Tried It All

Qualification

I remember raising my head from the toilet seat, where I had just shed my stinking guts. I turned to God and said, “I promise I won’t do it again.” But later that day, I sat in the dining facility of the university campus, gulping down a second lunch. After a purge was always the next binge.

Burning with guilt and shame, I decided to eat only fruit for the rest of the week. It soon changed into only eating flour for a whole week, then to eating exclusively non-fat products to try to limit the damage my uncontrollable greed had caused to my body, my work, and my relationships.

I changed that resolution and decided on a seven-day grain diet, a plan I got from a health-food store. Then I did a seven-day fast, hoping that total abstinence from food would lift the obsession, but I ended up bingeing worse than ever.

I felt like a greedy, insatiable glutton, always in pursuit of food, movies, theater, traveling, work, relationships, clothes, or self-hurting in order to avoid bingeing and purging.

I also tried following the suggestions of professionals to eat whatever I wanted whenever I wanted, without restrictions. They said that my eating habits would level out automatically if my soul recognized that there are no forbidden foods. One therapist assured me that if I worked on my childhood trauma efficiently enough, the eating disorder would level out. It never happened in 20 years.

I finally stopped searching and came into FA. I experienced a three-year period where I could stop throwing up. My binges were moderate, almost not present at times. I had a lot of excuses and denials. I told myself that I could extend a normal meal with desserts, hot beverages, fruit, and goodies because I had not eaten that much. I told myself that I deserved it, that I had never tried that item, or that it wouldn’t hurt me that one time. I told myself that I could stop eating after I had one of something. I firmly believed in my rationalizations.

I also was in love. Thank God for a healthy relationship, I thought, but declined when the man I loved proposed to me. My idea was that there was someone better out there. I looked for a room of my own that would give me privacy to resume bingeing and purging and, of course, find my real love somewhere out there.

I binged after my therapist was ill and had to end our relationship, and after I lost a child in the third month of pregnancy. I ate after strong exercise, after a fast, after a challenging counseling session, after sex, after a nap, when I was angry, and when my boyfriend of the month did not do what I wanted. I never really knew why I binged. I would tell myself that it was a slip, and then I would vow to start anew the next day. My clean slate was an empty stomach after purging.

Like the jaywalker in the AA Big Book story, describing the man who kept getting hurt again and again, continually being hurt made me feel important. I felt attracted to misery. With perverse pleasure, I let the world revolve around my wounds, helplessness, and despair. This expressed itself most in the way I attracted men for one-night stands when I had just ended a period of starving and drinking as an alternative. I did not care who I slept with. I just latched onto the guy who seemed ready for an adventure. I did not care about whether I liked him or whether I could contract a disease, get pregnant, or bring home some violent maniac.

When I asked my psychiatrist about an honest appraisal of my chances to recover, she told me point blank, “You will always have trouble controlling your eating. Why don’t you file for disability?” I was devastated.

Shortly after, another ferocious eating bout left me so humiliated that I had nowhere else to go but back to FA. I had no power left to fight the merciless obsession to destroy myself with food. I started to work all the tools of recovery in FA and started to get well.

Today, I start every day with a prayer on my knees and ask for another abstinent day. I am being transformed. I express my complete willingness to do whatever my creator wants me to do. I pray for kindness, consideration, love, and respect in all my interactions. I use affirmations to avert negative thinking and despondency, which are my greatest enemies. I tell myself that I deserve to be healed and to have a happy, joyous life. I accept help so I can help others. I am part of humankind—useful and responsible. I believe that I can heal if I persevere.

Now, 12 years into recovery, I am 50 years old and abstinent. I am neither disabled, retired, nor unemployable. I am surrounded with loving, well meaning, and reliable people. I have work, enough money, good health, and a harmonious life. My family relations have been restored. Doing service in FA, sponsoring, and meeting newcomers are an important part of my daily life. I care for others and do not feel isolated. I have resumed playing the piano, which is a source of joy for me. I feel whole and complete without having to be in a partnership. I am not driven by desires and wants. My happiness now comes from inside. FA has given me a balanced lifestyle that keeps the destructive forces of my disease at bay, one day at a time.