Tag Archives: overeaters

Day 4 of Abstinence (round 4)

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I got back working with my sponsor and finished going over my resentments, fears, and sexual regrets. I still hold onto a few resentments and fears after discussing them with her, but was told to just ask my higher power for help with those on a daily basis. I started doing that before I meditate. I have meditated 4 days out of 7 this week, which is a marked improvement. I also did strength training 2/3 times this week. I meant to do it three days a week to start with, so I am happy that I was able to do what I did. I am enjoying that I have more time, even though my husband is now working some evenings, requiring me to make dinner, do dishes, and hang out with our son. And I still feel more relaxed because I have that extra time with our son and extra time at home.

I broke my abstinence this week. I broke it over two cookies and returned to my abstinence right away. It was sort of intentional and sort of unintentional. I work at a school. I discovered that their baked goods usually have a small enough amount of sugar that I can eat them in my abstinence. Many of the other foods are like that there too. They have Italian ices and soda made with fruit juice. They had cookies for sale, so I thought it might have been the case. It wasn’t. They were full of sugar. I thought about asking my sponsor whether or not that meant I broke my abstinence. I thought about it and realized that if I had to ask, I probably did. So I re-set my count again. I am on day 4 (again).

My husband and I have a movie night once a week. We watched a movie based on an anorexic girl. She was in a facility with other people with eating disorders. Most of the other girls in the facility were bulimic or anorexic. There was one “token” fat girl who was a binge eater. I started thinking about it. Why are there so many movies about anorexic girls and none about binge eaters? I would hazard to guess that there are many more overeaters out there, considering the average BMI in this country. It’s because people would rather look at skinny girls, even the ones that are all bones and clearly unhealthy, than look at a fat girl.

When the movie was over, my husband and I got into a discussion about anorexia. He was surprised about how much knowledge I had on the subject. I told him I used to be interested in it as a disorder — probably because it was the exact opposite. I wished I was able to just not eat and lose all of my weight. I even spent some time looking up their “tips and tricks” to not eating. I even stopped eating for a whole three day stretch. But because of my issues, I couldn’t keep it up. I suppose it’s a good thing in hindsight, but I almost wished for it for a while.

I am back down to 226lbs (the weight I was at before I broke my abstinence). I only have 6 more lbs to go before I get to my pre-pregnancy weight! I have 27lbs to go before I get under 200lbs (my current weight-loss goal). I am hoping to try for another child soon and am hoping to at least be under 200lbs by then!

OA Recover – Day 1 of Abstinence (round three)

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Last week was probably one of the longest and most stressful weeks I have had in a very long time. I was working 14 hour days plus trying to find time for myself and my 1 1/2 year old. I hadn’t spoken to my sponsor in about three weeks because I felt like I just didn’t have the time for it, but partially because I really got sick of sending her the same meaningless phrase each day stating that I would follow specific eating rules. Needless to say, on the day before my presentation, I broke my abstinence of over 90 days. I went home and broke down and cried to my husband. I decided to just ride it out, eat what I wanted for the next day, then get back on the OA bandwagon on Sunday.

As much as I hate that I broke my abstinence, I learned some valuable lessons. I learned how much my body hurt after binging on sugar. I also learned how all sugar seemed to taste the same after so long. I have never really used this phrase before, but everything I ate — cookies, brownies, chocolate bars, seemed too sweet.

I posted that I broke my abstinence and that I would start again two days later on an OA support group on Facebook. They just told me that it wouldn’t happen and that the “tomorrow mindset” never worked for anybody. Everybody assumed that I wouldn’t actually be abstinent the next day like I said I would. Well, I did. To be honest, it really bothered me that people didn’t have faith that I would do what I said I would do. To be fair, they were probably just judging me how they themselves would act. The next day, I got back on the abstinence bandwagon and discovered that I had gained 4lbs in those two days. I kept it up until later in the week I wanted a cookie. So I had a cookie and went right back to being abstinent. I am now questioning whether or not I really do have a problem with overeating or not.

I am currently on day 3 on my third round of abstinence. I contacted my sponsor, apologized for the long absence, and we got back to step work. I really don’t like how her response to almost everything is “let it go and give it up to your higher power”, but I am still willing to give it a try. She also seems to have forgotten that I am Pagan in that time. She referred to “Him” and I asked who she was referring to. She meant my higher power, but assumed it was male and singular (sigh). I didn’t lay into her about it, but it bothered me. Then she sent me another meme about “God” and I told her my higher power wasn’t necessarily singular or male and let it go. My first sponsor was Pagan, but required a higher level of accountability than I actually needed. I am still not sure about this one, but am doing the best I can!

OA Recovery: Day 83 of Abstinence

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I have been a very bad sponsee. I have had so much going on at work, that I haven’t been talking to her. I feel like I haven’t talked to her in a week, maybe more. I have seen her on a website we are both on offering to sponsor other people so I am not seven sure if she still considers herself to be my sponsor. I am still asking my higher power for help remaining abstinent every day, but don’t have the time to meditate and listen to my higher power. Somehow, I have been able to remain abstinent throughout all of this. I catch one phone meeting a week. Does this make me just a low-maintenance sponsee or am I just doing something wrong? I know my trust in others is definitely lacking, so I don’t make phone calls, texts, or message when I am having issues, but I get through them nonetheless. Hell, my sponsor doesn’t even know my real name. This happened with my other sponsor too. Why can’t I rely on them? Why can’t I contact others for support when I am having a shitty time with my overeating? I got my period so I have been wanting to eat chocolate so badly, but I haven’t told anyone but my husband, despite the fact that I have been struggling with it.

Somebody I know has seen my progress and decided to do the same things I did. He also gave up sugar, but hasn’t been seeing the same results. He hasn’t been able to stick with it. I explained that he’s not doing the same things that I am because he’s focusing on weight loss. I am focusing on myself with the steps, even if I am taking a break on step 5. He flat-out refused to attempt to do the program. I don’t know why. Maybe he hasn’t hit the point where he realizes that he has no control over himself.

I also discovered another trigger food for me — fruit leather. There is no added sugars in it. I am usually okay eating fruit and drinking fruit juice, but I bought a box of fruit leather and couldn’t stop eating it. I actually had to ask my husband to hide it until our son had consumed it all.

Oh, and I have only 6 more lbs to lose before I reach my pre-pregnancy weight.

This update really doesn’t read very well and I apologize for that. I have been busy and stressed lately and my thoughts are jumbling together too much to become really well-organized.

OA Recovery: Day 69 of Abstinence

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I have been very busy with work lately. Unfortunately, it means that I have had to abandon my work on step 5 for the time being. Some people have told me that I am just making excuses, but I would like to spend the short time I am at home with my son. He is more important than my recovery. Also, my struggles with being so busy only will last until the end of the month. Since there is an end in sight, I plan to put off my remaining step 5 work until then. I am very stressed and don’t need the additional emotional stress from working step 5 right now.

I have discovered that there is a big difference between an eating plan and abstinence. Abstinence is just not eating my trigger foods. Following an eating plan is a whole other animal. I thought once I knew what I should eat, that I would eat it. After all, I have over 60 days of abstinence. It can’t be harder than cutting out sugary foods. Haha! It sure was! I have yet to have one day this week when I have completely followed my eating plan.

My daily eating plan is as follows:
– 1.5-3 cups of fruit
– 2-3 cups of vegetables
– 6-7 oz grains (half should be whole grains)
– 6 oz protein
– 2 cups dairy

I decided to break it down as follows:
Breakfast – 1 c. Cheerios with 1 c. low-fat milk and 1 c. yogurt
Lunch – a big salad with chickpeas and lots of veggies
Dinner – 4 oz grains (weighed out 4oz), 4 oz protein (weighed out 4oz), 1 c. vegetables
Snacks – 1 apple, 1 banana

This food plan seemed like to much and not enough at the same time. I never wanted to eat my lunch, so I didn’t. I love vegetables, but not salads. It also felt like dinner was too much food. I left the dinner table every night with a stomachache having eaten so much. Today I took a second look at the eating plan and realized I had been doing a few things wrong. One ounce of grains doesn’t necessarily mean literally an ounce. It often means a slice of bread or 1/2 cup cooked rice, pasta, or cereal. It was the same for protein. One ounce of protein meant 1 oz of lean meat, 1 egg, 1 tbsp peanut butter, 1/4 c. cooked beans, or 1/2 oz of nuts. Ack! That means I STILL haven’t been eating enough! So I need to figure out how I’m going to do all of that. I was also surprised that I had lost 3 lbs when I weighed myself for my weekly weighing. Maybe I wasn’t eating enough food before!

I spoke with a well-meaning woman who was telling me that eating plans like this aren’t sustainable because you will eventually miss eating certain foods and will end up eating what tastes good. She had a bit of a point about the low-fat dairy and the salad. However, I did okay with the rest of my eating plan. When I asked her what she eats, she just eats what tastes good and in reasonable amounts. While that’s great for her, I don’t feel like it would work for me right now at this point in my recovery. She also explained that OA is more about abstaining from trigger foods rather than following specific eating plans. I feel like I’m more confused than every about what I’m “supposed” to eat.

I also realized that one tool I really don’t utilize much is the phone calls/messaging/texting. I am used to being so independent and not trusting anyone. That’s something that has become worse for me in recent years. I am afraid to make new friends at this point. I am afraid of losing them like all of the ones that believed my ex-husband’s lies. I am also afraid of them finding out that I’m Pagan and me losing my job because of it. There is so much to fear.

OA Recovery: Day 63 of Abstinence

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I started working with my sponsor about letting go of all of my resentments. I know it is part of the process, but frankly, I was getting annoyed with all of it. Most of the things I told her about, she asked why I was holding onto them for so long. I know that was a question designed to help me let go of it, but I started getting annoyed after a while. I got sick halfway through the process and have really been putting off finishing it since then. She also got really judgy about one of my resentments which didn’t help matters.

I also visited a dietitian today. I had been looking forward to this visit for SO LONG! I was hoping that I would go in there, she would see my issues, and create a plan for me. Instead, she plugged my statistics into the computer and came up with a caloric intake number I should be following. Despite common misconceptions, weight loss is NOT a simple case of calories in vs. calories out. She also gave me a copy of the U.S. version of the food pyramid (it’s not a pyramid anymore, but it’s the same basic idea). I could have done that shit myself rather than take a half a sick day to talk to someone who is clearly not abreast with the latest research. I asked her what she thought of the latest research that came out that said that eating some fats is actually good for you. She said that she disagreed with that. When we were discussing dairy (I really don’t eat dairy except for cheese), I made a snarky comment about it just being on the recommendations because of the dairy food lobbying and she looked almost like she agreed with me. But this is her area of expertise. Shouldn’t she know best? I was conflicted. In the end, I was okay with most of her advice, so I decided to follow her plan. I am still disappointed.

I need to eat the following items daily:
1.5-3 cups of fruit
2.5-3 cups of vegetables
6 oz of grains
6 oz of protein
2 cups of dairy

I also need to follow the following stipulations:
– sodium should be under 2,300mg daily
– saturated fat should be less than 20g daily
– added sugars should be less than 45g daily
– avoid trans fats (any kind of hydrogenated or partially-hydrogenated oils)
– eat processed meats (salami, hot dogs, pepperoni, etc.) once a month
– eat or drink low-fat dairy options when possible

OA Recovery: 40 Days of Abstinence

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I have decided not to return to that face to face meeting. I believe that it’s a really low-level meeting since only one person seems to have abstinence for any length of time and she was the one who told my husband to leave — at an open meeting. Some people argued that I should go and help raise up the level of the meeting. Some people thought I was not far enough along in my recovery to do something beneficial for that meeting. I thought that I didn’t have the time or energy to waste on a meeting with toxic people.

I am no longer really concerned about losing weight. Yes, I want to lose it, but focusing on the steps has kind of shifted my focus away from losing weight. I have lost 8.5lbs since January 1st, only by cutting out sugar. It’s kind of funny, this past week, my meals have kind of sorted themselves out. I have been finding regular foods to eat, I have mostly been packing my lunch, and I mostly know what foods I will be eating each day. I think it’s kind of ironic because I couldn’t really do it before. I guess I have just reached the right part of my recovery where it’s become easier for me!

I have now reached step 4 in my journey of overeating recovery. It requires that we make a moral inventory. I read through the chapter on step 4, which just gave a lot of reasons why this moral inventory was necessary. My sponsor also said that this is the point where people tend to disappear from OA. When I asked her why, she said it was because it’s too tough and too emotional and people tend to overeat as a result. It was a good reminder for me.

They call it a “fearless” moral inventory and stated that a lot of people are dishonest with themselves. I knew that the only real way I tend to be dishonest with myself was about food, so I assumed that this step would be easier for me. The OA book Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions has a laundry list of questions that seemed quite daunting. My sponsor said she preferred the AA forms for that and e-mailed me three forms — one about resentment, one about sexual conduct, and one about fears.

My resentments took up two whole pages. I had a lot of people and institutions I held resentment towards. My gaslighting, emotional-abusing ex-husband took up almost half a page on his own. Other fall-out from that divorce, the friends I have lost over it, and things I stopped doing because he “ruined” the experience took up another half page. The rest were other times where I had mostly believed that I was wronged by other people. After writing in why I was angry, I had to “own” the resentment and figure out why it was my fault. I had some issues with this. I complained to my sponsor: how can I take responsibility for a gaslighting, emotional-abusing ex-husband and the friends that believed the lies he told them about our breakup!? I didn’t even realize that I was emotionally abused or gaslighted until over a year after our split. She said I should just write that I am at fault for holding onto it for too long. I did that for a while. Then I realized that I trusted people too blindly and expected too much of these people who were clearly not my friends. Then I re-read the chapter saying that this step is supposed to help me trust people again. Wait, what!? I had just come to the conclusion that I had trusted people too much.

The rest of my resentments were a mish-mash of issues — everything from being upset that my sister wants to live across the country (because I love her and I miss her), someone who denied me a scholarship even though I was the only one who met the requirements for it, a friend who was a pathological liar, a friend who broke off the friendship claiming that I was using her, all of the schools that fired me for being Pagan, etc. Anyway, I was hurting inside to relive all of these episodes where people and institutions made me angry. I didn’t overeat or eat any sugary foods, but once my husband knew I was upset and he was very helpful about trying to make me feel better.

The remaining two lists were comparatively easier. One great thing about being Pagan is that sex is part of the religion (“all acts of love and pleasure are my rituals”), so we don’t get shamed for having sex. I feel no shame for it. However, there were a few times where I didn’t say “no” with enough conviction when I was still healing from the emotional abuse. There were sometimes when I used my sex appeal to help me feel better about myself significantly earlier in my life, sometimes giving guys the wrong idea. Honestly, the sex section really only had 6 entries.

I was glad that I saved the fear section until last. Thinking about my resentments, I have a lot of fears due to them. A fear of not being good enough. A fear of rejection. A fear that no community would ever accept me being Pagan. I pushed to get these all done in one day so I didn’t have to feel bad for two days in a row. I asked what was next and my sponsor said I had to read step 5 and discuss my answers with her. I read chapter 5, which seemed to outline why it was important to share my lists with another human being. Both my sponsor and I agreed that we would save that for next weekend.

Recovery – 33 Days of Abstinence

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I got started with a new sponsor. She seemed to be very thorough and to-the-point (which I like). She gave me a list of eating behaviors and asked which ones I did. She then gave me a bunch of rules that I needed to follow in addition to abstaining from sugar. I don’t remember all of them because many were non-issues for me. The ones I do remember are: don’t eat standing up, eat slowly, do not do anything else while eating (like play on your phone or watch tv), do not take seconds, do not hide your eating, do not eat in the car, and only weigh yourself once a week. I argued for weighing daily and for our movie night once a week where we share a big bowl of popcorn. She was willing to allow movie night, but not weighing more often than once a week. She did not ask that I provide her with my food ahead of time and seemed to trust that I was following the guidelines, which I was. There was one exception, but I figured it wouldn’t count. I wanted a banana for a snack. However, my son loves bananas and would want one if he saw me eat it. We only allow him one banana a day because they make him constipated and he already had one that day. So I ate a banana while standing and hiding so my son wouldn’t put up a fuss (he’s only one and a half).

With this new sponsor, I was flying through the steps. She had me read each step in the book and then discuss the step with her. There seemed to be some pivotal questions to answer and then I was onto the next step. Today I reached step 3: “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.”  I knew I would have to deal with this eventually. I prayed and meditated for weeks hoping to find a deity willing to take on me and my recovery. Instead, I was met with silence. I finally decided to use “my-best-and-highest-self” or “Goddess-within-me” as my higher power. I’m glad I did, because when I thought about turning my will and life into the care of an outside deity, I think I would have had a more difficult time doing it. Instead, I could definitely turn my will and life over the best version of myself. Gods know, I am certainly not the best version of myself right now, but she is in there somewhere.

I attended my fourth meeting today. I had even convinced my husband to attend (albeit in the back). He has eating issues but is still convinced he can handle them on his own. Even so, he was curious about what happened at these meetings. He was called out at the beginning of the meeting for not being part of it. The woman who did this was the only sponsor in the room (what a great example). She claimed she was concerned about anonymity (even though this was an open meeting) and told him to go sit in another room. I was annoyed but stayed because I am abstinent for 33 days today and was looking forward to getting my coin for 30 days of abstinence.

The meeting continued with their usual announcements at the beginning, including “children are welcome so long as they are supervised”. My 1.5 year old son was there, giggling, running around and smiling at everyone. He was never an issue before. In fact, I was told to bring him back because he was a sweet boy. Now I am not one of those parents who is deluded in thinking that my terror of a son is a sweet boy. My son did not scream or cry. He didn’t even babble much and when he did it wasn’t that loud. They asked if my husband could look after my son. I said he could for today, but that there were days when I would have to bring him. I brought my son to my husband in the other room who suggested we leave. I agreed with him and started crying because I really felt unwelcome. One woman came out and apologized for the others and begged me not to give up OA because of it. I told her I didn’t intend to, but that I wasn’t going to drive an hour to go to that meeting again either. I was livid. There were no other meetings within an hour drive of me (except for the ones that met when I was at work). I never did get my coin.

I received a phone call from one of the members of the meeting about an hour later. Apparently after I left, they were all discussing how they could have handled it better. They decided to add language at the beginning of the meeting to mention that all who were interested in OA were welcome at the meeting. Unfortunately, they also changed the language at the beginning of the meeting from “all children are welcome if they are supervised” to “all children are welcome, but they must be in a different room from the meeting.” There is no way in hell I’m putting my one and a half year old in another room by himself (or with another child). So basically I can only go when I had child care, meaning my husband would stay at home with him when he could. That also meant that he could not come to meetings with me. I am very angry that this happened. I resent them for the way they treated my family today. I also resent them for changing the rules so I could no longer attend regularly. I am told that the next step is all about resentments, so this next step should be fun.

Recovery – 21 Days of Abstinence

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I have now been abstinent from sugary foods for 21 days now. It has been one hell of a journey so far. For the first two weeks, I was detoxing from all of the sugar. I wanted it. I craved it. Because I couldn’t have it, I overindulged on other foods. I was concerned for a time that it might be another food issue I have, but then after about day 15, I stopped wanting extra foods at meals.

That was around the first time that I managed to make it to an OA (overeaters anonymous) meeting. I had tried a few times, but due to the holidays and meetings that were no longer active, I finally found this meeting (and made sure to call first). It started with the serenity prayer and a bunch of other stuff that was read. It seemed like a ritual, so I guessed it was said every time. The best part was when people shared. One of them mentioned that after the physical detox was over, I would have emotional issues to contend with. She said that all of the feelings and issues that you ate to cover up would now show up and need to be dealt with. I had no idea how right she would be.

For the past week, I was angry, sad, depressed, but most of all I was distracted. My work started to suffer because I was having problems planning my lessons and getting things done that needed doing. It was a struggle, but I think the idea of having made it so far that I didn’t want to start over again helped.

I also had problems with my first sponsor. She wanted me to tell her what I was going to eat each day before I ate it. I really struggled with this for a few reasons. First, there are so many different resources out there with conflicting statements about “good” and “bad” foods, so I found myself in a state of chronic indecision about what to eat. Second, not knowing what to eat, we didn’t end up picking up any foods for me for lunch and so I didn’t have anything to eat, so I never knew what I was going to have. I found out later that this is a common tool for people to tend to overeat in general, but since my issue is with a specific food, it really didn’t apply to my situation. She also wanted me to fill out this checklist every day. I found out later that it was part of the 10th step and I was on step 1. I thought. I wasn’t sure because she sent me these lengthy emails with a ton of reading to do and questions to answer. She contacted me and said I needed to start doing those things on a daily basis (which I really struggled with doing) or she would drop me as a sponsee. She was doubtless doing what she thought was best for me. Some people need the “tough love” approach, but I was doing fine, so I found another temporary sponsor online.