Flying Up the Wrong Tree
A bird’s repeated failures reminds an OA member of the insanity of compulsive eating behaviors and how an outside influence is essential to arrest those behaviors.
Abstinence and Recovery
Progress not Perfection: Lesson from a Turtle
How does the turtle make progress?
A Disease of the Mind (Overeaters Anonymous, Third Edition, Appendix B)
A medical doctor asserts that compulsive eating is a disease that precedes other chronic disorders. The disease can be successfully treated by applying treatment principles similar to those used for alcoholism.
A Disease of the Body (Overeaters Anonymous, Third Edition, Appendix C)
A medical doctor puts the high cost of obesity in society in perspective and explains how OA provides a solution for individuals suffering from compulsive eating.
Prey/Pray
A poem of recovery — of taming the “dragon” of compulsive eating through the guidance of the OA Fellowship.
An Expert’s Prayer: Help Me Be Teachable
“When you have absolutely no self-esteem … sometimes you hide behind a wall of being ‘the expert.’” says this OA member. “I have made so many changes in my life, but there’s one that excites me the most.”
Last House on the Block
“Many of us come to OA feeling like this is the ‘last house on the block,’” Andrea writes. ”Thank God we find acceptance and understanding in OA.” Read about Andrea’s journey through food obsession, recovery, relapse, and finding serenity in our program.
Whole New Me
Joan has completely turned her life around in the four years since she joined OA. “The person I am today is no longer full of yesterday’s resentments,” she says. “She is a person who seeks daily to be the OA message.”
Totally Committed
Mary Ann weighed 236 pounds (107 kg) and was facing a fatal liver condition. That was her wake up call. She came to OA, threw herself into the program, lost 106 pounds (48 kg), and has found spiritual, physical, and emotional recovery.
New Chapters, New Truths
“If I could control food the way it controls me, I wouldn’t need OA,” says one OA member. For years, she lived life “in the food” and in other addictions to cope with the echoes of childhood abuse, but now she is standing vulnerably in our loving program where she has found a path to healing.