Working the steps.

[Nina Kay]

I've decided to work the steps basicly. I thought that if I wrote it here, it would help me.

1. We admitted we were powerless over our compulsive behavior with food - that our lives had become unmanageable.

I do admit that I am completely and totally powerless over my compulsive behavior with food and with my food addiction - my life is continually unmanageable because of my insanity from this.

If any of you would like to join me in this, you are most certainly welcome to.
Thank you all so much for allowing me to share this with you.

[Neagrm]

Hi Nina. This is a great idea. I think it could be so helpful in exploring our behavior and transforming ourselves. Do you mean by your last comment about "joining" you in this, are you inviting us to write about our own thoughts regarding our own progress on this thread? I don't want to step on what you're trying to do. Thanks,
Nea

[cali]

Nina-
I am so happy to see this post----I have not been here in a while because of my tremendous struggle with food. The shame, guilt and remorse has kept me away. I just couldn't take it anymore so I logged in only to find a PM from another member here. I was so filled with hope when I read it. I know if I don't tell anyone what is going on, I won't get better.

1. We admitted we were powerless over our compulsive behavior with food - that our lives had become unmanageable.

I am on step one. I am powerless, and I need help. I will join you today, and one day at a time I will work the steps with my food addiction to the very best of my ability.

thank you Nina!

[Nina Kay]

Yes Neagrm, I do want you to really join me with your own personal sharing. That will help us all, don't you think?

Hi Cali. I'm so glad to hear that you are going to join in too. That's so great.

Please share with us on Step one, anything that you want to.

[Pony]

Great thread Nina. Hope to check in on it and maybe contribute also (as I can)

I think it is very important to work the steps as you try to change your eating habits and retrain yourself to think heathly. Good job

[Neagrm]

Thanks Nina! and everyone.

Okay, here goes .... LOL

Hmmm.


Well, this idea really appeals to me and I just have to get going on it. Trouble is I tend to write in a wordy way when trying to figure something out and I'm not clear already. I am one who figures it out AS I write so I'm afraid it'll get convoluted. But, ... you all are so great to listen and bear with each other so I'm going to try to share.

Nea

[cali]

I don't think I realized the power food has over me---it was not until I dwindled my other addictions down, and it is only the food left that I see the power.
I am "accepting" that I am powerless over my compulsive behavior with food - that my life has become unmanageable---oh yes!

Today is a new day. I have NOT consumed anything negative and I feel ok. I would like to get my hands on some OA material but yes, step one is where I am.

I need to say that I have so much hope--that's why I know I've still got it in me to fight for a better way of living with food!

[Neagrm]

Step one is the foundation to all the rest and is more important than I thought when I first heard it. It also has rich implications that have taken me time to learn and appreciate.

It's simple to say -- Well sure, I'm powerless over whatever ... my life is unmanageable ... in this particular area.

It took time, but I see now that at first I left out "admitted" and re-wrote the ending to my own meaning, i.e. "in this area." I'd hear or read step one every week at the first Al-Anon meetings I went to and think -- It's a nice step and yep, people have to first acknowledge a problem before they can do anything about it.

I also thought it didn't really apply to me, but I went through the motions with everyone because I could feel the peace and serenity and wanted to make it my own. What first got me to those meetings was a crisis in my marriage and I thought it was my spouse with the problem. It took several years in and out the doors until three years ago I returned for good and found a sponsor.

Back to Step 1: "Admitted" has come to mean so much more to me now. To "admit" has a great deal more behind it than meets the eye. I had to become AWARE I had a problem with food in order to admit it.

To me this step is mostly about awareness; the kind of awareness that includes what I feel and think and how I behave -- what happens because of it. To truly understand requires serious personal work if I really want to "get it" and remember what I'm working on -- me, myself, and I.

That's all for now. Thanks,
Nea

[Biscuits]

What a fantastic thread!!!!!!!!!!!

One of the most impprtant things i have learnt i my years in recovery is that i am as powerless over food today as i was when i first stepped throught the door of OA 11 years ago.

It is something i learnt the hard way but still a lesson that i needed. After 18 months of true honeymoon abstinence i fooled myself into believing that i had self control around the food and i started reintroducing my trigger foods back into my life. To begin with i had them as part of my meal but it didn't take long for them to start appearing outside of meal times and eventually the inevitable happenedd and i ended up giving my life and will over to them.

It took me another three weeks to admit i was back at step one because my pride got in the way. Today i know that i am totally powerless over certain foods (I have a list as long as my arm that are poison to me and today choose not to eat them one day at a time with Gods love) and work the steps in my life to keep myself spiritually and emotionally well. If i continue to do this then the food cannot reach me as i am living as God directs and not as the desease dictates.

Love to all

[cali]

I am bewildered....but happy at the same time because today I did something for me---
I went to my first OA meeting today. as I stated in another thread, I felt more at home there then at ANY meeting I have ever been to. I am totally powerless. I have so much work to do. My triggers are glaring..I feel like I did the first couple days of not drinking..emotions all over t he place..I want to curl up in my bed with the covers over my head.....

[barb dwyer]

Something came to me last night - am I the only one who gets these huge 'thoughts' right when going to sleep... then have to get up and journal for a couple of hours about it?

Anyway -

I was thinking about the nature of alcoholism as being a spiritual maladay ....

but for *ME* ... the eating disorder ... is an EMOTIONAL one.

The other thing - you go a couple of days 'on program' with drinking -
you ALREADY begin to feel better.
The headache lightens up, at least.
YOu get SOMETHING.

You go a couple of days 'on program' with eating ...
or NOT eating as much ...
... nothing.

And since it's emotional, more tha Spiritual ...
there's no reward.
other than moral.
and that don't get it when there's oeros in the pantry.

Ookaaayy then -
just a thought that came to me.

[Neagrm]

I seems like shame is such a part of my addiction; am I addicted to shame also? It's such a familiar feeling it's become entrenched?

I can see my powerlessness and the unmanageability in my life from it. I cannot control it. The addiction has it's own pattern. Shame and guilt are the themes.

What my hope is ... by admitting I am powerless over it, somehow I will regain power in my life.

I wonder in what ways I'm not surrendering to this step? Are there more insights I need to learn that I'm not getting yet?

Self protection is part of it. I give myself the illusion of self-protection and power when I have more padding around my body. People see me and can't miss me. I have felt I have no voice in some important areas of my life so I've made my body the statement? I fight the helplessness/powerlessness in a passive-aggressive way?

But now I've become my own enemy by the harm I do to myself. The short-term satisfactions over-ride my intellect, emotion takes over, the addicted body takes over and I'm out of control.

How can I possibly accept this about myself? Self-acceptance is a key to progress they say, but I'm caught up in self-condemnation. I don't know how one gets to acceptance. For me this is all spiritual, my soul is suffering because of my actions/inactions.

I imagine there's a right way to do step one? Is that my problem? I am not doing it right. Ha, of course there's no one right way and it's progress not perfection.

Oh I KNOW I'm powerless and unmanageable!!!

Nea

[cali]

Neagrm:
Oh I KNOW I'm powerless and unmanageable!!!

That is me right now! I swore I was going to do the right thing today....I had every intention to "do the next darn right thing".....I have been steadily gaining weight....
"self-condemnation"---.............................this is nuts....I can stay "freE" from other vices----why oh why do I do this??????????????????????????????????????????

[cali]

so far so good for today. I want step one for my food issue to be as important to me as it is with alcohol. I was going to go to the vending machine----I told myself I would select the healthiest item they had to offer......I decided not to go......I mean really, I won't go into a bar to order diet coke......this seems so clear to me right now---but it isn't always so. I want to be willing to go to any lengths to get better. For me its 5 minutes at a time. so far step one is working for me today, because I am working "it".

[cali]

I want to keep step one on my mind constantly.....but today I feel like I am doing step 2 which is wicked cool! I really thought that if I was already in a 12 step program that I could just "transfer" my step work that I have already done (w/ alcohol) right to food....well, I can't.
I have to have an entirely separate program for my eating. I really get that now.
I see that "self loathing" and lack of self worth are part of "black pit" that envelopes me with food....I want to get better---I want to "live"!

[Nina Kay]

"The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous" is OA literature that I thought that I'd share from, and I'd like for each of you to share what you get out of this paragraph, from your own ESH.

In Overeaters Anonymous we begin our program of recovery by admitting that we're powerless over food. Some of us have difficulty with this admission because we've had so much experience in trying to control our eating. At one time, or periodically, most of us were able to do so. Our eating may be out of control right now, we persisted in thinking, but someday soon we'll again muster the strength of character needed to check our eating excesses, and this time we'll keep them under control. For all of us, however, the days of controlled eating grew fewer and farther apart, until at last we came to OA, looking for a new solution.

I've had alot of difficulty in the past thinking that I was powerless over food because I have managed to control it for a while, at a few intervals of my life. I kept thinking that I've done it before so I'll eventually get a grip and be able to have the self-control that I need to do it again. Each time that I did get control for a while, I thought that I would never let myself overeat ever again. I knew that I could do this because I thought that it was just a matter of making up my mind. I knew that I loved food, but I didn't ever want to overeat ever again. I kept trying to do it by myself again and again, for years and then went to OA with a friend and listened to others tell my story and I realized that it wasn't just me that had this same problem, so it was okay for me to admit to them and to myself that I couldn't control my compulsive overeating by myself. I was powerless over my eating and food. I needed alot of help, if I ever wanted to be healthy again.

[dancingkat]

i have never understood using the 12 steps for food problems. if i am powerless over food then the solution of course is to give it up which means stop eating which in the end justifies anorexia. its always confused me yet i use the 12 steps for alcohol cause i can NOT drink and be sober but food is different. you have to make a peace with it and still eat right? yet thats like saying you make peace with alcohol and drink only on weekends. i am just very confused by the 12 steps and food.

[sugarssweetpea]

I believe that the 12 steps with food are in regards to how much you eat & what you eat. We are to eat to live, not live to eat. That in my opinion is what has made controlling food much harder for me than alcohol or drugs. I could quit them. I can abstain from them, but as you said, you cannot abstain from food, or that brings on a whole other issue ...... still with food though. You have to find a healthy balance. I for one, turn to food for comfort as I turned to drugs & alcohol. When I am stressed, nothing a little chocolate cannot cure (it raises the serotonin levels & endorphin levels like drugs & alcohol), when I am sad, the same applies, when I am happy, I can celebrate with some cake, when I go to a party, hmmmm, what do they have to EAT. It is still an addictive behavior & that is what needs to change more than what the addiction is.

[dancingkat]

hm still i find it very confusing. though i do understand the balance part. i have been struggling to find that for years. i do get a high off food but its in two forms either by starving from it or actually eating soemthing and then purging. any bad behavior with food will cause damage to you nutritionally. whether it be starving or overeating. In both cases a person can be nutritionally damaged. perhaps the connection with the 12 steps in confsuing to me cause for years i have read them in regards to alcohol and it has helped me get sober and i guess using the same guidlines for something like food - a basic human need which we HAVE to have daily - muddles things a bit. i refer to the 12 steps when i am triggered to drink and such and it helps me be reminded to abstain from alcohol. Yet i guess another part of me fears the anorexic mind in me. its a very nasty tricky little beast who i am sure would love the chance to justify not eating. i am afraid if i use these 12 steps in regards to food then i would justify myself never to eat again. part of it also boils down to the fact that i am borderline personality and often think strongly in black and white thinkign. its very hard for me in any aspect of my life to find a middle ground( in my life, actions and even with ppl in my life) thus is why this life balance has been so elusive to me over the last decade. When i get a thought in my head i take it to extreme often without regards to long term consequences. through lots of therapy i have now been able to stop most of these thoughts in their tracks yet i still have not achieved a life style of moderation.