Day ???

I had a bacon-egg-and-cheese sandwich this morning. It was what I wanted. I was about a 7 on the hungry scale (10 being the hungriest possible) and needed food because of a migraine/hangover. It did hum to me about a 7, probably because it's my forbidden binge food. I feel somewhat good, a bit scared, a bit happy about eating it.

Day 26

I had a slip yesterday. It followed several days of bad attitude and feeling really disconnected from OA after going to Pittsburgh, despite going to two meetings this week. It just didn't gel, and I didn't want to do any of the things I was supposed to do to maintain my program. It was a bad attitude times 10. All this culminated in my doing an actual binge yesterday. Still not the "feel sick, can't button your pants" variety binge, but a deliberate "I'm going to the grocery store and I'm going to buy my binge foods" binge. Which I did. And I ate most of them. And it calmed my nerves a bit. And then I woke up this morning with an even worse attitude. The kind of attitude I have when I'm in the food. an I don't care, screw it, life sucks, I'm just going to roll over and go back to sleep attitude. But I couldn't sleep. So I went to a meeting. And then I called my sponsor, which I didn't do yesterday.

My sponsor told me to read a passage in the Big Book called "Acceptance Was the Answer." She told me to see what I got out of it, think about the things in my life that were unacceptable or that I was not accepting, and to write on them. Which I am doing. But very much with an "I hate this, this sucks, I want to stop" attitude. Ugh.

My first thoughts were, "why is she making me read this? It doesn't apply to me." It was all about he couldn't admit he was an alcoholic. I thought, "is she saying I'm not admitting this?" I think I have admitted I'm a compulsive eater. But about 3/4 of the way through the story I started realizing that this man's story does apply. And I started underlining. The first part I underlined said that at first during abstinence he had a reason (legit, he thought) for why he should take a pill each time he was tempted. I do that. I think that my pain or emotions are bad enough that I need the food.

Then he said he got to a point where he coudl say he was an alcoholic and it was "all right" with him. I haven't done the "its all right part." I always wondered in meetings when people said they were grateful compulsive eaters, not gratful recovering compulsive eaters. I got how you could be grateful to recover, but grateful just to be a compulsive eater? That didn't register. Though you do hear peple say they woudn't have learned the life skills they have without being in OA, so I guess I can see it. Then the story says that he began living in the solution to his problem, rather than living in th problem itself. I think I've been living in the problem. I can't get out of the negativity. I need to live in the solution.

Day 23

Yesterday I went to my first meeting in 6 days, and I'm glad I went. We had a relatively small meeting, which meant that pretty much everyone was guilted into speaking. I spoke and was glad i did, even though I didn't say anything too exciting. But it was interesting. After 23 days of abstinence, I'm starting to feel like its my job to comfort and offer support to those who are struggling or new. One old-timer sounded like she was struggling, and I found myself, after the meeting, going up to her and asking how she was doing and trying to find words of support instead of talking about myself. That's something I've been very self-conscious about. I've felt since July that all I do is TAKE, talking about myself, and not offer advice. But I think it's taken that long to really buckle down, so I've been struggling myself since then. Its way too early to say that I feel like I've got it figured out and that I can offer any advice to folks. But at least I can share positive stuff right now instead of negative or uncertain stuff, and that's a step in the right direction.

I'm between steps right now. I've finished reading about and writing on step one. I need to re-read what I've written on step one to make sure its really internalized, but I also need to meet with and discuss what I've written with my sponsor before moving onto step 2. I'll be curious to hear what she has to say. So instead of moving on, I'm reading some other OA literature, including the Big Book and Overeaters Anonymous. I read three stories in Overeaters Anonymous. And they all spoke to me generally in some way - they always do overall, in the way that I understand the pain and frustration adn hopelessness you feel when you can't stop binging. But none of them really grabbed me.

Though in the last story I read, there was a line right at the beginning where the author said "So great had been my isolation before coming to OA that no once had I ever told anyone about my bingeing, not even the psychiatrist who treated me for severe depression." I can relate to that. I've told people I'm a compulsive overeater, but its only recently that I've been able to admit out loud that I'm a binge eater. Somehow it seems worse - grosser, less appealing, more mentally wrong. I even asked one day why people in OA don't identify themselves as binge eaters and instead just call themselves compulsive overeaters. I was told that binge eating falls into the category of compulsive eating. But for me, I almost need it to be more specific, to admit exactly what I've been doing out loud to the group. The one group that won't judge. Maybe at my next meeting I'll identify myself that way. But one other big step I've taken recently was admitting to my therapist exactly what I consume during a binge. I kept a food log, showing rigorous honesty, even during a binge. It was sort of embarrassing, but I also think I'm numb now and willing to go to "whatever lengths," even if it means admitting my worst to a (relative) stranger.

Day 17

I binged last night. Not an all-out can't button your pants or breath binge, but it was unhealthy food, it was deliberate, and it was because I wanted it, not because I was hungry. I'd been craving chocolate and peanut butter for a while (a week) and had in my head that I wanted Coldstone Creamery's chocolate Reese's mashup. I've been resisting using the tools, but then I got it in my head that I could use a substitute. A substitute being fat-free, sugar-free fudge pudding with fat-free Cool Whip mixed with peanut butter. Better for me, probably, (in terms of calories and fat and sugar), but not in terms of health. Health-wise, it was very bad for me. I got all the stuff at the grocery store after lunch and also got a bottle of wine. I consumed all of it. I didn't feel too bad physically, but mentally I wasn't too happy.

I'm not restarting my abstinence date, because it's a slip, not the end of the world. When I got up this morning, I really wanted healthy food and didn't like that I'd had that junk. And I've continued to eat healthy all day and I'm about to go to the gym. Have I learned anything from this? I'd love to say yes, though I'm not sure that's true. I think what might be different this time is me acknowledging that I really do have this disease and that having that one (or 500) compulsive bite really is a problem, as it's much harder in general after that. I've also acknowledged that I have to keep doing what I'm supposed to do according to this program. The program knows better t han I do. So I went to a meeting today, and I'm doing my reading and writing and food logging.

Step 1 says "As long as we refuse to acknowledge that we have this debilitating and ultimately fatal disease, we are not motivated to get the daily treatment for it that brings about our recovery." I think that is what is different this time, that made me do wht I was supposed to do today. I KNOW I have the disease of compulsive overeating, and so I knew that today, like every other day, needed me to engage in my daily treatment, despite the setback last night. And that, I hope, is my lesson.

Day 16

"We ate to sate the fears, the angers, the disappointments. We ate to escape the pressures of our problems or the boredom of everyday life. We procrastinated,we hid, and we ate."

Oh my god. This is the passage that really hits me in reading Step 1. It describes me exactly. I ate over everything. Every emotion, even some good ones. That summer in D.C. I ate to block out my loneliness and depression over feeling fat and feeling like I didn't fit in. That first year out of college I ate my way through my terror that I had no idea what to do with my life and the fact that my life post-college felt like this huge, empty void. What did people DO on weekends without friends around and studying to do? Life seemed like a vast emptiness with no end in sight. And my job was miserable, I hated it so. And so I ate. It wasn't conscious at all. It was just how I subconsciously knew how to make myself feel better.

Later on I ate to ease my depression and boredom and loneliness. Which of course only exacerbated all of those things. I had no friends, and spending Friday and Saturday nights binging and watching TV gave me an activity, and allowed me to blot out the fact that I had no real social life. I didn't have to think about it when I was high on food and drunk on alcohol. After a while I realized that it was wrong. I knew that I was not behaving in a way that was healthy, normal. In fact, I used to make trips up and down the stairs of my apartment building to the vending machine thinking all the time "here I go, feeding my eating disorder." Literally. Somehow I thought that taking the stairs instead of the elevator would be better for me. It meant I was getting some exercise in (I lived on the 7th floor) and maybe in some way that would make up for all the crap I was shoving in my body. It didn't of course. And it certainly made me worse mentally.

I did, at one point during these years, go to OA. But my thinking was that Step 1 was a bad idea. "If we tell ourselves we are powerless over food, then we program ourselves to go right on eating compulsively!" It's too negative, I thought. I think I lasted a month.

Later on, once I had become much more aware of what I was doing to myself, mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually, it became even harder. I knew what I was doing was wrong and I made lots of efforts to stop. But in those periods when I did manage to stop, "life without food seemed unbearable." Both because it meant I had to deal with situations/problems/emotions without numbing myself out and because it meant that one big activity in my life - the one thing that kept me company when I was alone - was the one thing I wasn't allowed to use. And I couldn't do it. It seemed impossible. And so I gave in. Every time I gave in, for one reason or another. I remember one time relatively recently when I didn't have plans on a Saturday night. I knew I shouldn't be eating - I'd been going to OA meetings but not really working the program - but I didn't know what else to do with myself. Lying on the couch without food to numb my loneliness out seemed like an unpleasant prospect. So what else could I do?

I have to deliberately, every minute of every day, make a conscious decision to choose to live my life differently. And that's what I'm trying to do.

Day 15

The second part of step 1 says that we admitted that our lives had become unmanageable. For me this is the key to admitting powerlessness. I've been trying to control my food for 15 years, but my life still has become totally unmanageable, despite my best efforts to control it (and the food). That, to me, is the essence of powerlessness. I've been trying for so long and failing for so long. I still have a large part of me that thinks that if I just try a little harder or get slightly better circumstances, or somehow get more willpower or get slightly less depressed, I'll finally be able to lick this thing. But that never happens. Ever.

I always attributed the fact that the happy thngs that happened in my life didn't make me happy because I was depressed. And I was depressed in large part because of my weight. But that's an oversimplification, in reality. Yes, I was depressed by my weight, and my weight made it so I was less comfortable doing the things I love (like hiking etc) and didn't get that normal "high" you get from happy activities. My self-consciousness also kept me isolated and away from many of the normal life activities that would make me happy, keeping me in a depressed, isolated state. And eating.

Were our homes pleasant places to be, or had we been living in an atmosphere or depression and anger? My home definitely wasn't a pleasant place to be. It was often overrun with dirty dishes, piles of dirty clothes, crumbs, dust etc. I never cleaned it unless I had to, was always to embarrassed to ahve anyone over. You're supposed to make your home a sanctuary. Mine was like a dark, denlike hell.

Had our chronic overeating affected our marriages and our friendships? Yes! I essentially disappeared on my college (and high school) friends out of wanting to isolate and eat and out of embarrassment for being fat and not succeeding the way they were. I remember the times when I would go visit my best friend, I would think to myself "ok, time to go pretend I'm a normal, happy functioning person in the real world for a little while, even though in my actual life I'm nothing like that." It was like putting on a facade for a little while and acting cheerful and normal, when I felt like a total fraud, unhappy, embarrassed, fat, like I didn't belong in the real world anymore. It was absolutely exhausting one time on one of these visits my life was so out of control - I had let my finances get out of control, my eating was a disaster etc. I got to the airport and something had gone wrong financially. I'm not sure what. Maybe a check had bounced. Whatever it was, I was in total despair, knowing that it was only my irresponsibility that had done this. I turned around and went back home and told my friend I "accidentally" missed my plane. I hadn't. I just couldn't face the truth that night. I'm sure I went home and binged. I don't know. I do know I went the next morning and felt a bit better.

As for other friends, I spent the first 5-7 years in my new town without making any friends. Maybe one or two. But I was totally consumed by my disease and felt I had no way to make friends. And marriage? Well, I'm not married. And the main reason for that is that I have been too consumed by my disease to even try or have a successful relationship. All my friends are having babies and married, and I'm trying to get over an eating disorder. It's incredibly demoralizing, but I have to accept that this is the path my life has taken, and change only what I can from here on out. I can't change the past.

Day 14

I was just sitting here trying to figure out why I've had such awful cravings the last few days. I made a hookup call (my first!) and talking helped a bit. Thinking usually doesn't help much, because let's be honest. We've all tried to think our way out of this, intellectualize something that can't be intellectualized. Because it is our brain doing the thinking, but it is our brain that is messing with us.

Some of the craving right now, for me, might also be my body. My body wants to binge. It really does. But mostly it's my brain that wants to binge, I think.

But I've been thinking while reading some of the Big Book about various things, and one thing that occurred to me, on a vague, fuzzy level, is that I don't think I've accepted that I can't take that first compulsive bite. I think there is part of me that thinks I should be able to have my binge foods and be ok with it and not eat compulsively after. I think part of me is "waiting" for the time when I feel like it's ok to have that bite (or maybe even that binge). I don't know if I believe that just one bite will be my downfall. I think, yes, after a bite (which I imagine would turn into a binge), I believe that I will crave more. I believe that. But I also think that I can get through the craving on willpower. But when have I ever shown the strength to do that? Ever? Even if it's not that day (though it frequently is) or the next day, eventually after I do give in that first little bit, it leads to a still bigger and bigger binge until I'm all-out binging again. So these people, who have more experience than I do and more recovery than I do, might actually be right. It really is about that first bite. And I know when I'm taking a compulsive bite. Or at least, I know when I have a frenzied feeling, a hole I'm needing to fill, and I take a bite almost because I don't have the will not to. But there are other compulsive first bites, I think. That bite of cake that you think is ok and you aren't feeling frenzied, but then it leads to a binge. What if that's my problem today? I had a bite of french toast. And it was amazing. And I really wanted more. Could that be making the cravings worse right now?

It's really interesting that I had this thought occur to me while reading the Big Book right now - that is, the thought that I don't really believe that I need to abstain forever. The thought that I am, at some point, on some level, anticipating that first bite and first binge, I'm just not letting myself do it yet. Then I turn to my designated section of the Twelve and Twelve and read the first highlighted passage that I'm supposed to write about today. And it says: "If we don't ever overeat, we don't trigger the reaction that makes us crave more." I guess that's my HP speaking to me. He wanted me to read that passage. It then goes on to say that "this has proven impossible for us to do on willpower alone. This is becaue our malady is not just physical in nature; it is emotional and spiritual as well" Which is true for me. So I need to address this need to binge this time. Not just hold out until my brain (or my disease) tells me I've behaved long enough and I can have a binge food. I need to address this need to binge now. Look at why, how, call people, write about it, think about it, read about it, pray about it. It's the end of the road. And I have to address the spiritual and emotional reasons why I want to binge and why I still think I can overeat at some point and come back. I think I will overeat at some point, but I cant spend my time waiting for it happen.

Day 11

Compulsive eating "doesn't stem from habits learned in childhood, nor from adjustment problems, not merely from a love of food, though all three of these things maybe be factors in its development. It may be that may of us were born with a physical or emotional predisposition to eat compulsively. Whatever the case, today we are not like normal people when it comes to eating."

This is an interesting passage to me. I have, at one point or another, attributed my food problems to each of the factors listed above. I did think they were probably culpable in combination, but I was inclined to blame childhood habits and adjustment problems. And I think I DO have a physical or emotional predisposition to eat compulsively. For whatever reason, my baseline approach to food is to eat too much and the wrong thing. Did I start out that way? Probably. I remember sneaking food as a very young child, so it seems it started when I was very young and it has simply progressed from there.

But I think that is not what OA deals with. "Whatever the case, today we are not like normal people when it comes to eating." It doesn't matter WHY or HOW you got this way. What matters is that you need to stop acting this way.

But "We can't quit." I've tried many times. Each time I think it's different or I think it's just because I'm going through a rough period in my life that I can't quit or I think that this is something I can control or will be able to control soon. But each time I get some measure of success, I fall. I end up back in the food, totally demoralized and depressed. And fat. It has become painfully clear that I CANNOT DO THIS ON MY OWN. I literally cannot stop eating on my own. I need the help of the group, of a higher power, of both.

I had a thought last night about OA and God. I was thinking about how some people use meetings and the collective group in OA as their higher power, and honestly, I think it's kind of all the same. The OA program helps you become the ideal version of yourself. It helps you acknowledge and rid yourself of character defects, it helps you approach life on a more even, kind, serene level. It helps you approach food the way you should approach it. And the idealized you is obviously the one that God wants, the one he intended for you to be. So the OA program is essentially putting God's wishes and plan into action. I like that. I don't know what it means in terms of my higher power, but it's a nice thought.

Day 10

Well, when counting the days like this it sure highlights how frequently (or infrequently) I post on here! Though if I'm going to try to write every day, hopefully I'll be on here more frequently. That's the goal anyway.

So today's topic is admitting I am powerless over food and that my life has become unmanageable.

The first thing that stands out for me is the idea that I had trouble admitting that I was powerless over food. I didn't like the idea that it wasn't in my control (am I a control freak?) or that it was hopeless. To me that felt so negative. Before even thinking about that I spent so long either not being aware that this was a problem or a problem that was affecting me or not being willing to let go of my control over it.

I was living under the delusion that "someday soon I would again muster the strength of character needed to check my eating excesses, and this time I'd keep them under control. But the days of controlled eating grew fewer and farther apart, until at last we came to OA, looking for a new solution."

Like many people in OA, I tried diet programs. Many of the. I did Weight Watchers 4-5 times, each time lasting a shorter and shorter time and losing less and less weight and being increasingly disgusted with it and myself. I tried Jenny Craig and a shake diet center. None of it worked, and as I got older and gained more weight, the diets worked less and less well. I couldn't even seem to put together 24 hours of controlled eating by the end. They just made me hungrier. I think that is what having a progressive disease is. It got worse and worse. My last attempt (the shake diet center) even came after I'd been to OA at one point. But I didn't believe I had a problem, really, I guess. I wasn't willing to admit that just willpower and counseling alone would be enough. I needed to admit that I am, really, and truly, incapable of fixing this on my own. I need someone much stronger, more powerful than I to help me with this disease. Because it is a disease. And I need to admit that so I can "cease blaming" myself. I heard in a meeting the other day that something is broken in us. Normal eater's status quo or baseline approach to food is to eat normal, healthful portions. My baseline approach to food is broken. My body and mind want me to eat junk and large quantities of it. That means something in me is broken, which means, by definition, that I have a disease. And if you have a disease, you seek out a cure.

The hard component for me at this point is admitting that this is a disease that is not just physical, but emotional and SPIRITUAL. I get the physical part. Science ha shown that the more junk food you eat, the more your body craves it because it becomes addicted to it. The emotional part I also get. I am an emotional eater. When I don't know how to deal with my emotions (and I almost never do - and boy have I had a lot of them lately), I eat over them. I just want to numb out and not feel anymore. Not think about what I don't like in my life. And there's a lot of that too. The really tricky part for me is that this is spiritual. And that's the part that I actually think might be the key, even though it's the hardest to wrap my head around. If this disease were just physical and emotional, then abstaining from eating junk and trigger foods and going to counseling to address your emotional problems would be enough. But it's not. It is not. I need something else. A belief that there is something greater than will solve this problem for me, with my help. I've often thought I didn't need religion or god. But I've also found myself thinking a lot over the last few years that I was "morally bankrupt." What I could have said was "spiritually bankrupt," I think. I have had no reserve of faith on which to draw. Where should that faith come from? Faith in what? I don't know. But I need to find out.