Higher Power Perfect Understanding To see where I am and how I got here, I must look into the past, where the God of my understanding put people, places, and situations in my path. Perhaps he was using the Tool of anonymity when he made me trip over coincidences to get me into recovery. I had a chance to try another way of living because … Read More
Recovery Cleaning House I haven’t read much about how overeating’s unmanageability is reflected in the disorganization in our homes. My eating compulsion began with a vengeance when I left home for college in the early sixties. I coped with stress and insecurity by taking food from roommates’ care packages and money from their purses to feed the candy machines downstairs. (Later while in … Read More
Recovery Consequences and Magic I came into OA when I was 35, after realizing that I felt about food the way alcoholics feel about liquor. If I started eating, I didn’t stop until the food was gone. But I didn’t understand being powerless over food; I just wanted to lose weight and move on. You can’t die from food, I thought. Well, I had … Read More
Diversity Newcomers One Meeting A light bulb went on in my head. I got it! After reading the Twelve Steps, I realized my stress and my worries were causing my overeating. Now I put all of that in God’s hands. I don’t worry anymore. It’s wonderful! It’s like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I now get Lifeline, and I’m very aware … Read More
Newcomers Pleased to Believe I just attended my first and second ever OA meetings. In 2013, I lost 80 pounds (36 kg) in seven months using powdered food, veggies, and prescribed medicines under a bariatric doctor’s care. That diet was not sustainable, and now I’ve gained all the weight back, plus 10 pounds (5 kg) more. I knew all along that I could not … Read More
Traditions Tradition 2: Seeing the Love Five or six years ago, I was involved in OA service work within my region. To aid my interactions with the personalities I encountered, I read recovery literature on Tradition Two. Over time, it slowly occurred to me that this Tradition was inviting me to have a relationship with a loving Higher Power. It came with the awareness that I … Read More
Higher Power God Shows Up While I was raised with a concept of God, I used to wonder how God could exist in the chaos and fat that surrounded my life. I must have been cursed! I am thankful God knew better than I did. Over and over, it was as if he were saying, “It’s okay, honey. I’m here for you when you are … Read More
How OA Changed My Life Feeling Good I have been thinking about how proficient I was at feeling bad, and how I am now learning to feel good. My food compulsion started at age 7, which is when the worrying began as well as before-school stomachaches, bad dreams, fear at bedtime, and the chameleon-like behavior I developed to deal with people who were different from me or … Read More
Atheists & Agnostics I’m Not God When the OA speaker said, “I lost a whole person,” it shook me to my core. I needed to do that. Not a whole adult person, just a 30-pound (14-kg), scrawny three-year-old. His picture looked at me from 1951, sitting in the wagon with his two younger siblings, them looking like kids, him looking like desperation to please the photographer. … Read More
Atheists & Agnostics Pathway to Salvation I don’t consider myself a religious person. Although recovery has reconnected me in some ways to the religion of my youth, it does not define my concept of Higher Power. Too often a physical manifestation of Higher Power eludes me. As a child I yearned for the simple belief depicted in the church where I attended a youth program—a gentle … Read More