As a psychiatric nurse, Nancy Z. from Missouri USA knew what insanity looked like, so at first it seemed absurd to her that she needed to be restored to sanity. But as she started to look at the evidence—her weight and her relationships—she started to see that there was something for her in taking the Second Step.
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.”
Deborah has endured jail, marital separation, and cancer, but today she shines with recovery. “I am now claiming six years of abstinence,” she says. “Y’all have taught me life is fun, but my meals can’t be fun. . . . It’s worth all the daily discipline for freedom from food obsession.”
A poem of recovery — of taming the “dragon” of compulsive eating through the guidance of the OA Fellowship.
Taking an anniversary cruise while carrying 300 pounds (136 kg) of body weight left Elizabeth feeling despondent and suicidal. When she joined OA, her weight loss journey began. But her greatest progress so far has been working the Steps to covering and recover from the dysfunctions that have been driving her compulsive overeating.
Sharon’s old life was one of constant bingeing and restricting and a false belief that being thin meant being happy. That all changed as the result of working the Twelve Steps, and in this story, Sharon shares her two main methods for working the Steps: 1) quickly every day and 2) slowly and thoroughly over weeks and months.
I am a very grateful compulsive overeater with thirty-six years of abstinence. That is amazing to me, but not to my Higher Power, who asks me only to be abstinent one day at a time. The adding up of days and weeks and years is in the hands of my Higher Power. My job is … Continued
Here is a simple question that has helped me numerous times: how important is it? Asking myself this helps me reframe how I think about problems and situations and spurs me to ask myself these follow-up questions: Is it worth my sanity and my abstinence to keep obsessing over a problem? The answer is always “No, it is not.” Without spiritual, emotional, and physical recovery, I cannot maintain contact with my HP, who helps me … Continued
I heard the Second Step and had a spiritual experience that I’ve never forgotten,” says N.P., who went on to lose 75 pounds (34 kg) after joining OA. “Nothing could keep me from coming back.”