Fellowship Recovery Diversity and Sensitivity I recently went to an OA marathon that focused on diversity within the program. I have multiple chemical sensitivities and sometimes meetings can trigger problems for me. I’m allergic to many commonly used chemicals, including perfumes, odorous hand creams, hand cleaners, hairsprays, and more. Since I started speaking out about these sensitivities, many people in program have thanked me for … Read More
Fellowship Recovery Five Helping Concepts Back in 2007, I had the pleasure of hearing the chair of the OA Board of Trustees talk about how to strengthen meetings. She mentioned five simple (but not necessarily easy) concepts that may help all meetings and OA as a whole. 1. Offer radical hospitality. Newcomers want to be at the meeting. They are there because they are ready … Read More
Diversity Recovery Around the World Birthday at Home Recently, I had the privilege of celebrating both my twentieth OA birthday and the twentieth birthday of my OA home group. I met OA for the first time at this group’s very first meeting. For this event, we asked our intergroup to invite other OA groups to join and celebrate our journey toward recovery. We had more than double our … Read More
Service Tools & Concepts Easy Service Commitments Service is one of the ways I stay in recovery and out of relapse. When I came back to program last April, I knew that taking continuous action was the only way to keep my program moving forward. The first thing I did was commit to service at the group level because that’s key to getting me to a regular meeting. … Read More
Recovery Around the World Combined Strength I need meetings to be strong, vibrant places where a variety of voices express recovery through each person’s story of experience, strength, and hope. I grow concerned when I hear about OA meetings shrinking or closing entirely. Fewer meetings with fewer members means danger for me. I need support, and I need to be able to reach out to others. … Read More
Relationships In Losing, Men Win In my three years of coming to the rooms of Overeaters Anonymous, I’ve been moved by the profound ways I see the power of God working in the lives of my brothers. As a former church worker, I thought I had a corner on the God business. Was I ever wrong! Whether I’m in my Sunday morning men’s meeting or … Read More
Abstinence Six Courses of Abstinence The first thing I did as a member of Overeaters Anonymous on a path to abstinent eating was to divide all foods into two groups: foods I would eat and foods I would not eat. Thirty years later, I still have not eaten any of the foods in the second group, just as I would not eat a pencil or … Read More
Literature Lifeline Makes a Meeting Recently I went to visit a meeting to bring flyers, newsletters, and other materials from our intergroup. When I arrived, I couldn’t find the meeting or the members. They had been denied access to their regular meeting space because the facility was hosting another event. I found them huddled around a table in the rear of the dining room. Although … Read More
Relapse & Recovery Different Perspectives In 1994, I hit bottom. Food no longer filled the hole in my soul. A sense of hopelessness and futility was constantly with me. I had reached what was my heaviest weight of 335 pounds (152 kg) and doubled my size in just four years. I was a graduate assistant working as a tutor at my university’s writing lab. One … Read More
Service Miracle of Meetings For me, meetings are the essential Tool, the base of the program. Without meetings, we would have nothing on which to hang the other Tools. Without meetings, we would have no ground from which to climb the Steps. Without meetings, we would have no hope of gaining serenity and no chance of attaining the abstinence necessary for recovery. A meeting … Read More
