I have been a member of Food Addicts in Recovery in Melbourne, Australia for two years now. I weighed 260 pounds when I came into Program, and have been as much as 285 in the past. I had a relapse last year that took seven months to get through. I am 61 years old and have now been contentedly abstinent for nine months. I believe I have been a food addict from about age 4 or 5. The behaviours started early: stealing food, hiding food, eating in secret, stealing money from mom’s purse to buy sweets, making slices even so nobody could tell some was eaten, stuffing wrappers inside something else before depositing it in the garbage so I wouldn’t be sprung. One of the startling things that I have learned about myself in this beautiful Program is the level of dishonesty that had become part of my way of being.... Continue Reading
For my whole life I lived in the fairy tale that if only I were thin, my life would be perfect. I have always battled 20 pounds, but those 20 pounds were enough to make me feel separated from the rest of the world. Eventually by my 40s, the battle increased to 40 pounds. After discovering the FA program, the weight came off quickly. Finally I was thin! But life wasn’t perfect. Yes, I was thin, but I still had the same job, the same house, the same husband, and quite frankly, I hated them all. Because I was using the program as a diet rather than a recovery program, I eventually picked up the food. Thus began a viciously chronic cycle of breaks that lasted over three years. Without a doubt, I proved to myself that this disease gets worse, never better. Then things that I always said hadn’t... Continue Reading
I came to FA at the age of 47, after 16 years of trying in other Twelve-Step programs to string together some long-term abstinence. Once I had lost 78 pounds, and another time I lost 100 pounds, only to see it fall apart. I watched all that weight come rapidly back on. When I found FA, I knew I had my answer, and was determined to shut off my head and follow directions. I lost 80 pounds and found a level of serenity I had never imagined. So how did I find myself having a slip and starting over? It was a slow decline. After being divorced for many years and with a new thin body, I decided I was ready to start meeting men again. I discussed this with my sponsor and began Internet dating. After several less-than-enchanting experiences, I met a charming, handsome, successful, alcoholic lawyer who I was crazy about. I... Continue Reading
When I came into FA in August 2006 at the age of 30, I was 5’ 4” tall and weighed 210 pounds. I heard that the disease of food addiction is threefold: mental, physical, and spiritual. Therefore, I understood that the solution as laid out in this program is also mental, physical, and spiritual. But I can be a slow learner. I never fully surrendered to the spiritual and mental aspects of the program. I rarely took the suggested 30 minutes of quiet time, and my AA Big Book and my Twenty-Four Hours a Day book didn’t see much action. I made phone calls only when I felt like it, and I certainly didn’t ask my Higher Power for help. One month after coming into program, my husband of 10 years and I separated. Sometimes I thought I would go out of my mind from the stress of it. We... Continue Reading
Before I was abstinent, the idea of ever getting free from food was as impossible and unlikely as hitching a ride to the moon. I was never very interested in food as a child, but got the idea that I was fat and ugly and should get thinner. So as a teen, I got into starving myself. This progressed to starving and bingeing, then dieting and bingeing, then being unable to diet or control my eating by the time I was 25. Whatever I was doing with food, whether I was under 100 pounds or more than 300 pounds, my thoughts were never far from the obsession about it. FA broke the obsession. I handed my food over to the scales and a sponsor. I fought the FA Program for 10 years. I got abstinent a few times for a few years, and twice lost a large amount of weight... Continue Reading
