Giving Service, Receiving Help

I am a compulsive eater who arrived in OA six years ago and has been in continuous abstinence ever since. I maintain a weight loss of more than 40 kilograms (88 lbs). I know I have an emotional, spiritual, and physical disease and need to keep my recovery strong by doing daily work.

This is a simple program, not an easy one. Working my program has kept me from relapse, but these last few months brought many difficulties with anger and resentment. I didn’t want to feel these things, but they were stronger than me, and I felt anger and resentment more and more. I kept working my program but thought many times about stopping everything and quitting OA. I began to control my food, which, for me, is not in keeping with abstinence. I thought about food all the time, and I cried a lot. I understood that I was losing my precious abstinence to this disease.

Anger and resentment are not for me; service to OA is. Because I give lots of service to this Fellowship, my life is saved, one day at a time. During this difficult time, God gave me responsibilities to OA, and I had to keep coming back because I was giving service. I didn’t binge because I had to keep my abstinence to give service.

Many times, I thought about the other meaning of BINGE: Because I’m Not Good Enough. I couldn’t love myself, and I couldn’t love others. I only felt anger and resentment. But, again, service helped me. When we hosted two trustees for some workshops, it was my service to accompany them. I went to receive them because it was my responsibility, but I grew to really love them; the person who was helped most was me.

In the first workshop, I listened and felt a few words begin to take those terrible feelings from my head: “God is in charge, not me.” “If you want what I have, do what I do.” “If you have resentment and anger, pray—even if it takes one week, one month, or one year.” While I was giving service, I received help, love, and understanding beyond my wildest dreams.

God gave me an opportunity for a new beginning in OA. I am working on the feelings, accepting I don’t need them, and beginning to see how my own character defects were bringing me this difficulty. I keep working my program and praying daily, and I keep my continuous abstinence one day at a time. I have discovered that my worst poison is not sugar. My terrible poisons are anger and resentment, and eating them could easily lead me to eating sugar too.

I love giving service to OA! It assisted more than I could imagine in difficult times and brought me loving help that I needed—and still need.

— Anonymous