Recovery Working the Program Ten Things Here is what has helped me get abstinent: Planning out my food for the next twenty-four hours and making my lunch and snack night before. Making a commitment to my OA sponsor (by phone or email) of what I will eat for the next twenty-four hours. If I need to change it, I call her ahead of time. Being rigorously … Read More
Relapse Relapse & Recovery One Small Change When I first came to OA in 1985, I was blessed to walk into a meeting full of recovery, love, fellowship, and fun. Abstinent sponsors were available, and a group of about eight of us ate lunch together afterwards, did things together, and gave service beyond the group level. (Our specialty was entertainment for OA events.) We had parties at … Read More
Keep Coming Back Relapse Balance in Program The week before Unity Day, I made a commitment to call three people whom I had not seen in many months. I left three messages, and one called me back. She was happy to hear my voice, but said, “I just cannot stand to do all the work this program requires: the prep, planning, shopping, and precooking, and the reading … Read More
Recovery Relationships Word of Hope When I woke up on Unity Day, I wasn’t too thrilled to be around people. The disease of compulsive overeating, which for me is a cacophony of voices in my head, was screaming that I didn’t need to be at Unity Day with other compulsive overeaters. My disease was permitting me to isolate! It didn’t matter that I made a … Read More
Relapse Slipping & Sliding No-Apologies “Carefrontation” Is there anything more heartbreaking than listening to and watching people in program who simply can’t seem to get and stay abstinent? Day after day, month after month, they show up at meetings, but the gift of abstinence eludes them. Compulsive eaters can become so physically sick that they will swear off the abuse for a little while, but a … Read More
How OA Changed My Life Recovery Following Suggestions I’ve completed seven years of abstinence and recovery in OA, yet until recently had always been puzzled by this quotation from “How It Works”: “Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery” (Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th ed., p. 59). Why simply “suggestions”? I had come to believe that my recovery depended on following these Twelve Steps … Read More
Recovery Gifts “As Is” Before I fully surrendered, my life was an ever-increasing battle with food, weight, myself, and others. I was a child who didn’t like being given half a cup of juice; I wanted the full cup. After overhearing family conversations about my “puppy fat,” I decided, at age 9, to attend my first commercial weight-loss club. I only had to lose … Read More
Anorexia & Bulimia Diversity An All-In Proposition “And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone . . . the problem has been removed. It does not exist for us. We are neither cocky nor are we afraid. . . . That is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition” (Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th ed., pp. 84–85). When I first came into OA, I … Read More
Service Tools & Concepts Don’t Disappear Last year, I reflected on whether I should run for another term as intergroup chair. Because of work and family commitments, I felt I was not as effective in the last term as I could have been. It was the second time I had served as an intergroup chair in my twenty-five years in OA. I wondered if I should … Read More
Keep Coming Back Relapse Renewed Humility, New Peace I am a returning member, back in OA after many relapses over the past fourteen years. Earlier this year, after almost a year of abstinent recovery and losing two thirds of the weight I need to lose for my health, I began experiencing painful and disturbing digestive symptoms. It took months for doctors to diagnose the trouble, and in the … Read More