New to OA, Step I

[swansong56]

I attended my first OA meeting last week. I met lots of friendly supportive people at different places on their weight loss/struggle journey. I read all of the phamplets they gave me and most of the OA website.

I'm pondering over Step I of the 12 Steps. I remember turning to food as solace when I was a young girl. Food was viewed as entertainment when I was alone. I was thin because I was so active.

Foolishly I married at 18. I married him for who I thought he could be and was let down. That's when the pounds started to multiply. Once again I found comfort in food, but my lifestyle had changed to a less active one. I went from 112 to 170lbs. over the following 17 years.

Our marriage ended when I discovered he was having an affair with a friend, at least I thought she was a friend. We separated and over the next 9 months I lost over 50lbs. I didn't diet, I just wasn't that interested in food. I poured myself into my riding stable and afterwork I met with friends or walked on the beach. I find it very interesting that I didn't turn to food.

I ended up moving back to my home town and taking the position as the riding director at a stable there, and filing for a divorce. I have to admit it was the time of my life. I loved the way I looked and felt. I started doing all the activites I had always wanted to do, but my stick in the mud ex husband wanted no part of. I went scuba diving, snow sking, learned how to country line dance to name a few.

I met a wonderful man and got married. Three months into the marriage, here comes the weight creeping back up. Its been a losing battle ever since. I'm up to 210 and hate myself. Still love the husband, he is a wonderful man. He wants to be supportive of me losing the weight. He doesn't give me ha hard time about it, but doesn't know what to do to help.

We have a shared dream of using the horses to help at risk youth, and are both in school. He is starting graduate school for his MSW and I am in my freshman year. He also works a full time job so there is little time for anything else.

So here it is: as a child I turned to food when I was alone, during a bad marriage I turned to foodd for comfort, while going through a separation and divorce I never felt the desire to turn to food, in a good marriage I've turned back to food and find myself eating for any reason. Just doesn't make sense.

[josaphina330]

I am the same way!!! Bad marriage - overate... Divorce - lost weight... Good marriage & kiddos - now overeat again....

Someone help her out - you'll help me too

[Larry H]

Welcome swansong56 and josaphina330

It has been a while since I have been to OA but I remain very active in the original 12 step program.

Step 1. "We admitted we were powerless over food ~ that our lives had become unmanageable"

This is a two part step. The first part admitting we were powerless over food comes hard for many of us. I was a reasonably smart man so why couldn't I find the answer to stop my over eating? I tried hundreds of ways. Different diets, different times, different foods, different medications, the list goes on and on. Each time I thought this new way is the answer, but it never worked for long. I would start the day with a very sincere mindset that I am not going to overeat and would always eat more usually much more than I had planned. I could not understand why and I was very demorilized and ashamed. It seemed like I had absolutely no control. We say in OA that you must surrender to win and this was the case with me. When I surrendered and said I can't fix this food obsession, I started down the road to recovery.

The second part of the step that our lives had become unmanageable was a little easier for me to accept Here I was grossly obese, hiding food, sneaking food, lying to myself and others, always overeating and most of all I hated myself and who I had became. If that is not an unmanageable life, what is?

Guess what? At that point I had completed working step one and I was on my journey to a whole new life. Step one is simple. It is making a decision, Nothing more and nothing less, only a decision although possibly the most important decision that I ever made.

We tend to complicate the 12 steps. They are simple the whole program is simple, NOT EASY!!, but it is simple.

Hope this helped in some small way.

Larry,

[swansong56]

LarryH, thank you for your response, I do tend to overthink things. I bought the workbook at last night's meeting and am looking forward to the journey.

Josephina330, so delighted to see your reponse. Do you think that when we were on our own after the divorce we knew we had to take better care of ourselves and depend on ourselves more?