The more “cured” I felt, the more my inner used car salesman convinced me that I really could eat that extra stuff . . .
When I’m asked to speak at a meeting or lead a retreat, I usually start off with my name, etc., and then explain, “I’ve been in the OA program exclusively for 46 years. Hard to believe because I’m only 39.” (My actual age is 80.) And then I say, “I like to tell people my length of program endurance because it sounds like I must know something. But the truth is the longer I’m in this program, the less I know.” At this point, the people in the meeting who are also longtimers smile in recognition.
It is wonderful to reach “dummyhood.” Finally.
My basic story is that God graced me with abstinence and a l00-pound (45-kg) weight loss my first 18 years in program. Next, I tried to be an OA star: I did multitudes of service, wrote stuff, led retreats, sponsored, and was even on television talking about OA (with my face blanked out, of course). I was flying and enjoying every moment of my newfound freedom. Abstinence brought me beaucoup opportunities to discover myself and try out my gifts, things I would never have believed I had.
And then. Well, I got busy with my new life, and since I thought I was “recovered,” I figured I didn’t need to talk with Higher Power every day to “improve conscious contact” as we say in one of those Steps. (Funny thing—it took me four decades to see the word “improve” Step Eleven.) The more “cured” I felt, the more my inner used car salesman convinced me that I really could eat that extra stuff because, after all, I knew it all now. True, I hadn’t worked all the Steps thoroughly—I didn’t much like Six, Seven, Eight, or Nine, so I only gave them lip service. Wryly, I had thought “Take what you like and leave the rest” must be applicable to the Steps too.
So guess what happened? You know it. I entered relapse. Guess how long it took me, this “recovered” OA member, to gain back 100 pounds? Within six to eight months, I weighed 100 pounds more. I was living in Switzerland at the time, so thankfully none of my OA friends in California could see me. And when I moved back to the US, I went to live in Massachusetts instead of California. (I wonder why?)
I kept going to meetings in Massachusetts and eventually did move back to California (to a different city than the one I’d left), where I attended more meetings. During my relapse, I never took back sugar, but unfortunately abstaining from sugar didn’t make me abstinent. And because I wasn’t working toward a healthy body weight, so I was not abstinent. One can’t sponsor unless one is truly abstinent, so I didn’t sponsor.
So, how long did I stay in relapse? Ten years. Yep. I became so ingrained with the extra food that the thought of losing all the extra food goodies felt like I’d be losing my life and my “friend and protector,” food. And when someone once told me that Defiance is my middle name, I thought that was impossible because . . . well, because I’m so nice. Ha! Now I have to admit it: Defiance is my middle name. Tell me what to eat and how to eat it, and I will hiss and spit at you. Not so nice. How horrible this disease is.
What made the difference finally? Well, God in all sorts of forms, including hearing one question I heard at a spiritual gathering: What are you doing that’s keeping you from the abundant life God has planned for you? When I truly heard it, I had the sudden realization that my life in relapse had lost its abundance, that the light of my inner candle felt snuffed out, that a world that used to be full of colors had become gray and foggy, and that oh, yes, my life used to be abundant.
What are you doing that’s keeping you from the abundant life God has planned for you?
I sigh every time I repeat this question because that realization made the beginning of a difference. I began to take responsibility for my choices to avoid abstinence instead of waiting around with that horrible phrase “grant me the willingness to be willing,” which had kept me from doing anything for abstinence for ten years because as long as I was waiting for God to do something, I was safe, sort of like the couple on the top of the house in a flood being sent all kinds of help in the form of a boat, a helicopter, etc., yet refusing the help by saying “That isn’t God. I’m waiting for God.”
The next thing that made a difference was when someone asked, “I wonder what it is that prevents you from choosing abstinence?” I highly recommend exploring this question—every day if necessary—and writing about it. I ended up arguing with God almost every day about how I didn’t really have to be abstinent, I wasn’t going to give up extra food, I couldn’t do it anyway, and why was God so persistent in bugging me?! Get the heck off my shoulder, God!
I wonder what it is that prevents you from choosing abstinence? I highly recommend exploring this question—every day if necessary—and writing about it.
Guess what happened? I finally became worn out with the struggle. I mean God, whatever God is, just would not leave me alone. It was infuriating. But I became so totally weak—Aha! “It is weakness, not strength . . . ” (Our Invitation to You)—well, I became so totally weak that one night, without meaning to, without planning it, I found myself down on my knees begging God to please help me give up the extra food, and—finally!—I said, “I will do anything you ask . . .”
God did take the extra food, and I started doing anything I thought God was asking me to do. I got a brave sponsor. I adopted a food plan with fear and trembling. I began to talk with God every day. I worked the blasted program.
So I lost 100 pounds again. That was 16 years ago, and I’ve been at a healthy weight for these 16 years. As I write this, I am abstinent. Yet I know all too well I could eat a refrigerator as soon as I stop typing. A balanced awareness of that fact is crucial, I think.
I figure one of the reasons I’ve been mysteriously given this abstinence that has nothing to do with willpower (over food, I have none) is to share that this kind of coming back to life is possible. And that God never gives up on me, even when I do.
I make sure I talk with God every day now, even when I don’t want to, even when I doubt, even when I see that God is really there, and even when I feel sometimes like I’m wandering in a desert. Because to quote a spiritual text you may be familiar with, some days “my soul is like a watered garden,” and that is enough to keep going.
May you keep going.
—Mimi D., California USA
