Martine from Texas USA used to binge eat on the way home from work, stopping at multiple fast food drive-thrus. “But tonight . . .,” she says, ”I thanked my Higher Power . . . and the OA program for giving me the freedom . . . to look back on my day of healthy and abstinent eating.”
Sepidah, an OA member from Iran, came into the program feeling physically, mentally, and spiritually bankrupt. “I could barely bear the weight of my soul,” she says. Through OA and working the Twelve Steps, however, she has found a workable solution. “I am calm,” she says. “I sleep more peacefully . . . and I have better balance in working the Steps.”
Abused from age 6, Linda started eating compulsively at an early age. As a young adult, she was unable to grasp the nature of her problem with food. When health problems mounted, and she was unable to cope, “I threw in the towel,” she says, “by overeating.” And that’s when the message of OA started making sense.
Laura from Connecticut USA originally thought that coming to an OA meeting was the same as taking the First Step. But for eight years, she never found a lasting abstinence. It wasn’t until she faced the prospect of an early death from obesity that she came to understand what it truly means to work Step One.
As I continue to work the Steps and continue to attend meetings, I’ve been delivered more hope and faith in the power of this program . . . I came into Overeaters Anonymous nearly a year ago, distraught and caught in a relentless cycle of bingeing and at other times bingeing and purging. I was … Continued
OA member A.K. from Wyoming USA was consumed by the demons of her addiction to food. “I withdrew from my friends and family, too embarrassed to face them in my current state,” she says. When she followed her therapist’s suggestion to try OA, she experienced, “a profound emotional and spiritual shift” in addition to “shedding physical weight.”
Even after weight-loss surgery, Kaveh from Tehran, Iran, discovered that he could not overcome the feelings of inadequacy that had led him to overeat. He tried books and therapy, but ultimately found emotional recovery in OA. Working all Twelve Steps, Kaveh learned to “heal the overeater not only physically but emotionally and spiritually.”
OA member A.M. recalls the exasperation she felt one day because she could not stop eating compulsively. “I can’t do it! I can’t do it!” she cried. To which her husband, also in a Twelve Step program, replied, ”No, hon, you can do it alone. I suggest you go back to OA.”
Linda realized that one cause of her compulsive eating was coping with her neurodivergent/neurodiverse condition. “For example, if I was exposed to lots of noise, talking, or activity . . . I would seek out food to combat my distress,” she says. She discovered that “OA can take care of that too.”
“I was a fat kid, a fat adolescent, and . . . weighing 315 pounds (143 kg), I was a fat adult,” says Stuart, an OA member from Louisiana USA. Stuart suffered relapses and weight gains “but I never quit coming back,” he says. “In concert with my Higher Power, I have achieved a normal body weight of 139–144 pounds (63–65 kg) for the very first time in my adult life. . . . I am eternally grateful.“