is a cruel taskmaster. . .),  mother nature (not much you can do if good ol' mother nature decides to drop a tornado on your head at lunch time), the door knob (this seems to be the classic example I hear in meetings, so for a few months I told the door knob on a regular basis what a shit job it was doing running the universe), the ceiling ("I am powerless over whether that ceiling decides to collapse and crush me"), their sponsor (if you have made them your "boss" then you have placed them as a "Higher Power" over you - although this one is a sticky one long term), the people in the OA rooms (this was the route I went with once I stopped thinking that the requirement for a higher power was stupid),  a celebrity (I've heard people go with Chuck Norris' beard, Burt Reynolds, Burt Reynolds' moustache, and other such silliness - but guess what: it worked for them), time (you can't stop it and you can't control it), and the universe (we can all agree that the universe exists).

I have heard two things in meetings that have stuck with me.  One person who struggled with active atheism was told by his sponsor, "Can you believe that I believe in a Higher Power?"  That was a starting point. 

The other thing I heard was:  "All I need to know about God is that I'm not Him."

In my experience with program there are two stages of the Higher Power proposition.  The first is accepting that you are not calling the shots for the universe.  There is some force outside of your control deciding that Joe down the street is going to have a heart attack next week, or that there is going to be an earthquake next month, or that you're going to suddenly have the worst food poisoning of your life the day you have a big interview.

The second part of the proposition is learning to trust that somehow things are going to work out for the best.  All you need to do is do the footwork (i.e. if you want a promotion then work hard and show up on time, if you want a college degree then enroll and go to your classes, if you don't want food poisoning then don't eat the leftovers growing mold in your fridge, etc.) and let The Great Whatever do the rest. 

This second proposition is much harder to reach.  It involves not only the understanding that you aren't in control of the world, but surrendering to whatever is. And us addicts hate surrendering anything.  It is the difference between deciding to sky dive and actually jumping out of the plane.  In my experience you can't force this part - it just comes with time.

But for today, you don't need to be at that second part of the proposition.  All you need to do today is reach the point where you know that "I'm not Him/Her."  And that isn't a hard point to reach.  On an intellectual level, most of us know that we didn't create the universe.  (Those that don't know this have much bigger troubles than compulsive overeating.)

But the most important thing about finding a Higher Power is understanding that it really doesn't matter if that Higher Power actually exists.  What matters is that you act as if you believe one does.  My sponsor once shared in a meeting that she didn't know if there really was a Higher Power out there.  But even if there was nothing - well, nothing was sure doing a better job running her life than she did.

Meditation: Growth

This last week has been a difficult one.  My boyfriend broke up with me.  My ex-husband took my son to see his family in Texas for Easter.  But most importantly, after looking at the relationship patterns I've gravitated towards, I realized that I use love as a drug - and I'm referring to that Hallmark, Valentine's Day kind of love, not the truly deep and intimate kind of love.  When things get bad, I move from one relationship into another - keeping a casual distance, putting the new person on a pedestal, and waiting for things to collapse before starting the process immediately over again. 

This is just one more outlet for my disease to keep me from coping with life, and so I have a cross addiction that I am now dealing with.  Which means I spent this week managing an empty house and a breakup without food, without alcohol, and without the lure of seeking out a new romantic partner.

Being without my son is always tough, but on Easter it was particularly difficult.  So last night I decided that it was time to do a guided meditation.  When working on my Second Step, I learned a number of guided meditations designed to help me grow closer to my Higher Power. 

My favorite of these meditations is one that involves going into your "inner temple."  The process is simple.  Lie down and get comfortable.  Picture that there is a light (pick a relaxing color, mine is a teal color but yours can be anything you like) that is moving from your feet and filling your body as it goes up to your head.  Once you are in a safe little cocoon of relaxation, let yourself drift up and out of your body.  You are going up and up to the clouds.  Ahead you see a big fluffy white cloud and your cocoon stops there and you step out onto that cloud.  Ahead of you is your temple.

The meditation goes on to tell you to approach the temple and go inside.  You let your mind wander and just watch what you do in there - it's like semi-active dreaming. 

It's up to you to picture what your temple looks like.  My temple used to always be a Greek ruin with a few tendrils of ivy going up the side.  The inside had broken floors - it looked like a place that had not seen a human being in centuries (if not longer).  There was a lone stone altar in the center, but nothing else.  I have always loved my meditation trips to my temple because I thought it was beautiful and special. (A bit of foreshadowing . . .)

I couldn't seem to get into my teal cocoon this time.  Instead I felt like I was being sucked into a black hole.  I was trapped inside this little popcorn kernel shaped shell, curled into fetal position - and it was like this that I went up to my clouds.  I thought about stopping the meditation and starting over, but figured I'd go with it.

This time when I went into my temple, it was like a lush botanical garden.  The structure was the same - the same pillars and vines, but this time the whole place was surrounded by lush plants and hanging vines of flowers. The floors were old and worn, still ancient, but they had that well-kept look that you see in old cathedrals in Europe.  My stone altar was still in the center, but it had a pristine white table cloth on it, with candles and flowers.  On one side of the altar there now was a throne where I knew my Higher Power sat.  Instead of a place of decay, everything was pristine - as though it was millennia old, but had been loved every single day of its long, long life.

Looking around my temple, I realized that the changes I was seeing were a reflection of my growth in program.  I am no longer a barren, broken down human being.  My temple before was very pretty, but this place was beautiful beyond compare.  I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude that I was given this chance to see the changes in myself.  After how rough this week has been, I'd been feeling like I had made no progress whatsoever - and yet here was the proof to the contrary.

I looked around and didn't see my Higher Power anywhere, but somehow I knew he wasn't far.  I looked down and in my hand there was the little kernel with me inside, and I realized it was a seed.  Down at the base of the throne there was a missing stone with a plot of really rich smelling soil.  I'm not much of a gardener (as my poor half-dead vegetable garden can attest) but if I were a plant, that is the kind of soil I'd want to live in!  So that's exactly what I did.  I knelt down and planted the seed that was me, and stepped back.  I knew that I had planted my seed in a safe place and that my Higher Power was there to watch me grow.  I didn't have to worry about water or sunshine - my Higher Power had that part.

I knelt down next to the plot of dirt and told my seed-self, "I know it hurts now, and I know growing is a struggle.  But keep fighting, because it will all be worth it once you break the surface and see the sunshine."  I was picturing my seed-self pushing against the walls of the seed, breaking out and struggling against the dirt to push up and to the sunshine. I realized that the feelings I'm having now are just that - I'm pushing through the dirt trying to reach the sunshine.

I came to after that and felt this sense of peace.  I know days are going to be difficult, but just for today I can have faith that the sunshine is going to be worth it.

I don't know if these meditations are just my subconscious giving me the information I need or a way for my Higher Power to reach  me, but either way: message gratefully received.

Do You Know Who You Are?

I watched an episode of Grey's Anatomy that posed three questions.  The patient was a man who had been paralyzed from neck down in an accident.  The doctor was asking if he wished to be taken off of life support as he would never be able to live without machines to breathe for him.  To confirm that he wished to be taken off of the machines he was asked three questions:

Do you know who you are?

Do you know what's happened to you?

Do you want to live this way?

It shocked me just how appropriate these questions were for a compulsive overeater.  Really, for any addict.  Before program the answer to all those questions was a resounding no. 

I didn't know who I was.  Indeed, I spent nearly every waking moment trying to avoid figuring that out.  I ate, I drank, I played excessive video games, I read, I did anything and everything to not think about who I was.  

I didn't know what had happened to me.  I woke up one day and I was 305 pounds.  Sure I saw myself getting larger and larger, but somehow it still snuck up on me.  I kept expecting that tomorrow would be different - tomorrow I'd find the will to change.  Tomorrow I'd eat healthy and exercise.  I'd suddenly know how to act and be like other people.  But tomorrow never came.  So I got a gastric bypass.  I lost the weight but it came right back on.  And again tomorrow never came.

The only thing I knew before program was that I didn't want to live this way.  I couldn't live this way.  I was hopeless.  I was desperate.  I was completely unwilling to surrender my life and will to the care of a power greater than myself.  It took the complete and total annihilation of my willingness to live before I was able to put down the reigns and hand over control. 

That day I waved the white flag and got a sponsor.  That's when the miracle happened.  How different today is.  I went from 305 pounds down to the 169 pounds I weighed today (and I'm still losing).  I went from a size 24 to a size 10.  A size XXXL to a size M.  I went from constantly depressed and angry to a genuinely happy, optimistic person.  My life has never been better.

I now can confidently answer all three of those questions with a yes.  I discovered that the answer was surrender.  Sweet, simple surrender.

Full of Feelings - And Right-Sizing Them

I've had a bit of an emotional week.  After much prayer and meditation, I realized that I needed to have a frank discussion with my boyfriend about what being with an addict entails.  I talked to him about the possibility of relapse, and what that could look like. 

Being a compulsive overeater, my relapse looks very different from that of the alcoholic or the drug addict.  I am killing myself every bit as much as those addicts when I am in my disease.  The difference is that I'm doing so in a quiet way that one simply doesn't talk about.  Sure the concerned family member might note I had gained weight, or someone might ask if I was still going to meetings.  But ultimately it isn't the kind of addiction that you can get court-ordered to do something about.

I asked my boyfriend if he was willing to stay knowing that relapse would always be a risk.  He knows I work a strong program.  He knows I am putting program first.  He knows that I intend to do everything in my power to stay in the rooms, because that's where life is.  But after having a slip, I knew that the only way I could continue with him was knowing that he wouldn't suddenly be blind-sided if I relapsed after we were married with children. 

He took my question very seriously, and has been thinking about it all week.  It isn't so much the prospect of me being obese that concerns him (while he wouldn't enjoy that aspect of relapse).  What concerns him is that he will be watching me kill myself and be unable to do anything to stop it.  In fact, if he tries to interfere, he may be hindering my recovery.  That is the aspect that has him concerned.  In his mind, that is a lot of responsibility and potential conflict.  So he has not ended things, but he is taking time to truly think things over.

I appreciate that he is taking this seriously, because it is something that I take seriously.  But being left in suspense is an uncomfortable and frightening place.  I took the action that I felt was in the best interest of my program.  Food had gotten loud and I realized it was my anxiety over how my relationship might interfere with my program.  So I did what was necessary to resolve that anxiety.  In the process I created a different anxiety. 

Today I was feeling that perhaps it would be better to simply end the relationship.  It would give me certainty and end that fear and that powerlessness that I'm so uncomfortable with.  I would choose loneliness and isolation instead - those are feelings that I'm far more at home with. 

Then I learned that my friend lost his battle with cancer, leaving his wife and their four children behind.  Boy didn't that put my life into perspective.  I'm in a huff because my boyfriend is taking time to consider whether he wants to take our relationship to a more serious level.  Yet my friend's wife is mourning the loss of the love of her life.  I will see my boyfriend on Friday.  She will never see her husband again. 

It was a very humbling and I felt ashamed to realize how ungrateful I was for the blessings in my life.  I have a relationship that for today is very wonderful and beautiful, and I was willing to throw it away because of fear.  I might lose him later so I'll throw him away today. . . when there are countless widows who would do anything to get just one more day with their loved ones.  It is entirely possible that my boyfriend will tell me he wants to part ways when I see him this Friday.  If that happens, I will wish him the best and thank my Higher Power for the time I had with him.  But to throw away the possibility of a future with him simply because I was uncomfortable with the uncertainty is ridiculous.

So for a while I stopped thinking about my problems.  I started thinking about those things I was grateful for.  I spent time getting my emotions shrunk down to the right sizes for the situation. 

Then I spent time mourning my friend, because he deserved to be mourned.  I sat down alone on my sofa and I held a small conversation with him.  I thanked him for the things he brought to my life, apologized for anything I could think of that might warrant an amends (and then a few things that probably didn't).  I sat with a Kleenex box and said my good bye.  Then I moved on to work on my program.  I feel very keenly the void my friend will leave in my life, but I know that I must accept the things I cannot change. Sadly, death is one of those.

Why Sponsoring Yourself Fails and Facing Relapse

After a span of 15 months of solid abstinence, I slipped.  I have plenty of excuses for why it happened.  I was exhausted.  I was distracted.  But the fact remains that my 2-year-old son left part of a cookie on the floor.  I was cleaning up the assortment of cheerios, pretzels, fruit snacks, grapes, and other detritus he'd dropped on the floor that afternoon when I picked up a piece of cookie and popped it in my mouth. 

Had it stopped there, I may have salvaged my abstinence.  But once the cookie piece was in my mouth the curious insanity set in.  "It's already in my mouth, I might as well eat it."  We all have moments where we pop a food item in our mouth unthinking.  When this has happened to me in the past, I have spit out the food item and told my sponsor about it.  Well this time I was between sponsors - meaning I was my own sponsor.  I'll give you a hint - sponsoring yourself doesn't work.  Because you see, as my own sponsor, I told myself, "It's already in your mouth, you might as well eat it."

It was a slippery slide from there.  I bought my boyfriend a box of doughnuts.  My son took one and was done with it.  Well I wrapped it in a napkin and threw it away.  In a weak moment, I figured out that I had enough calories left in my daily budget to eat that doughnut.  Since it had been carefully wrapped before finding its way into the trash can, I figured it was fair game to eat.  Never mind that my baseline abstinence is no flour, no sugar, no compulsive eating behaviors (i.e., eating off the floor and pulling items out of the trash can).  I counted that as an abstinent treat because I budgeted for it in my calories.  I hadn't felt triggered by the cookie, and that doughnut hadn't set me off on a binge, so clearly I could handle flour and sugar again.  But to be safe I wouldn't eat any breads or salty treats - that might not go over as well.  I was the man who believed it safe to drink whiskey with his milk from the Big Book.

The next thing I knew, a few days later I went to the store and purchased six more doughnuts.  I budgeted them into my calories but wound up eating them all in one day.  So instead of a calorie cap for a day, I started using my calorie cap for the week.  I ate all six doughnuts, but now I was struggling to find a way to control my calories for the week.  Well then I started to look at my "average calories on plan" - this is something in my calorie counting application that tells me how many calories I typically am over or under budget per day over the span of my tracking period.  Now I figured as long as I averaged out being under calories I'd be fine.  So I bought and ate a dozen doughnuts over the course of two days.

When I got on the scale I discovered that in three weeks I had managed to gain eight pounds by steadily eating up the calorie deficits that I'd spent three months accumulating.  It was time to face the music.  I knew that my abstinence had been broken and I was in relapse.  So I did what any compulsive eater would do.  I went to the grocery store, picked up about $50 worth of binge foods, and took them home.  My son sat with me as I ate two Twinkies, a Hostess cupcake, a store made chocolate chip cookie, and about 9 Oreos.  (While eating I discovered they no longer tasted that good, much to my disappointment.)

It was then my son's bed time.  I got up to give him a bath and discovered I felt buzzed.  Being an alcoholic, I used to laugh when people described getting a buzz from food, but I honestly felt like I'd been drinking a bottle or two of wine.  I had a strong buzz.  I got sober when I got abstinent, so the two had always overlapped.  Now I knew that I was feeling that sugar high people spoke about.  I was high and I hated the feeling.  I gave my son a bath feeling completely numbed out and disconnected.  It was like life had lost its color, and I didn't want any more of that feeling.  I spent so many days wishing for sweet oblivion while I went through the pain of writing my fourth step, and here I was with that sweet oblivion and I discovered there was nothing sweet about it.

So I put my son in bed and proceeded to throw out the rest of the binge foods.  I then picked up the phone and asked someone to be my sponsor. 

When I first came into program I was suicidal and so desperate for help that handing my life over to the care of my sponsor was an incredible relief.  This time I wasn't holding the weight of the world on my shoulders.  I was living my life working the steps.  I was doing daily 10th steps.  I was praying and meditating.  I was saying the serenity prayer when things got difficult. What I wasn't doing was being honest with myself.  As soon as that honest appraisal happened, I did the most amazing thing:  I picked up the phone and used my tools.  I surrendered without the feeling that the world was crushing me.  For this gift of willingness I can only thank my Higher Power, because with my pride there is no doubt in my mind that I didn't surrender on my own.  I heard in meeting tonight that when we stop listening to God's whispers, he starts throwing bricks.  God had to throw skyscrapers before I came into the rooms and got abstinent.  Yet somehow I listened to the whisper over the roar of the food.

One of the horror stories we "grow up with" in program is the story of the person in relapse.  When you go out, you never know how long it's going to take you to come back in.  The fear of relapse is what kept me from acknowledging it for so long, because I had a fear-driven belief that relapse meant that I would gain all my weight back and more.  I'm down 135 pounds from my top weight.  That is a long road of pain and heart ache that I saw stretched before me.

Those stories gave me the idea that relapse was a creature with a mind of its own.  I would be hijacked by my disease, helpless to stop the weight gain.  I'd lose everything I'd gained in program, and gain everything I'd lost whether I wanted to or not!  And yet I have four days of abstinence.  The food speaks to me, but when the food talks to me, I talk to my sponsor.  I make outreach calls.  I do readings.  I go to meetings.  I am doing all those things I did before relapse when the food got loud.  And I am ending each day abstinent.  I will admit that I want to go back for more doughnuts.  That's fine to say and fine to feel.  But I don't have to act on those feelings and thoughts.  As long as I let myself be guided by my Higher Power working through my sponsor, I can choose abstinence.

Today's For Today Workbook posed the question:  "When has believing in the possibility of being abstinent enabled me to stay the course to better times?"  The answer is: today!  When I first got abstinent my sponsor told me that I didn't have to worry about tomorrow or next week or next year.  All I had to worry about is today.  For today, I can do anything.  So when the craving for that doughnut hit me, I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and whispered to myself: "Not today.  Maybe tomorrow, but not today."  It was the mantra I used before relapse, and it worked just as well today as it did then.  The anxiety, the panic, the craving settled down.  Because I don't have to worry about tomorrow.  I believe I can follow my meal plan today.  I can't tell you about tomorrow or next week or next year, but for today, I can be abstinent.

A friend of mine with over twenty years of abstinence once told me that he really only has one day: today.  And for today, I've discovered that I can believe in abstinence.  I don't have to surrender to relapse.  I'm a compulsive overeater.  I am powerless over food and my life is unmanageable.  It is the first step, and it's just as true day one abstinent as it is day 500 or 5,000.  I can't. God can.  I think I'll let God.

Staying On The Train

First Bite

Today I wanted to eat those little sugary frosted cookies they sell in the grocery stores for holidays. They are this beautiful floury sugary mush and I love them. It started when thinking of St. Patrick's Day and why we'd need a meeting marathon for that holiday. Then I thought of the cookies. And damn it I wanted one. Badly. I still want one and it's been 7 hours.

I tried all kinds of rationalizing. I said to myself, "[My Sponsor] doesn't need to know if I just ate one cookie. Or not even a full cookie but just a BITE of the cookie. That would be fine. Oh, and you know, I probably could manage one box of them without it impacting anything. The next day I'd be right back on the food plan and no one would need to be the wiser. I could just eat the cookies in the parking lot of the grocery store, toss the carton, toss the receipt, and no one would ever know."

Then that fucker who doesn't want me to enjoy a beautiful box of green frosted shamrock shaped cookies thought, "but that wouldn't be rigorous honesty, and rigorous honesty is how we got to peace." It then went on to remind me how happy I have felt lately. How much energy I have had to do chores and be attentive and playful with my son.

So I thought, "you know, I can just close my eyes and remember how they tasted and felt in my mouth. They can't take that away from me." [Because, you know, everyone in OA is conspiring against me and my cookies.] But it wasn't enough.  I just wanted one bite of cookie.  That was all I needed and I'd throw the box away, scout's honor. [Which is especially convenient since I was never a Girl Scout.]

And I had to go to the grocery store to pick up my husband's medicine. I thought, "I bet they don't even have those cookies yet. It's still February. They won't have them until March. I will just go and check and prove to myself that they aren't even there."

Well God was on my side today.  [One of my daily outreach calls] felt bad we hadn't talked in a few days so she called me as I was in the car on the way to get my husband's medicine. I made it a point to stay on the phone with her the entire time I was in the store. Because I know if I see the cookies I'll buy them.  If I take one bite of that cookie, I'd eat the whole box. Then I would raid the candy aisle. I saw the Starburst licorice sticks today and they looked amazing. I'd eat those next. Then some Mike & Ikes - I miss those. Then I'd keep grazing on sugar until I made myself ill. Ooh, then I'd hit the doughnuts and maybe get some more cookies. And I'd top it off with some garlic bread or maybe just get a whole big sourdough loaf thing and eat it with oil and balsamic vinegar. And Ding Dongs. I'd have to eat a box or two of those.

So really, I think it's easier to just not eat that first bite of cookie.

Yesterday



Relationship With God

This is an excerpt from a blog written by an incredible young woman named Sheila.

"Having a relationship with an infinite, all-knowing, all-powerful being who doesn't talk back is really, really hard.

This post is to summarize those things I do know about God. Some of them are things I know by instinct; others I have to remind myself over and over again, because there's a part of me that can't quite wrap my head around them. I find myself just defaulting to Jerk-God because the real God is just too puzzling to understand.

What do I know about God?

First, I know his definition. He is the creator of all things. That is what most people mean when they say "God." I tend to explain by saying that all things we know of in this world have a temporal beginning and a cause. But we know, because the universe is here at all, that something had to come behind all these causes -- something different, something that didn't have a temporal beginning or a cause. . . .

And when I look at the created world, really look at it, I feel like the person who made all these things is someone I would very much like. I mean, think about it. He could have created us like the plants, just needing some sunshine but never having to eat. But he made us able to bite into a juicy steak or crunchy apple. We could have reproduced by budding, but he gave us sex, pregnancy, birth -- things so weird and wonderful I sometimes imagine the trouble I would have explaining them to aliens. He didn't paint everything with a broad brush; every detail of creation is worked out perfectly, so that no microscope can see the infinitesimally small but absolutely organized structure of everything.

This comforts me more than anything. I know that Jerk-God could never create this wonder. Jerk-God would have had the world be so much less fun. Real God gave us a place we could really delight in, because he wanted us to be happy.

Someone who would go to the trouble of all that creating wasn't going to be happy just setting us on our way and letting us go. He wanted to have an actual relationship with us. Now I think we all know that it's impossible to have a real relationship that's forced in any way. God made us able to say no to him. . . .

This God is someone who is awfully eager to get to know us. . . .

I was struggling internally a few weeks ago with all this when [her son] started singing to himself. He sang a song from Mr. Rogers: "It's you I like, the way you are right now, way down deep inside you." I couldn't help but think, "If Mr. Rogers can love me just the way I am, what kind of person is God if he can't manage the same?"

It's hard to believe in this. It is so, so hard to believe that at the same moment a person could know everything about you, and I mean everything ... and at the same time love you. It's hard to believe that there could be a person who couldn't deceive or be deceived, who is pure unchanging truth ... and at the same time love you.

We tend to pick one or the other, love OR truth. Either God lies and says everything I do is a-okay and I never do anything wrong, in which case he can love me, or he sees the reality of what I am and the people I've hurt and the lies I've told, in which case he can't possibly love me. I think this is one of the mysteries of God that we'll never fully understand, how he can see us and our faults and still smile at us, the way I smile at my boys, and say, "I love you just the way you are, not later when you've earned it, but right now."

All of my spiritual life . . . has been a process of trying to be worthy, to be good enough. I feel that God has made a terrible mistake by loving me, and the only way to make it right is to try to be good enough so it won't be such a mistake. . . .

. . .  I want to be a better person because everyone wants to be a better person, this is a good thing to do. But God isn't my personal trainer. Sometimes he might want to talk about other stuff besides how awful I am.

In fact, I think that, if he's anything like all the other people who love me, he doesn't like hearing about how awful I am. Think how you feel, if a person you love starts bashing themselves. You want to run in and yell, "Don't talk that way about the person I love!" Why wouldn't God be the same?

To understand God, I have to redefine my terms.

God loves me.
Old definition: God tolerates me and gives me things for no apparent reason, considering how much I suck.
New definition: God actually likes me, enjoys being with me, and sees all the good in me.

God wants me to be happy.
Old definition: I'd better do what God wants, even if it makes me miserable, because if I don't things are going to be even worse.
New definition: God wants me to be happy, and if I'm not, it isn't his doing. He hates seeing me suffer, and though he can't always rush in to fix everything, he really does care about my struggles.
. . .

If God is like this, I really do want to know him. Not because I feel guilty that he loves me so much and I've loved him so little in return. God can handle that. He wouldn't have created mankind if he couldn't take a little rejection, and anyway I actually do love God at least to some extent, so it's not like he's actually getting rejected by me. The reason I want to get to know God is because he seems like the sort of person I would like to know."

Step One, Question 1, Page 1

I think it's time I take the plunge and start writing on the first question in the workbook.  It has been sitting on my desk, open to that page, for weeks.  I will begin working the steps with my sponsor this week and I have some time before bed to do a bit of work, so here goes nothing (or perhaps, everything)!

1. "In OA we are encouraged to take a good look at our compulsive eating, obesity, and the self-destructive things we have done to avoid obesity - the dieting, starving, over-exercising, or purging."  Here is a First-Step inventory of my compulsive eating history.

A lot of my early compulsive eating is blurred by the haze of the sugar high.  Or perhaps I should say "glaze".  I remember not being allowed sweets because my mom was worried about my weight.  It wasn't consistently enforced, though.  It was like her own warring opinions on whether she could eat sweets spilled over into what she permitted me to eat.  But here are a few compulsive overeating memories:

I would sneak into the pantry when people were busy/sleeping/away to steal food.  My favorites were fruit snacks and granola bars.  The best was the "Fruit O's" from Costco - fruit snacks in a huge container from Costco.  I knew I could take one or two of those a day without being caught.  Granola bars were another love, but I knew I had to take those slow.  I would take one bar a day.  There was a very strict order to how I ate my closet foods: 2 Fruit O's, 1 granola bar, 1 of this, 1 of that.  It depended on what we had at the time.  Gold fish had to be smuggled one handful at a time.  If the container went missing I would get caught and I'd either get lectured or in actual trouble.  The number of items became just as important as the theft of the food and it's consumption.  No matter how much or how often I smuggled, I always wanted more.  It called to me and I craved it, but I knew I had to wait until the next day or they'd notice the food was disappearing too fast.  Thankfully my brother was assumed to be the one doing the eating.  Eventually he hid the food in his room to keep me out, which upped the stakes.  I only could sneak in maybe once a week to get the food then.  Even now, when I go to fast food restaurants, I find that I get a list of foods I want: 1 of A, 1 of B, 1 of C, 1 of D - the ordering of the food is part of the ritual, even when I ordered far more than I could possibly consume.

I remember being excited about the food come the holidays.  It was the one day I knew my mom wouldn't chase me about how much I ate - until the car ride home when both parents would scold me in front of my brother.  I would make the obligatory round of hugs and then settle next to the appetizer table.  I would eat non-stop until dinner.  Then I'd eat a plate of two of food at dinner, maybe sneak back for more appetizers.  Then I'd get one of everything offered for desert, after I snuck in plenty of cookies, fudge, and whatever else was sitting out for deserts.  The sad truth is: I can't remember much about the holidays other than eating and hoping my parents weren't watching how much I was putting into my mouth and body.

In elementary school I used to offer to put anything people wanted to give me into my yogurt to eat it.  I wanted the food, so even if they put tuna salad in my cherry yogurt, I'd take it.  Mostly it was things like Oreo cookies [yum] or half eaten sandwiches.  I ate anything people wanted to throw out.  I never fished in the school trash cans [although I did in the kitchen trash can at home] but I was a mini garbage disposal for anything and everything no one wanted.  My friends eventually started bringing extra food for me.

In college I remember thinking constantly about food.  Classes were the things I did between meal times.  I loved the cafeterias because I could get as many plates as I wanted, and if I went alone I didn't have to worry about anyone following me.  Mostly I didn't think about people watching me eat then. I was out of the sight of my parents, which to me meant I was out of the sight of everyone.  I frequented the vending machines in my building - I think I stopped on the way to and from every class for something, usually those little doughnuts.  Once I had a car, my food adventures were usually in the form of 4 or 5 large meals a day at fast food as well as the dining halls.  I went every Tuesday to a Thai food restaurant where I ate until the point of pain.  I also always had snacks in my room to nibble on between meals.  This part is a bit fuzzy, because I didn't pay a lot of attention to what I was eating when.  I have always been a grazer so I had meals I paid attention to, and meals where I just grazed along without paying attention to what I was eating.

In grad school I think I lived on pizza, sub sandwiches and chips, and fast food (including an awesome fast food Italian restaurant that had cheese covered baked lasagna that I would eat with garlic bread sticks - carb heaven hell.) I ate huge quantities of food, including in the middle of the night while studying.  I would go to IHOP, order 2 or 3 meals and eat it all before I left.

After grad school I got the gastric bypass stomach surgery, which severely limited my ability to binge.  They literally sewed off part of my stomach and rerouted my intestines.  So once I was recovered enough to eat normal foods, I would still go to the restaurants and order all my food.  The ritual was still in place.  I just ended up throwing out most of it.  I would eat a bite or two of everything and make myself ill, but I would do my best.  I often grazed on my meal all day long - one monstrous breakfast-lunch-dinner mishmash of a meal.  Eventually I managed to eat back on most of my weight since there was nothing that caused the infamous "dumping syndrome" for me. 

When I joined OA, I had gained back some - but not all - of my gastric bypass weight loss.  I gave up certain "trigger foods" but binged freely on the others.  It was retaliatory binging.  I took away french fries? Then doughnuts it was!  I took out doughnuts next, then I went to those little fruit-jelly filled pies and cookies. Eventually I gave up and went back to before.  Then I came back and tried it again - with the same results as before.  Before I started with my current sponsor I had a two week long binge that was pure hell [described here]. And I haven't compulsively overeaten since.

Now to move on to the memories involving restricting/anorexia/bulimia:

These three were always lumped together for me.  I remember in second or third grade hearing my mom talk about how she dieted as a kid: hard boiled egg for breakfast, and she kept lunch and dinner each under 200 calories.  So I did the same.  It stunted my growth and I stopped growing at age 10.

In sixth grade I started the anorexia.  I would skip every meal I could get away with.  It was not that hard to get away with: I would tell friends that I was eating at home, and family that I ate with friends.  No one paid attention to what I ate at school, so I didn't have to worry there.  Sometimes I ate at school because I liked the food, but it depended on the day.  I think it got bad when I was between sixth and seventh grade, actually.  During the summer months.  When I had to eat dinner with my family, I'd squirrel the food into my cheeks and spit it out into napkins [because I wasn't smart enough to think that people would notice].  I just pretended it was gristle.  My mom wasn't inclined to feed me sweets, so that was never a problem.  When I couldn't get away with the gristle ruse, I'd rush to the bathroom and spit out the food in my squirrel cheeks.  My parents obviously knew what was going on but chose to do nothing about it.  Eventually my friends at school held me down at lunch time and force fed me.  Once I was eating it seemed that this phase of my life had ended.

Bulimia became something that popped up intermittently with my binges.  I can't really remember much about the bulimia, except that it took me a while to figure out how to make me puke since my gag reflex isn't very sensitive.  After my weight loss surgery I was lucky that as soon as I overate I would need to vomit.  So the purge just took a few extra bites of food and out it would come.  I often used that route to get more food, but sometimes it was a way to clear the binge.

Eventually I would alternate as an adult between binge, purge, and restricting days.

Compulsive exercising hit me around eighth grade.  I wanted to be skinny so I signed up for every sport my school offered, including cross country.  Later I ran for the love of running, but at first it was all about the burning of calories.  In grad school I exercised five to seven days a week as a means of telling myself that I was working on my weight and clearly it wasn't my fault that I was fat.

I can honestly say I've tried just about every diet over the years:  calorie counting, Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, South Beach, Atkins, HMR, Liquid Only, Slim Fast, Lean Cuisine, not eating after 6/8/10pm, skipping breakfast, eating no breads, eating no dairy, eating no red meat, vegetarian, alcohol only, eating no pasta, eating no snacks, eating five small meals, etc.

That First Step's A Doozie

The speaker at my meeting this evening talked a lot about the steps.  He expressed something that resonated with me: he couldn't start the program until he was willing to take the first step.  Of course, he was referring to the actual First Step: We admitted we were powerless over food - that our lives had become unmanageable. 

While in a step study meeting focused on the Sixth Step (were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character), one speaker stated that we are always ready to have the consequences of our defects removed if not the defect itself.  We cling to our defects like treasured friends.  So too do we cling to the notion that we are not compulsive overeaters.  We may want to have the symptom removed - our excess weight - but we are often not ready to admit that the excess weight was brought on by our powerlessness over food.

I have heard the road to recovery begins when you take that step into the door of your first meeting.  But the fact remains that recovery simply will not happen until you are able to admit that there is something you need to recover from.  As the Big Book says, "Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely." (Page 58)

I walked into my first meeting to be moral support for a friend.  A very clever friend who knew exactly what I was even if I didn't know it myself.  At the end of the meeting, I was able to declare with absolute certainty that I was a compulsive overeater.  I marched up to the speaker and asked her to be my sponsor that very same meeting.

The problem was, I didn't necessarily believe that I was powerless over food, and I most certainly didn't believe that my life was unmanageable!  I had done quite well for myself - or so I believed.  All I needed was someone to help me with a food plan and to give me accountability.  Then I would lose my weight, keep following my food plan, and not need to worry about silly things like meetings.  You see, I had it all figured out.

Every time I asked my sponsor when we would start doing step work, she would tell me that we were: we were working on the first step.  I would protest, "but I already admitted I was a compulsive overeater."  She would just smile and tell me to trust her.  So for months I was performing exercises designed to show me that my life was unmanageable.  I just didn't realize that was what we were doing. 

The exercise that caused me the most pain and suffering was so innocuous that I never suspected what I was in for.  I was told to perform one simple task: write down three things you love about yourself every day.  I rolled my eyes at this task, but when I sat down that first night to write down my three things I was in a quandary.  I couldn't think of a single one!  So I tried to go through my laundry list of achievements.  But no matter what achievement I looked at, I found a way in which it wasn't good enough.  I should have done better.  In the hour I sat there, I turned every last accomplishment I'd ever had into a personal failure, right down to my first place trophy for my seventh grade basketball team's undefeated season.  (Yes, I was digging that deep to find something to be proud of that I could love about myself.)  After running out of accomplishments, I then went to tear down every aspect of my physical appearance, from my wild curly brown hair to my big ugly feet.

That was the moment I made my first outreach call to a woman named Diane.  Looking back I almost feel sorry for that poor woman.  As soon as I verified who I was speaking with I broke down into a loud wailing sob and announced "I don't love anything about myself!"  It is to her credit that she didn't even miss a beat.  I can't remember what she said that day, but it was apparently exactly what I needed to hear.  After getting off the phone I sat down and came up with my three things I loved about myself.  1) My purple sparkly toenails (I usually have my toes painted).  2) The three freckles on my left foot that form a straight line diagonally across my foot.  3)  The way my wrists pop and I can make little popping sound music with them.  The next day, the cluster of freckles on my right leg that look like they could make a smiley face if you connected the dots was at the top of my list.  Of all my accomplishments, these were the things that I could identify as something I loved about myself.

Not once during the time with my first sponsor did I ever reach a point where something about my personality or my accomplishments was found on that list.  Yet still, I didn't see that my life was unmanageable.  I left program ten pounds lighter but no better off emotionally.  I got married.  Had a baby.  Lost the baby weight while nursing.  Then within a matter of months gained almost all of it back.  To put this in perspective, I weighed 230 when I got pregnant. I weighed 290 when I gave birth. I weighed 220 when I stopped nursing 6 months later, and 250 when I went back to OA 3 months later after having been completely incapable of keeping that weight from coming back.

Yet still, I wasn't ready to let go.  I thought to work the program on my own, and for two months I was able to maintain a personal abstinence while not getting any healthier mentally or emotionally and while only losing five pounds.  I realized I had to do something.  So I sought out my current sponsor and asked her to take me on.  As I discussed in my earlier post (here), I allowed myself to go off the deep end. 

I can remember the exact moment that I realized both my powerlessness and the unmanageableness of my life.  My husband and I were in Honolulu.  We had just eaten dinner and were walking back to our hotel.  I was quite full, but we had discussed getting Coldstones on the way back from dinner.  I didn't really want the ice cream, but seeing as how we'd already said we were going to get some I didn't feel up to backing out.  So I walked into the store not wanting the ice cream.  I ordered the ice cream - and not the smallest size either - thinking I would rather not have the ice cream.  Then, I proceeded to finish that ice cream while still thinking I don't want this.  I didn't enjoy the ice cream, I didn't want it, but I couldn't stop myself. I ate it anyway.

That night I stared up at the ceiling, unable to sleep, and thought.  The middle of the night is a terrible time to be alone with my brain.  I realized that I was going to die unless I could find some way to stop eating.  As the Big Book words it, I was finally licked.  That night I waved the white flag and knew hopelessness and despair like I had never experienced before.

I had finally taken the first step.

Red Light, Green Light and the Inventory

When I first came into OA, I grabbed a sponsor my first meeting.  The first thing she discussed was making an inventory of red light, yellow light, and green light foods.  Red light foods were those which I knew I could not eat safely.  Yellow light foods were those that I would have to be cautious around.  Green light foods were those foods I could eat without fear of triggering compulsive overeating.

A few weeks ago I purchased a workbook at my Thursday night meeting.  I turned to the first page and read the prompt before deciding to wait for instruction from my sponsor to begin this workbook.  But the past weeks I have been thinking about that prompt, and for me the thoughts don't really go away until I let them go (i.e. write them down).

The prompt reads: "In OA we are encouraged to take a good look at our compulsive eating, obesity, and the self-destructive things we have done to avoid obesity - the dieting, starving, over-exercising, or purging."  Here is a First-Step inventory of my compulsive eating history.

This isn't going to be a full response to that prompt, but this prompt made me think about why my work with my first sponsor was doomed to fail.  Everything is a red or yellow light food!  I have managed to binge at least once on all of the following [and by binge I mean overeat to an extreme degree often resulting in physical illness or extreme discomfort]:

Meats
grilled chicken breast
chicken/turkey cold cuts
bologna
hot dogs
sausage
(turkey) bacon
steak
ground beef
ground turkey
meatballs
beef jerky
ground lamb
lamb/chicken/beef kebab

Dairy
cheese [everything from goats cheese and brie to cheddar and pepper jack]
(Greek) yogurt
ice cream [not sure that should really count as dairy]
cottage cheese
sour cream [have sat down with a spoon to eat this before]
cream cheese [although I did add some sugar to it before I ate it]
eggs [scrambled, poached, over medium, hard boiled, medium boiled]

Breads/Grains
All [everything from bread to oatmeal to falafel and more]

Fruits
apples [which was a terrible idea since I am allergic to them]
(dry) apricots
avocado
bananas
blueberries
cherries
coconut
grapes
honeydew
mandarin
cantaloupe [also an allergically bad idea - I thought my mouth would never stop itching]
watermelon
nectarine
orange
peach
pear
plums
pineapple
salsa [of various origins - yum]
strawberry
tangerine

Vegetables
artichoke [that was a painful binge. . .]
black beans
chickpeas
green beans
kidney beans
lentils
pinto beans
soy beans
peas
broccoli
cabbage [another terrible idea intestinally speaking]
cauliflower [amazingly tasty with lemon juice]
celery [an unpleasant binge since I hate celery - but I ate it all anyway]
corn
okra
yellow & orange bell pepper
pepperochinis [that was some awful heart burn]
beets
carrots
pickled turnips [so tasty, but so painful in large quantities]
spinach
cucumber
zucchini
pumpkin
potato
sweet potato
yam
water chestnuts

Sweets
All

I have even binged on juices, soda, energy drinks, coffee, tea, and once drank so much water that I threw my electrolites completely out of whack.

That isn't to say I even like all the foods I've binged on.  While a lot of my binging is related to the foods I like to eat, it isn't always about the food.  Sometimes it is about that feeling of being painfully full - full to the point of vomiting.  As in the above-mentioned celery binge, it was about inflicting punishment upon myself. 

A food plan based upon avoiding trigger foods is nearly impossible when everything is a trigger.  That's why my own food plan - eating virtually the same thing every day - works for me.  There is no need to think or plan or be at the mercy of my binges.  I eat my food and leave it at that.  In the simplicity I [usually] find peace.

Chapter 1 - Bill's Story - page 1

"Here was love, applause,war; moments sublime with intervals hilarious.  I was part of life at last, and in the midst of the excitement I discovered [food]." - page 1

Growing up I remember my mother's valiant efforts to teach me reasonable eating habits.  Considering that she had her own issues with food, this was more a situation of the blind leading the blind.  Not that she is a compulsive overeater by any means, but she has had a conflicted relationship with food as long as I can remember.  Food was her great love and her great enemy, as she often showed with her almost religious dedication to exercise and dieting.  There wasn't a fad diet or crazy medicine she hadn't tried to help her fight what she saw as her own personal battle of the bulge.  That she never got beyond what someone might call a "normal" weight never mattered.  It was the fear of obesity that rode her back like a pitchforked demon.

So it was with a sense of wonder and awe that I discovered my first weeks in college that there was no one watching me.  No one cared what I ate or didn't eat.  I could binge on Fruit Loops for dinner and no one would even blink!  I had a cafeteria with a wealth of junk food round the clock to cater to my whims and fancies.  I was an adult with my own choices and mistakes to be made, and I discovered food in all its glutenous glory.  I slept at insane hours, shirked my classes as it pleased me, ate what I pleased, spent time with whomever I pleased - I was free at last.

That first semester I gained my freshman fifteen and then some.  I was out the gates and heading headlong into disaster with a smile on my face.

"I was very lonely and again turned to [food]." - page 1

All my life I have had a feeling that there is some part of me that's missing.  It's this gaping hole inside that I have tried to fill with success, love, excitement, sex, food, and even pain during my stint as a cutter. 

I can't say I've gone more than a week without some love interest or another since I was fourteen years old.  In those times when I didn't have some romance to moon over I was despondent.  I would starve myself, vomit up whatever I ate, and exercise like a fiend until I finally attracted a new boyfriend.  And then I would wait until the new rush passed before finding someone new, wait until the new relationship was a guarantee, and then leap between boyfriends.  I stayed with men I was no longer interested in so I would have someone there until I found the replacement because the thought of being alone was too terrible.

When I had my son, I felt like that missing piece had been filled and said "ah ha! This is at last the source of my problem!  I was missing my baby and never even knew it!" With that I promptly quit OA and went on to live my life as a normal person. But nine months later I was back in the program again.  My son does fill my life in ways that I never dreamed possible, but the fact remained that when he was in bed that gaping chasm would open up once more to swallow me whole.  Then I would turn to food once more to help comfort me.

But during those times when I didn't have someone to distract me from the loneliness I would eat and eat and eat.  I would go to multiple drive-thrus, ordering huge quantities of food until I had enough to feed a reasonable person for days.  I would even order extra drinks so that people at the restaurants would think I was ordering for multiple people.  But something tells me that a nearly 300 pound woman ordering multiple burgers, fries, onion rings, and deserts plus a few drinks wasn't going to fool them - especially if they happened to see the three other bags of fast food sitting on my other side.

So I picked food to be my solace all the while hiding away in my lonely little apartment so no one could see me eat away my loneliness.  The bigger I got, the more I turned to food - relationship or no relationship - to ease the emptiness inside.  Even after having had a gastric bypass I'd order food like before and then eat it slowly until all of it was inside my stomach.  I was never able to gain back all my weight, but it wasn't from lack of trying.  I would eat to the point of vomiting, clear my stomach, and then eat again in an unending cycle of binge and loathing. 

I would hate myself before I even started the binge, dread the feelings of misery that would result as I took each bite, but was completely powerless to stop myself. So even as I ordered the food I felt that sense of dread and self-hate, and wished I could just stop those words from coming out of my mouth.   But it was like I was a horrified passenger, along for the ride in my own personal never-ending nightmare.

"I fancied myself a leader . . . . My talent for leadership, I imagined, would place me at the head of vast enterprises which I would manage with the utmost assurance." - page 1

Feeling ugly as a child, I had to find another avenue for self-worth.  To that end, I focused on education as my key to making my family proud of me.  I was blessed that in high school and even in my undergraduate years I was able to excel in honors courses with little hard work.  It was the best of all worlds, bringing me accolades with little real effort.  By the time I decided to go to law school, I saw no reason why this should change. 

Of course I was wrong.  The thing about being at the top of your high school class is that you are the best in your little pond.  There has been no sorting of the students to give you real competition outside of your honors and advanced placement courses.  Then you arrive at college where in theory you are with the top students from high schools around the country.  But then you finish undergraduate studies at the top of your class and believe yourself to be one of the best and the brightest.  And you are.  You are selected for a top law program in the nation and you go there expecting to glide through that program as effortlessly as before.  Except there's one hitch.  You're now among the best of the best in the universities. 

This is a rarefied group where you are no longer a unique snowflake - you are just like everyone else.  And then the real sorting comes down to who is willing to work the hardest, because everyone is of about equal intelligence.  Those who are willing to make the most sacrifices are the ones who will win out in the grade pool.

So it was that after my first semester in law school I discovered that I was in the middle of the pack and in dire need of a place for my first summer internship.  These are already difficult positions to come by - all firms expect you to find something, but no one wants to hire you!  And I then realized that I was no longer a special snowflake, and my intelligence alone was not going to get me to the top of anything.  Unused to having to work hard, I floundered and I began to drown.

My ego took a deathly blow, and with it so too did my waistband.  While I had gained ten pounds from stress that first semester, in the next two years I would go on to gain another sixty pounds.  I went to grad school wearing a size fourteen and left wearing a size 24. 

The bigger I got, the worse my job prospects, and the worse my job prospects the bigger I got.  I tried crazy diets, all liquid diets, medically supervised diets, you name it. Nothing seemed to work!  I dieted and exercised like a fiend, and I don't really recall actually breaking the diets.  I could have sworn that I was giving it my all - exercising what I thought was herculean willpower.  But nothing helped.

I can still remember the day I went to the doctor at age 24 and heard that I would be dead by age 30 unless I got bariatric surgery.  I was reactive hypoglycemic and had what they called Metabolic Syndrome X.  Even if I was able to control my eating, my body was so broken, they said, that I was going to be unable to sustain meaningful weight loss without surgical intervention.  So it was with great remorse that I researched and ultimately had a rou-en y gastric bypass.

The Serentiy Prayer

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.

This excerpt talks about applying the serenity prayer to every day problems.  In doing so, the exercise "brings serenity to my life and helps me feel God's presence." - Voices of Recovery, page 365.

I started doing this last week.  I know this is going to sound ridiculous, but I was dog-sitting for a friend.  As I was getting ready to go to sleep, I kept hearing the dogs licking their paws.  The sound was driving me crazy.  I tried yelling at the dogs, I tried distracting them.  I was about ready to put socks on the dogs to keep them from their paws.  But as I sat there, I remembered the serenity prayer.  So I repeated it to myself over and over again until I no longer felt like kicking the dogs outside [they are indoor dogs and it was cold].  I suddenly found I could ignore the licking and go to sleep.  What a relief.

Today when I was reading about the fourth step, I felt complete and utter panic.  The concept of sharing everything about myself with my sponsor was just horrifying.  But reading the serenity prayer I started to feel calmer.  I need to work the fourth step.  I can't change that, and I can't change the things I've done in the past.  I theoretically could run away and leave program, but I'm not willing to do that.  I am going to do whatever it takes to find recovery.  So here I am.  Worrying about the upcoming fourth step isn't going to do anything to help me today.  So I am letting it go.  I'm going to hand the fear and the worry over to my Higher Power, and I'm going to go to sleep. 

God and the Willingness to be Willing

Today I sat in on a phone meeting that I normally would not have attended because I am going to be having [abstinent] dinner with family friends.  So it came as a surprise that the meeting topic was something that had been on my mind all day: the willingness to be willing.

To go back a step, I want to talk a bit about my abstinence.  I love my sponsor, and I love my program.  When I came into program this second time I wanted to be in the driver's seat.  I saw the program as a tool that I could use in building my own recovery.  But after 2 months of being abstinent with my own program and not seeing any improvement, I realized that I couldn't do this alone.

So I told myself I couldn't just wait for the right sponsor to drop into my lap.  I would pick up the first sponsor I could and just run with it until I found my perfect sponsor.  The very next meeting I attended, my sponsor's close friend was the speaker.  I listened to his story and thought he was really wonderful.  He had so many good, helpful things to share.  And my sponsor, who was present to support her friend, stood up to identify herself as a person who sponsors.  It was perfect timing.  The best way to describe it is that I got good vibes from her.  She was lovely, slender, older than me (but not by much), and I just had a natural inclination to like her (and have since discovered that she is warm, loving, supportive, and funny as well - I hit sponsor gold).  My gut instinct said "yes please."  So I approached her at the break and she started to tell me a bit about her program, promising to go over it the next day with me on the phone.

When I heard just how strict my abstinence program would be, my first thought was complete and utter horror.  I didn't want to hand over control!  I wanted someone who I would be accountable to, not someone who wanted to run the show!  I wasn't ready for this, and my husband wasn't ready for the craziness to start right before our vacation.  So I put it off until we got back.

Knowing I'd be starting fresh at day 1 as a beginner, I went on that vacation and thought "what the hell, screw my abstinence.  I don't get credit for it anyway!" (Because, of course, abstinence only counts if someone is watching. . .)  And I went wild.  It was the last hurrah of last hurrahs.  I ate myself silly and managed to gain nearly ten pounds that week.  By the time I got back, I was finally defeated.  I'd been miserable letting my disease drive, and I didn't know how I could stop!  I needed help and I was finally ready to surrender.  The phrase "willing to go to any length" suddenly had real meaning for me: I would do anything to not live in the state of compulsive overeating torture one more day.

It turns out that my sponsor is exactly what I needed.  I discovered that surrendering my food to her was the only way I would find sanity.  My sponsor arrived in my life at the exact moment I needed her, in the exact manner I needed her to, and with the exact program I needed.  It was thinking about her that I was able to make the connection to God.  I'd always had a notion that a God was out there, but I'd never felt he took any particular interest in individuals.  But realizing the serendipity of meeting my sponsor, I suddenly knew that God had put her there for me to find.  He'd heard my prayer and he'd answered it just when I needed it most.  He knew what and when and how - and He made it happen just right.

Well fast forward through seventeen blissful abstinent days living on the pink cloud and I am speaking to a beloved family friend.  She is desperate to return to program, and she told me how she needs a sponsor.  Well, she asked me about my program, so I told her what my days are like.  Immediately she began to go through the same objections that rose to my mind: she didn't want to hand over the steering wheel.  She wanted to be driving her own recovery.  But that wasn't true - she wanted to have a reasonable abstinence, just a different one from my own.

So when I left her house I made a call to my sponsor and my three outreach people, leaving a message to ask them to keep an eye out for a sponsor with the characteristics my friend was looking for.  Even if she never picks up the phone or doesn't pick up the phone to call the people I find for her any time in the next X number of months or years, I'll have done my best to help her find the help she wants.  I also gave her the information on how to find online and phone meetings [since she is often too depressed to leave the house].

But the first thought that went through my head was that she was not willing to go to any lengths for her recovery.  She wasn't willing to be willing.  And this thought has been stewing with me ever since.  Just like no two people are the same, no two recoveries are either.  So who am I to doubt her.  Maybe she is ready, she just needs something different than I do.  There is nothing wrong with that.  There is no one right answer.  As yesterday's Voices of Recovery pointed out, the problem is within.  No one has the answers, they don't even know the question.

I am far too ready to look into other people's lives and other people's recoveries and think about what it is they should be doing.  But I am not in charge of their lives or their recoveries.  That's God's job, not mine.  There was a great quote from my Thursday night meeting:  "The only thing I need to know about God is I'm not Him."

So while I'm thinking that she isn't willing to surrender, that her ego is going to get in the way unless she finds that willingness - I realized that I am showing that same ego I was internally accusing her of displaying.  Here I stand with my whopping seventeen days of abstinence feeling so high and mighty and proud of myself.  Like I have all the answers and have found the cure.  In reality, I should be the one eating humble pie!

Listening to the readings in that meeting tonight, as well as the shares, helped me realize what was bothering me about the situation with my friend.  It wasn't that there was anything wrong with her, it was that there was something wrong with me.  I thought I was doing good by trying to be of service to her - helping her locate a potential sponsor and find meetings.  Being supportive of her and explaining that there are many ways of finding abstinence, not just my own.  But deep down I was being prideful.  It was my pride that was making the gesture feel hollow, not the doubts about her ability or willingness to accept the help.  My sponsor assigned supplemental readings to deal with my issues with my in-laws, but it applied to this problem as well.

What keeps striking me is the random luck of my meetings.  It always seems like these meetings cover exactly the subjects I am needing that day.  It just makes me realize that God is talking to me, I just need to stop talking and listen.

I realized that I'm willing to let God run the show in my own recovery, but I need to be willing to be willing to let God do the rest of his job.  Because if I can't manage my own life, I have no business managing anyone elses life either!

Inertia And Burst

The past few days I had been feeling a lot of inertia, with today being my random burst of energy and purpose.  That seems to be my pattern of late.  I spend my days in this bone-deep and crippling sensation that I am moving through water.  Even the simplest task seems astronomically daunting.  Driving to pick up my abstinent meal seems to be a nightmare.  Before starting with this abstinence there were days I simply wouldn't eat until my husband got home from work because I simply couldn't get up the energy to order pizza. 

I cared for my son, but I prayed and prayed for him to nap, and keep napping.  I called my mother to try and visit her so she could chase him and play with him between nap times. 

Today I got a lot of work done and got my Christmas cards out, which is wonderful.  But now I don't want to go to bed because I am dreading tomorrow and the return of the weight.  On those dragging days I feel like I weigh a few thousand pounds.  And I feel beyond old - I feel ancient. 

I'm going to go catch some sleep - after all the baby will wake up long before I'm ready - but I wanted to at least write a little bit.

Preface - xxx-xxxii

The Doctor's Opinion

"These men were not [eating] to escape; they were [eating] to overcome a craving beyond their mental control." - pg. xxx

A lot of people associate binge eating with emotional comforting.  But I found, especially when the cravings were hitting me bad, that it didn't seem to be any particularly emotional or stressful time that was causing me to eat.  This was not the "I just got dumped" ice cream binge.  I tried to find justifications for the eating - I worked hard today so this is my reward, or I didn't get a lot of sleep so I'm eating to make up for being so tired, or I'm eating because I'm bored.  But the reality often was that I was eating because I constantly was thinking about food.  It had nothing to do with what was going on around me, but everything to do with the fact that I woke up thinking about food and spent the whole day fantasizing about what I was going to eat.  Then when it came time to eat I couldn't pick what I was going to eat so I ate it all.  Sometimes I ate to spite my parents, or to reward myself.  Often I ate even when I didn't want to because I just couldn't seem to stop myself!

"There is the type of man who is unwilling to admit that he cannot take a drink.  He plans various ways of drinking.  He changes his brand or his environment." - pg. xxx

I think for a while this was me.  I used to say I didn't have an eating problem - I just needed to try a different diet.  Once I got on the right diet I would stick to it and I would lose the weight and there wouldn't be a problem because if I gained a few pounds I'd just hop right back on.  But that's just not the case.

"There is the type who always believes that after being entirely free from [compulsive eating] for a period of time he can take a [bite] without danger." - pg. xxx

This was me after my first stint with OA.  I remember that after having had my son, I thought I was fine. I was losing weight while nursing and instead of thinking about food all day I was thinking about my baby and about how badly I wanted to sleep.  I thought I was cured!  Whatever chemical defect caused the binging was clearly fixed now that my body had "reset itself" with the pregnancy and I could live the life of a normal person again.  Yeah right. 

"Then there are types entirely normal in every respect except in the effect [food] has upon them. They are often able, intelligent, friendly people." - pg. xxx

This is probably me now.  I understand I have a problem.  I understand that I need to stay away from compulsive eating behaviors - I just can't do it alone.

"This phenomenon, as we have suggested, may be the manifestation of an allergy which differentiates these people, and sets them apart as a distinct entity.  It has never been, by any treatment with which we are familiar, permanently eradicated.  The only relief we have to suggest is entire abstinence." - pg. xxx

This is the cruel joke of food addictions.  You can live without alcohol.  You can live without nicotine.  You can live without heroine or cocaine or meth.  But you can't live without food.  I once thought I would be fine if they could just feed me through an IV. That would be perfect, or so I thought.  I'd never have to worry about what I ate and I would always get the exact nutrition I needed.  Except that isn't going to work.  Abstinence in OA terms is such a varying concept from person to person.  I heard a speaker say that their abstinence is reporting their food truthfully in an email to their sponsor.  Another person has a list of items he cannot eat.  My abstinence now involves eating a specific meal plan every single day.  There is no one "entire abstinence" that we can sign on for and be fixed.  All we can do is try our best to pick our sponsor and pick our abstinence and hope it makes a difference for us.

"He had lost everything worthwhile in life and was only living, one might say, to [eat]." - pg. xxxi

I found that when I was heaviest into the food I would isolate myself from the world.  I wouldn't talk to people, I wouldn't accept invites to events.  I would get food and sit in my room eating all day long.  I'd play video games or read books and try to shut out the world.  I wouldn't get dressed most days, and often would not even shower because then I'd have to see myself out of my baggy sleep shirt.  If I didn't see myself getting fatter, then there wasn't a problem.  I was an ostrich with my head in the sand, and my day involved eating and those things I had to do between meals.

"From a trembling, despairing, nervous wreck, had emerged a man brimming over with self-reliance and contentment." - pg. xxxi

This is the hope.  I am still that trembling, despairing, nervous wreck.  I am so anxious about my body and my weight and my food and my abstinence that I am a complete mess.  I want to be that self-reliant and content person.  I keep hoping and hoping that I will get there.

Preface xxix

The Doctor's Opinion

"After they have succumbed to the desire again, as so many do, and the phenomenon of craving develops, they pass through the well-known stages of a spree, emerging remorseful with a firm resolution not to drink again.  This is repeated over and over, and unless this person can experience an entire psychic change there is very little hope of his recovery."  - xxix

I think every compulsive overeater [really, every addict] knows this story far to intimately for comfort.  It is almost painful to read and remember the gut wrenching despair and shame after the binge.  And the worst part is the knowledge, the certainty, that in spite of the most fervently meant resolutions lurks the knowledge that I can't win.  I know one day, far sooner than I could ever anticipate, the process will start over again. 

When I have candy in the house, or when there is food in front of me, I desperately begin the binge.  It becomes a certainty that I will enter the spree, so I seek to eat all the food so I won't be tempted to eat the food.  It is insanity, and it is backwards logic, but I can never seem to help myself.  I struggle and struggle but once that food is in the house it torments me.  All I can think about is the food, whatever it is. . . Halloween candy, cookies, bagels, muffins, chips, even rice cakes - I can't sleep because I am thinking about them.  I worry about them all night because I'm afraid I'm going to binge on them.  Hence - I eat them to relieve myself of the torment.  It is torture, but I can't help myself.  And I live with others, so I can't keep the foods out of my home.  And I can't always resist the urge to purchase additional things at the store.

". . . once a psychic change has occurred, the very same person who seemed doomed, who had so many problems he despaired of ever solving them, suddenly finds himself easily able to control his desire for [food], the only effort necessary being that required to follow a few simple rules." - xxix

This seems like a dream to me.  It is such a foreign concept that I almost am too afraid to believe it is real because I am too afraid to get my hopes up.  But I pray for this every single night, and at every single meeting.

"Although he gives all that is in him, it often is not enough.  One feels that something more than human power is needed to produce the essential psychic change."  - xxix

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.  I am a professional woman.  I am a mother and a wife.  I have a family I care for and a job and home I manage and care for.  I have overcome adversity, and I am diligent and tenacious.  No matter how many times life knocks me down or how many obstacles are thrown in my way, I keep getting up and marching on.

But in spite of every ounce of struggle and fight and determination I have in me, I can't beat this.  I need something more.  I  can't say I am comfortable with a higher power yet.  I have an often conflicted relationship with God.  But right now I'm content for the OA group to be my higher power.  They are the ones I am responsible to.  And my sponsor is the one who I listen to for permission and instructions.  I am giving her the power, because I clearly can't manage my life in this regard in spite of all my best efforts.  I will need to develop a better relationship with my higher power over time, but for now, this will have to be enough.

Preface xxviii

The Doctor's Opinion

"We believe, and so suggested a few years ago, that the action of [food] on these [compulsive overeaters] is a manifestation of an allergy; that the phenomenon of craving is limited to this class and never occurs in the average temperate drinker."  - xxviii

There hasn't been any indication of an "allergy" response, but as I mentioned previously there is a definite difference between compulsive overeaters and the normal population in terms of brain response to food.  I mentioned to my sponsor tonight that this mechanism is why I always had a hard time relating to other people who tried to help me.  It just seemed like the dieticians, nutritionists, doctors, trainers, food counselors at diet locations, family and friends - everyone tried telling me about some magic trick that would help me overcome this problem.  They all made it sound like it was sooo easy to just follow a diet and lose the weight.  Whenever I try to talk to my mom about it she talks about her own struggles with food - but even then it isn't the same.  She says how it is hard to say no to sweets, but she doesn't have the same cravings.  And if she does have them, clearly the fact that she can say no indicates it isn't as bad as what I experience.

I was on vacation last week.  My husband and I passed a Coldstone and I thought "wow, that sounds amazing" and then we went in to buy the ice cream.  As we waited, I thought "you know, I really don't want this - it's just going to give me a stomach ache."  But I bought the ice cream anyway.  Then I ate the ice cream and every bite I thought "I really don't want this" - but I couldn't put the ice cream down.  I felt powerless to stop myself from going through the motion of eating that desert.  And it was stupid, but I really felt unable to stop.  It was a compulsion to keep going.  And it wasn't that I didn't want to waste the ice cream, either. 

How can someone who doesn't have that type of response understand what I go through on a day to day basis with food?

"These allergic types can never safely [eat] in any form at all; and once having formed the habit and found they cannot break it, once having lost their self-confidence, their reliance upon things human, their problems pile up on them and become astonishingly difficult to solve."  - xxviii

The alcoholic can simply stop eating, but the food addict doesn't have that luxury. So we enter the danger zone every time we hit a meal time.  I hear all the time in meetings about how things get tough when people are "in the food" - how the world goes crazy.  I can't say it goes crazy per se, but I do know that I feel absolute desperation when that point hits me.  It is this sense of defeat that is absolutely awful.  And the lack of self-confidence is a very true point.  It always seems when my eating and weight are out of control - and I have tried to control it and tried and tried - I feel like I doubt myself in everything and everywhere.  And suddenly I am just crippled by the hopelessness.

"Frothy emotional appeal seldom suffices.  The message which can interest and hold these [compulsive overeaters] must have depth and weight." - xxviii

My dad loves to tell me how I need to lose weight because he doesn't want to have to raise my son for me.  I know I need to get my eating under control.  I know this disease can be deadly.  I don't want to die.  I don't want to miss out on my son's life.  But that doesn't mean that this is going to help me.  If it was a simple matter of willpower, I'd have kicked this thing years ago.  It isn't.  But all of these reasons are what has gotten me through the door at OA, and they are the reason I will go to any lengths for recovery.

"Men and women [overeat] essentially because they like the effect produced by [food].  The sensation is so elusive that, while they admit it is injurious, they cannot after a time differentiate the true from the false.  To them, their [compulsive overeating] life seems the only normal one." - xxviii

I honestly don't know how other people can eat "normally." I don't think I eat more than other people.  It doesn't seem like I am doing anything that other people aren't doing.  But somehow I'm still obese.  I still eat things I shouldn't.  And I lie to myself about what I'm eating and how much I'm eating.  The process of stuffing myself becomes so unbelievably automatic.  Now that I'm on a food plan I look at what it entails and I'm amazed becuase I'm still hungry.  The portions are resasonable, they seem normal, and even though I would think this would be more than enough food - it isn't.  And I'm hungry.  Which tells me I was eating more than this amount every day.  That just makes it all the harder to  know what I'm doing right and wrong.  The worst part is - I have believed for years that dieting doesn't make a difference to my weight at a certain point - it seems like my body clings to the weight.  Is this true or is my ability to understand normal portions so skewed that I can't see that I am overeating instead of following a sensible diet.

"They are restless, irritable and discontented, unless they can again experience the sense of ease and comfort which comes at once by [eating a few bites] - [bites] which they see others taking with impunity."  - xxviii-xxix

It is awful to wake up thinking of food.  Eat, thinking about the next meal before the current one is even finished.  Think about how long until you can eat again without it being odd or bizarre.  Grocery shopping is just torture, because you want to buy one of everything and eat it all.  And the worst part is you see all these normal sized people eating junk food - cake and ice cream and pizza and fast food.  How can they do it but I can't?  It's maddening.