FA Stories of Recovery from Food Addiction
April 2021 $2.50
We will be amazed before we are halfway through
April 2021
Columns Qualification: Living Life Abstinently. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 First 90 Days: Not (All) About the Food. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Frontier Focus: The Solution That Saves. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 No Matter What: Walking Through Fear. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Lighten Up: Packing My God. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
Features Surrendering Comfort Food. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10 New Self Portrait . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
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Front Cover Art: Arienne C., Canada Back Cover Art: Anonymous Graphic Design: Tickled Plum
Copyright © 2021 Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous 400 W. Cummings Park, Suite 1700 Woburn, MA 01801-6572
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abstinence in FA, connection invites you to share your experience, strength, and hope with us. Submit online at: connection.foodaddicts.org
Qualification
Living Life Abstinently
“T
oday I got me one of those people like you have, Mom” says my 12-year-old son as we are trekking up the San Francisco-like hill in our small town. Before finding Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous (FA), I annually huffed and puffed my way up this hill during trick-or-treating on Halloween. After FA, I was walking it three times a week while my son delivered the town gazette. He was notorious for saying random sentences that had no prelude to help determine the context of his statement, and this sentence was no different. I had absolutely no clue what he was talking about. He proceeded to tell me about this boy from his elementary school that was often bullied on the bus because of his weight and other characteristics. I was familiar with these stories and that my son often sat with him on the bus and stood up for him against his peers. One day, this younger student ended up in the vice principal’s office regarding an issue on the bus. Although my son did not ride the bus that day, the vice principal called him in to get a better understanding of the typical interconnection
actions between the various students involved. My son constructed a plan to help this student out even on days they could not ride the bus together. He instructed the boy to meet him daily by the lockers. There they would discuss this boy’s plans for the day, discuss best approaches about how to handle things that may come up, and the boy was to report back the following day of how things went. “You know, just like your morning people, Mom.” Ah, my “morning people.” Now I was putting two and two together. He was referring to my sponsees. Only I never knew that he knew about my sponsees. I had only been sponsoring for a year or so by this time. I took my sponsee calls well before I had to pull his dead-to-the-world body out of bed each morning in a completely different room. I never used the speaker feature on my phone, so anything being overheard would have only ever been my side of the conversation. Yet somehow, through a maze of hallways and doors, and subliminally through his deep slumber, he had learned the tool 1
of sponsoring. And better yet, he had learned to use this tool in his own life to be of service to another. A service he would do countless more times in his adolescence because of his kind heart and his activist persona. As time passed, this darling sweetheart of a young boy would become a teenager with all the eye rolling, know-it-all attitude that all teenagers must dabble in at some point. I was never so grateful for the tool of sponsoring as I was during this stage of our relationship. First and foremost, I was grateful for having a sponsor who endured the ups and downs of me trying to navigate raising a teenage boy on my own. But it was really through sponsoring various newcomers and returnees that prepared me the most for parenting my son through his teenage years. Through them, I learned I cannot want my sponsees abstinence more than they want it. And I certainly cannot force them to be abstinent. Likewise, I could not force or wish my son to do his homework or even to turn in homework he had actually already completed. I learned how to set expectations and be patient as new sponsees learned time management skills needed to get to their calls on time. Expectations and patience were handy as my son’s time management skills seemed to backslide during his high 2
school years. I learned when to speak and when to wait for a sponsee to actually ask, or give me space, to share my experience on a topic. Learning to wait until my teenager asked for help was extremely difficult but I solely credit this to the outstanding relationship we still have to this day. He continues to seek out my advice and guidance because he knows I will patiently listen and will share my experience in a way he can truly understand, and not in a dictating, controlling, manner. When sponsees broke I stayed abstinent. When sponsees left Program I stayed in Program. I learned to rise above other’s actions and stay true to myself. That also came in very handy, since it is too tempting to match snarky comments with snarky comments and eye rolls with eye rolls. I had to rise above my own childish ways and stay true to my new, recovering adult self. I am aware of the concept that addicts stop maturing at the onset of our addiction. My food addiction really took off in my teenage years. Therefore, many of my son’s actions triggered my character defects. By the grace of FA and AWOLs (A Way of Life, a study of the Twelve Steps), I had learned not to react to those character defects and instead used mental mottos to buffer my response. I would love to April 2021
say that I used one of our great mottos of this program, but the truth is I came up with a custom motto just for dealing with that time of our lives, “There can be only one teenager in this house at a time, and just for today, Karen, you are not it!” The last sentence of the tool of sponsor states, “Find a sponsor who has what you want and ask how it was achieved.” I often share in my tool meetings and to my sponsees that I make a silent addition to that sentence, “and be willing to do what they do to achieve it.” No TwelveStep program is for all the people who need a Twelve-Step program. Other programs may claim to be there for the people who want recovery. In my opinion, FA is for the people who will DO it. It is extra special and dear to my heart when I get to work with my “morning people,” who do want what I have, are asking how it was connection
achieved, and are willing to do what I do to achieve it. I love seeing them navigate through the ups and downs of life in a calmer, mature manner and simply take me along for the ride, 15 minutes at a time. The promises guarantee that “we will see how our experience can benefit others.” My experience of putting down the food, losing 220 pounds (about 100 kilos), and staying abstinent for 10 years now can benefit others who want to get neutral around the food. But my other experiences as a mother, a daughter, an employee MEREDITH M., ME and all the other roles in my life can also benefit others. We all have multiple roles, responsibilities and life circumstances and it is possible to handle all those things abstinently. In fact, for me, it is easier and more rewarding to handle all these things more sanely because of my abstinence. Karen W., Washington, US 3
First 90 Days
Not (All) About the Food
I
t has been seven-and-a-half years since I walked into my first FA meeting, a lovely being full of rage, defensiveness, and self-righteousness, not to mention with about 60 to 70 extra pounds (about 27 to 32 kilos) on my body. It is easy to forget how bad it was, so I am grateful for the opportunity to take a moment and remember some of the “highlights” of my first 90 days in FA. I want to make sure I never forget how bad it was before I got here, how sick I was when I got here, and how much better I got, pretty quickly, before having much “recovery” at all, just by virtue of putting down the sugar and flour and excess quantities. This isn’t to say that there were no bumps in the road. I remember getting on the phone for the first time with the woman I had asked to sponsor me and instantly bursting into tears (she hadn’t said “yes,” yet, mind you!). How humiliating! But she was incredibly kind. She praised me for being brave enough to reach out for help, and gently asked if I would like to talk with her a little later. I gratefully took her up on her offer. And the miracle is that I actually did call her back a few hours later. Before this pro4
gram, I would have avoided, at all costs, anyone I had embarrassed myself in front of. Any reminder of my shameful vulnerabilities needed to be erased from my consciousness, either by avoiding the person who caused me to remember my shame, or by drowning myself in food, excessively watching television, or indulging in selfrighteous rage. But things had gotten bad enough for me with the food that I was willing to humble myself and ask her for help, despite my embarrassment. That was the beginning of a very loving relationship with my first sponsor. Many people come into FA and balk at the prospect of being told what to eat and when to eat it. Not me! I was relieved to be given a food plan to follow. I had spent almost 20 years in and around another Twelve-Step program for food, trying to define my own abstinence. That “abstinence” often included meals consisting of quantities like a half-pint or a super-sized flour product. If I felt hungry in the middle of the afternoon, I often “justified” another few ounces of something to tide me over. Finally, someone was giving me clear guidelines. And as a newly abstinent member of April 2021
FA, these guidelines made me feel safe. As long as I ate only what was on my food plan and nothing else, I could count myself as “abstinent.” As a side point, when I first came into FA, it was very important to my rigid sense of right and wrong to be on the side of what I perceived as “right.” I am grateful that since that time, my current sponsor has worked with me to change my thinking quite a bit. Using the tools of FA, including the tool of abstinence, is no longer a platform for selfrighteousness. (I am doing this the right way and others are doing it wrong, so they are somehow “less than.”) My surrender to a food plan, and to using all of the tools this program has to offer, is about self-care and self-love, and more than anything else, is a way to find a connection with my Higher Power. What I have learned is that my food needs to be committed, weighed, and measured perfectly. And for that matter, I need to use every tool of this program every day, not out of self-righteousness, but rather out of a desire to rid myself of anything that could block me from my Higher Power. I have learned that my obsession with an eighth of an ounce of extra food can form an insurmountable barrier between me and my Higher Power. Similarly, a rule-based, punitive program will keep me separate from God, as do the character defects of fear, reconnection
sentment, and self-pity. Of course, actually sticking to the guidelines around my food initially brought up some uncomfortable emotions that I wasn’t sure I could deal with. For the first two weeks, I would take out my food scale before each meal. I would weigh and measure my food down to the “point zero” like a good, obedient girl. Then I would take the plate to the table, sit down and look at it, and want to cry. There was no way this would be enough food! I was going to starve! I would try to push aside the fear as best I could and eat my meal. And then, what I kept finding was that, when the meal was over, I would experience the feeling of being satisfied. It had been enough food! Another miracle happened. After two weeks of going through this fearful ritual three times a day, I had a spiritual experience. What I suddenly realized one day was that my fear of not having enough food and of going hungry was not really about the food at all! During my childhood and adolescence, I had often experienced the fear that my father would not come through for me. If I were trying to achieve something, in his misguided attempt to protect me from the pain of failure, he would tell me that I would never succeed. This experience followed me through grade school, high school, college, applying for fellowships and graduate 5
school, and even into my search for a man to marry. The fear that accompanied this experience was immense. If I failed, then I would be all alone and unable to cope. In point of fact, my dad would almost always come through for me in the end (like the time I worked two jobs all summer to earn enough money to buy a plane ticket, but didn’t quite make enough, and he filled in the rest of the money for me). But there was always this sense that I was going to fail and be unable to take care of myself. The good news is that, after several AWOLs (A Way of Life, a study of the Twelve Steps), I realized that my dad was just doing the best he could, even if it was a very damaging approach to parenting. What I also realized in these AWOLs was that I could begin to let go of the fear-based mentality that had compelled me to achieve so much outward success, but at the expense of my spiritual well-being. Going back to my first weeks in FA, I don’t know exactly how the epiphany hit me, but what I realized, after two weeks of being afraid that I would not have enough food, was that this fear of starving had everything to do with my earthly father, and nothing to do with my divine Father. There was enough food, and I was being taken care of. Unlike my human father, God would always come through for me with uncondi6
tional and abundant love. A quiet voice inside told me, “There is enough. God has enough.” I was instantly relieved of the fear of being hungry in this program. I experienced the healing love of my Higher Power, and an immense sense of gratitude to this program for helping me to see that I had used food for all sorts of things that had nothing to do with real hunger or nutrition. Since that time, I have often been grateful to have that feeling of hunger without cause as a barometer to help me sense when there is an issue in my life that has to be dealt with. As a food addict, food is the first thing I want to turn to. But if I want to stay abstinent, I can’t indulge that first impulse, so I am forced to look for the real reason for my emotional or spiritual discomfort. Thank God for a baseline of abstinence that allows me to heal, mentally and spiritually. I could certainly list many other miracles that happened during my first 90 days. I don’t want to forget the excitement I felt when I got on the scale after a month and saw that I had lost 15 pounds (about 7 kilos)! Without exercise, without going hungry. But even though this weight loss certainly motivated me to keep going with the program, I quickly realized that the more significant miracles were those that took place for me on the mental and spiritual planes. Growing friendships, willingApril 2021
ness to be vulnerable with my fellows, and to go through growing pains many times the unconditional love of my sponsor— since then. I often remember those days and even more than the weight loss—gave me remind myself that if I could make it the lasting blessings for which I keep com- through that paralyzing fear, I can make it ing back, long after losing all of my weight. through whatever currently faces me, using I never want to forget the discomfort, as the tools of this program and searching for well as the utter miracles, that happened for a deeper connection to my Higher Power. me when I was newly abstinent. I have had Rachel W., Israel
SUSAN F., CA
connection
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Frontier Focus
The Solution That Saves I am amazed at the countless ways I have seen my relationship with God and others transform during this Covid-19 virus crisis. There is a state order to remain in my home to prevent the spread of the virus, so I don’t get to see my FA fellows. I do have a working telephone to make outreach calls, and I can sit with God and do my quiet time. I have a sponsor who is readily available to support me, even outside of our regular call time. I have a scale that works and tells me when to stop adding food to it, and I have enough food in my house for today, tomorrow, and a few weeks out. No circumstance can make me take the bite of flour and sugar. I truly believe it is the will of my dear Higher Power to not take the lick, bite or swallow of anything outside of my committed food. 8
Before FA, there was no way that any of that food in my refrigerator or pantry would still be there. In the past, I bought extra food for emergencies, but soon found myself eating it within 20 minutes. It was physically impossible for me not to eat my emergency foods. If this crisis had come before my abstinence in FA, my house would be foodless. Today, my Higher Power has given me the grace, peace, and power to not dive into the food. I have no idea how to explain how God lifted MARGARETE N., NJ the obsession of food from my mind. I asked each day for help and it was removed. How awesome is that? When hard things in life happen, like what is happening in the world right now, some family members’ words can trigger me, and I take the “bite” of control. Praise April 2021
God, I have a formula to stop myself from granted or assume that I no longer have a trying to control everything. I hop back battle to fight with my addiction. Each on the phone and share with my fellows day I return to my tools and let them wash about my fears, judgements, resentments, over me. or anxieties. I am reminded to be grateful, I am so grateful that food does not enter to forgive when I need to forgive, and to my mind as a remedy for my feelings anylet go and trust the process. I turn to more. When I have uncomfortable feelpower greater than myself to restore me ings, I think about which fellow I can call. to sanity. I call my fellows when fear is Before FA, I’d think about what food gripping my mind, and I ask for help in- item to go hibernate with. I am amazed stead of suffering. I am willing to be of that God has the power to renew my service to those who are hurting. I work mind. I always thought I was doomed to on practicing honeat or to remain in esty, openness, my resentments I have experienced true mental, and willingness in with my family. If I working the recovhad the thought, spiritual, and emotional ery program of there was no way FA. I show up out. But I have extransformations in this program. when I say I am perienced true going to show up. I mental, spiritual, do all these things with the help of my and emotional transformations in this sponsor, my fellows, and God. program. Sometimes it takes a few days, months, My whole being is being transformed. or even years to let go of things. But I My skin glows now, and I am pretty sure keep showing up to my sponsor and out- it is because I am healthier than a piece of reach calls and let the healing grace of fruit itself. I wouldn’t trade the peace and God mold me and change me into the joy I have today for a dot of food. The person He wants me to be. only thing that stands between me and I cannot live life on my own strength. I the promises of the program is my level tried. I couldn’t eat normally, think right, of willingness and surrender. I know my or function in relationships on my own. Higher Power has incredible things in My brain was poisoned. Yet today, I walk store for me. as a free woman. I do not take it for Rachel H., California, US connection
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Surrendering Comfort Food
W
hen the pandemic first hit food. If I had a challenging day at work, I the major metropolitan was in and out of a coffee shop multiple area where I live, my hus- times, each time leaving with a sugary band and I decided to hunker down in beverage in my hands. the small condo in the mountains that we In recovery, I have learned that food is typically rent out as an Airbnb. Before we not the answer. I have been given the left, I did what any food addict filled with tools to help me turn to my fellows and fear, doubt, and insecurity might do. I my Higher Power in times of stress, rather went to four grothan the food. But cery stores and sometimes my first bought as much I was using food for comfort, instinct is still to use food as I could pack the food to soothe even though this time it was into my car. I didn’t myself. On the day even know if it we left for the cans of protein rather than that would fit in the remountains, I was frigerator or cabipanic-buying food boxes of flour and sugar. nets, but I did know to help me feel betthat with each bulk ter in the face of package of food I purchased, I felt as if I something that felt completely incomcould breathe again. I was using food for prehensible and unmanageable. comfort, even though this time it was We were just barely able to find space cans of protein rather than boxes of flour for all of that food in the condo, and I had and sugar. everything I needed. I started to work Until I came into Food Addicts in Re- with fellows to create Zoom gatherings covery Anonymous (FA) 12 years ago, I in place of meetings, I took on extra sponused flour and sugar to get through any- sees, and I got into a routine of getting on thing that made me uncomfortable. If I my knees, taking quiet time, and connecthad an important paper due, I steeled my- ing with my Higher Power on a daily self for the task with some takeout and basis. All of these tools helped, but still I then rewarded myself afterwards with fast had a lot of fear. I was uncomfortable and 10
April 2021
I was bored. I wanted to go to the grocery store every day to re-stock this or that item (given the empty shelves we had seen back in our city), but my husband and I were committed to practicing social distancing, so we decided to order pickup from the local grocery store just once a week. This was a huge surrender. Someone else would be responsible for picking the size of my fruit. I could no longer entertain myself by wandering through the aisles, getting the exact type of organic meat I preferred. And the store’s app would often tell me that an item I had reserved was no longer available. I was surprised at the variety of food I was actually able to get, but there was one dairy product I could only get at the fancy organic market near my house, and I wanted it. I fixated on how to get it. I did connection
a comprehensive internet search for stores near the grocery store that would carry it, and I rationalized that if I were just going in for one item, it wouldn’t really be that risky. How many people could I expose or be exposed to if I just went in for five minutes? I was ready to abandon my principles for this dairy product. I knew that if I could just get that one thing, I would be okay, everything would be okay. I could relax and be comfortable again. This was my solution. After several hours of searching, I found the perfect answer. There was a coARIENNE C., CA op that offered curbside pickup just five minutes from the grocery store. I could get my normal weekly grocery order, then get my special food from the co-op and not even have to go into a store. I was triumphant. But even as I was placing the order, I heard a still, small voice telling me that maybe I 11
should let go of that item. I ignored it, but during my quiet time the voice got louder and louder. Then it mingled with the voice of my sponsor in my head, reminding me that every surrender would bring me closer to my Higher Power. I was angry and resentful. We’re in the middle of a global pandemic, and I can’t even have this one thing to make me feel better? But I also knew that what I really wanted was peace, and I wasn’t going to find it in any kind of food, even abstinent food. I asked God for help and I cancelled the order for that item. The grocery store had everything I needed, even if it wasn’t exactly what I wanted. After a few phone calls the resentment faded, and in the end I was left only with gratitude; gratitude for convenient access to a well-stocked grocery store, delivery that keeps my family safe, and a program that teaches me to turn to a Higher Power instead of food for help and comfort. Today is filled with uncertainty. I don’t know how long this pandemic will last or whether I will still have a job in a few months. I don’t know what size my fruit will be when I pick up my grocery order later this week. But I do know that I don’t have to eat addictively, no matter what. And as long as I continue to practice surrender and gratitude, I can be certain of that. Deborah F., Maryland, US 12
Twelve Steps 1. We admitted we were powerless over food – that our lives had become unmanageable. 2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. 3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him. 4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. 5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. 6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. 7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. 8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. 9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. 10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. 11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. 12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to food addicts and to practice these principles in all our affairs. April 2021 Adapted with permission from Alcoholics Anonymous
New Self Portrait
I
came into Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous (FA) in 2006 at 230 pounds (about 104 kilos). I am 5feet, 8-inches tall, so many people said that I did not look so big. In some strange way I took comfort in that at the time. I tried to dress very fashionably to camouflage how big I was. I thought people would notice my clothes instead of me or my size. At the end of the day, however, red rash rings around my waist and bra line that burned and itched, swollen feet, painful varicose veins in my legs, rosacea red cheeks, scattered desperate thinking, and self-pity all painted a very different self-portrait. I had given up, accepting that I was doomed to be this fat person forever. I found FA after years of dieting in other connection
programs. Little did I know where this journey would lead me. I lost 95 pounds (about 43 kilos) in FA and have gained my health, integrity, sanity, self-discipline, accountability, honesty, service to others and much more. After a few years in Program, I started taking art classes. I love being creative, however, my insecurity always kept me from expressing it fully. FA has helped me to have the courage to explore that part of myself through art. I painted a new LYDIA S., CA self-portrait that exudes peace, contentment, and tranquility. I have gotten so much joy and healing from this experience. I see myself differently now. I know I would not have had the courage to do this if not for FA. Barb C., Canada 13
No Matter What
Walking Through Fear
B
eing at home during the pandemic, surrounded by my family and food all the time, reminds me just how grateful I am to be in recovery. There have been several times in my life when I have been at home with the family in very challenging circumstances and without a program, when I depended on food as a crutch. This time at home can be uncomfortable and challenging. The Covid-19 pandemic is very anxiety provoking. I have made countless calls relating to my fear about how to manage. Family relationships are being tested. As a mother to a large family, I need to handle the food requirements, and it feels like I am constantly shopping and cooking. As a food addict who comes from morbid obesity, who ate through boredom, fear, happiness, tiredness, anxiety and stress, it is an absolute miracle that I am not obsessing or thinking about food. I am also exceptionally grateful for the opportunity to choose faith; for a fellowship that supports me and for the tools of this program that keep me abstinent. My phone calls and Zoom gather14
ings have been a lifeline. They remind me that I am not alone. My fellows can relate to my fears and challenges and they share their experiences. Their recovery helps me to shift my thinking and move forward without picking up the food. I have benefited from the experience of fellows all over the world who are often a couple of weeks ahead of what we are experiencing in Australia and that has been enormously helpful. One night I was tired and overwhelmed after three weeks of being at home with my husband and four children on school break. I lost patience with my daughter and spoke to her in a very mean and frustrated tone. I hurt her feelings. On another occasion, my tiredness and self-pity manifested in screaming at my teenager, who was pushing my buttons. I felt remorseful. Recovery has taught me that I want peace of mind and I want loving relationships with the people in my life. I needed help from my sponsor and my fellows to show me how to make amends, change my behaviour and walk through life gracefully. G-d uses everything to help me learn and grow. I April 2021
am exceptionally grateful for the tools that support my recovery and keep me away from the food during this challenging, unprecedented time. In the early days of Covid-19, I had a lot of fear of leaving the house. I feared the family would get sick, I was afraid about my sons’ vulnerable immune system. I am spending a great deal of time with the children and that can feel boring at times. Some days it can be hard to stay in the day and be present. A connection to my Higher Power and many phone calls help me to get out of that obsessive, negative thinking. It feels like an absolute miracle that I am not eating through the fear, selfcentredness and anxiety. It is noticeably different to life before program and in the early days of recovery, when I found it very difficult to be around my children without wanting to eat all the time. My experience in the food shows me that being at home, feeling bored, looking after connection
small children and running the home was a great excuse for me to eat. I loved to eat in isolation and secrecy. I was morbidly obese. I felt great shame around eating any type of food. Additionally, I could justify eating as using my time wisely. I felt I deserved to eat; I used to get the children ready for school, take them to school and then go to a café for my reward. In the evening, I ate while I was preparing dinner and then ate a “real” dinner once the kids were in bed. I also ate through the night while I prepared lunches for the next day and I MARGARET N., WA ate when I woke up in the middle of the night because I thought it might help me go back to sleep. The food I ate outside of mealtimes did not register as calories. Before coming into Program, I gave birth to a sick child who subsequently passed away after three weeks. I ate my way through that experience without a program or Higher Power. During that time in 15
hospital with Abby, I ate to numb my feelings. When I felt anxious after receiving news that Abby would not survive, I came home, walked straight into our pantry and stuffed food into my body to push those feelings down. When extended family did not behave in a manner that I felt was acceptable, I found ways to use food to numb those feelings. I did not know how to sit with the pain of watching my child dying. I needed massive quantities of food to fuel me. I started program when I was 38 years old and had two children. Today, I am 44 years old with four children. I was blessed to fall pregnant and have twin boys whilst in recovery, and throughout that pregnancy and their turbulent entry into the world, I was blessed with abstinence. The twins were born extremely prematurely and spent the first five months of life in hospital. We didn’t know if our boys would live or die. We faced many harrowing times and medical challenges during the first two years of their life. During that time, my program kept me abstinent. It wasn’t always easy. I relied heavily on my sponsor and fellows to pull me through the days where I felt extreme fear, when I didn’t know how I would stay abstinent and manage life. Sometimes I was so tired and stressed that I just wanted to eat. A power greater than me kept me abstinent. 16
Fear at that time was palpable. Just like the pandemic situation, there was so much uncertainty and unpredictability. For a food addict like me, it is a miracle to feel that kind of fear, doubt and insecurity and not eat over it. Food used to be my higher power, but the experience with my twins connected me strongly to my Higher Power and I believe that is helping me to stay abstinent through this pandemic. I am aware that food can have a strong hold on me, and without a program, I struggle with boundaries around my food. Thank you G-d that, today, my program gives me very clear boundaries around what food to eat, when to eat and how much to eat. I have non-abstinent food in the house today. I do the cooking and shopping for the family, people can bring food to our house and I do not eat it because it is not abstinent. I am physically able to exercise, keep up with my children, shop for clothes and stay in a slender body all thanks to a Higher Power and a program of recovery. I know, without doubt, it feels infinitely better to be home with my family today during the pandemic and stay abstinent. My Higher Power keeps giving me the faith, strength, courage and wisdom to choose recovery and the willingness to stay abstinent. Loni B., Melbourne, Australia April 2021
Lighten Up!
Packing My God
I
was preparing for our third annual anniversary trip when my brother sent me a text. “Are you still going on your trip tomorrow?” Smiling, I quickly swiped “Yup! I’m packing my food right now.” As a matter of habit, I checked that the words I wanted to text had come out clearly, and I’m glad I did! It read, “Yup! I’m packing my God now.” I had to chuckle at the irony. For so long, food really was my Higher Power. Now the food is in its place and I no longer serve it; it fuels me so that I can serve others. Thank you God! Alex J., New York, US connection
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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.