Drug Medical Information

OVEREATERS ANONYMOUS: WHATEVER IT TAKES, I'LL DO

I always knew there was something wrong with me. My weight problem started when I was twelve, but I had always been a very unhappy child. I have a vivid picture of myself standing in a corner, crying. Communicating my feelings was difficult. Consequently, it was hard to make friends. I knew everybody hated me.

I left home when I was nineteen and moved in with a girl who was extremely overweight. I disliked her immediately; fat people appalled me. My own battle with weight had left me resentful of this condition. As a teenager, I had tried every diet ever invented. My mother brought all of them to my attention and I followed them just to make her happy. Each diet lasted about two days. I was promised new wardrobes, money and, one time, anything I wanted - to no avail.

Immature and naive for my age, at twenty I knew nothing about boy/girl relationships and what they entailed. I met and married a man who was very thin and who accepted me the way I was and gave me the attention I needed. I had no understanding of what was expected of me as a wife. After our marriage, I hated sex and avoided it as often as possible by staying up late watching television and eating. When I did give in it was because I felt it was my duty.

I did as little work around the house as possible. When the neighbors got together for coffee, I would just sit and listen. I still couldn't communicate my feelings. Besides, I was so naive I often didn't know what they were talking about. I felt I scored points by letting them know I was a very good listener.

My husband never complained about my weight, possibly because I never allowed him to see just how much I ate. I hid in the kitchen, "cleaning up" - a process that consisted primarily of eating the leftovers.

No matter how much I was given - new house, new car, new furniture - or how much money my husband made, it was never enough to make me happy. Through two pregnancies my attention and energies were focused on eating and dieting, gaining weight and losing it. In between there were diet pills and depression. Wanting badly to be liked, I would bend over backward to do things for people, hating what I was doing and despising myself for doing it. I thought of suicide many times, but I was afraid I would bungle the job and lie there in pain.

One day, a friend who weighed more than 300 pounds asked me to attend a new weight meeting with her. I agreed to go just to keep her company. When I walked in the door to my first OA meeting I was so "ready" that had they told me to crawl on the floor I would have done it. Imagine finding out that there were other people who had the same problem I did and that there was a name for it!

They said all you have to do is live one day at a time. I didn't have to worry about my past anymore - childhood, parents, any of it. Or my future, either. Next morning, I turned off the television, switched on the radio and started singing. My family thought I had flipped. I opened my curtains and looked out and said, "To hell with trying to please everyone! I don't need that anymore!"

I began losing weight - 50 pounds in two months. My neighbors started coming around and for the first time I enjoyed their company.

The following month I attended an OA convention where I met the person who was to be my first sponsor. He asked if I had worked the steps and I said No, they hadn't been explained that well.

He said, "How about if I come to your meeting and bring some people with me who can do just that?"

He came with two women a week later. That was the beginning of the changes that were to come in my life. With my fourth step, I got rid of all my hangups from childhood - hatred for parents, jealousies, uncomfortable feelings about sex and many other aspects of life. I felt my face clearing up for the first time in my life. There were no longer frown marks on my forehead. Where there had been drooping lines of depression there was now a wide smile. It felt like liquid draining out of my face. I wanted to tell everyone about this miracle, so I started speaking to various groups in the area.

The years that followed were not without their problems. This program is not a once-in-a-while thing. It is an everyday commitment. The abstinence is for the fat downstairs and the twelve steps are for the fat upstairs - in the head.

After finally attaining a normal weight I decided to go to work. Now the compliments started coming. Being admired was a new experience and I enjoyed it. I had never been thin since early childhood and I had never had so much attention from the opposite sex. It was too much to handle. I got involved with a man at work. At this point, my second sponsor turned up, helping me through many tenth steps and even an attempt to kill myself after the affair ended.

I thought I was beginning to grow up, so it was a shock when, during a third pregnancy, I gained my weight back. I had never expected this, though I realized that I had let go of my program. It was not easy to begin again, but with two months of abstinence, my weight was almost back to normal.

After living for a year in a small town that had no OA meetings, we moved to a large city where I continued to lose weight. Then my husband began losing jobs again. Out of insecurity, I starting eating and the weight crept back on. I prayed and attended meetings regularly, but my mind was not open and I didn't hear anything. In spite of my pain, however, I knew my Higher Power was listening and would eventually allow me to lose the weight when I was ready.

Two years ago, I worked part-time for an agency that sent me to a job where another OA member was employed. She was abstaining and she talked program every day. I didn't always listen, but I heard. After I left that job, I continued talking to her on the telephone. Finally, it got through to me. I started abstaining. Again, I lost all my excess weight. I had reached my last bottom.

Abstinence for me now is not eating any of my binge foods. But that is not my problem. I am my problem. I have to read my literature, practice my steps and let go of my will every morning. I can never again forget who I am or where I came from. I call an OA member every morning, even if it is just to say Good morning. This is part of my program. Whatever it takes to keep this weight off and the peace of mind I now have is what I will do. If it means making phone calls by the dozen and going to two and three meetings a week, I do it. Helping others, speaking at meetings, spreading the word. This time I am desperate and I will go to any lengths to keep my program. It is a constant daily program of reading, phoning and working with others.

The beauty we all share comes from within and if we don't have that, no matter how much weight we lose, we have nothing. Giving service, working the steps and abstaining one day at a time - these are the tools for this wonderful program for living.

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