Not having a great experience with meetings...
 

I read up a lot on OA before going to my first meeting and was really excited that it could help me. I thought I'd be fine as far as finding meetings because I live in a city (Denver). At my first meeting, I was the only person there under 60 (I'm 25) and all we did was a round robin reading of a book about how to run meetings. I tried to go to another meeting this afternoon. Long story short there was tons of traffic and it took me forever to find the place, so I didn't even end up going in (was 20 minutes late) but I did peak in the windows as I drove by and could see it was only a few people and again they were all much older. I'm not saying I want everyone to be my age, but I do want a more diverse group and preferably one with more people to. Have others had this same experience? I'm going to try again tomorrow in a different meeting (will leave WAY early) but it is getting frustrating!

Haley-Don't give up! You will find them and perhaps there will all kinds of people there that "fit" your other needs. Some of those "old" people have some good experiences to share but there is nothing that says you can't try out every meeting in the area! Go girl!

Good news! I found a meeting today that I loved! It was very diverse with younger and older people and people of all sizes and stages of recovery also. The mood was more "light" and people didn't talk about specific foods which I liked. There was a speaker about my age and I felt like she could have been describing my life! I liked the set up much better than the "literature" meeting.

Hi Haley,
Remember we can often learn a lot of wisdom from older people ;) But being that I'm almost 28, I would prefer meetings that had younger people too.

I attend online meetings and you can tell who is older when they say they've retired, etc, but what's nice is that you really don't know much about a person until they share. If you're interested in going to online meetings, this is one I attend sometimes that I've enjoyed a lot: http://www.starchat.net/chat/?chan=OARecovery (they have online meetings every 3 hours- 3am, 6 am, 9am, noon, etc).

I've been thinking about going to an OA meeting myself. I actually follow the GreySheet but there are no live meetings where I live and I feel like I'm missing that face to face quite a bit.

I've been to several meetings for OA and I've noticed that it's mostly women and they're mostly older women. There aren't that many young women. And I live in the Silicon Valley so there are at least 5 meetings a day that I can attend which are guaranteed to have at least 5 people. The thing is, if we want more people like us in OA, then we need to go there to attract other people like us. It's a vicious circle. I'm 24 btw.

I think it depends on the location. When I went to OA there were a LOT of women in their 20s there. The other thing that I was not expecting is that most of them were very thin. I think they were in the meetings as part of their recovery from bulimia.

I never really got much from OA because it was liking going to church for me. Not in a religious sense. I didn't care about the talk about a "higher power." But I felt that the repeated readings of the core principles at every meeting was a waste of time. First, I can read those on my own. I don't need it read to me every time I go to a meeting. Second, that 1/2 hour of reading took away from being able to hear more from the people in the group. Third, the fact that there was no actual discussions between the members was disappointing. It was great to hear people's stories, but I felt that follow up discussions would be helpful too. That is why I enjoy 3FC so much. In fact, 3FC was more helpful to me than OA ever was.

I need oa but have a hard time finding a meeting.I'm older and compulsive eater,overweight woman and feel out of place with younger eating disorder people who only weigh 99 lbs going on about being fat and hating themselves.It gets depressing with me being overweight.I leave hating myself even worst.

Hi! I noticed you're in Los Angeles and I just started attending meetings there. Right now I'm trying to go to around four a week. I'm in my thirties and overweight, and I haven't experienced anything like what you're talking about. Are you going to a meeting that specializes in anorexia? (might account for the young, thin people...) In fact at the meetings I attend there's a very good mix. All ages, some overweight people, some are thinner. If you'd like, I can recommend a good newcomer meeting in the LA area that might help set your mind at ease. Let me know!

I'm having a little chuckle here. No offense intended. But a few of you have communicated your assumptions, based on the fact the many of the people in groups that you visit are thin.

Ladies, they aren't anorexics or bulimics. They aren't just non-fatties who don't really get what its like to be really fat, or have body dismorphia. It is true that some anerexics come to OA, but by far, the biggest number of people who come to OA experienced being significantly and uncomfortably overweight before coming into the program.

Many of these women are thin because they are recovering! Not everyone who stops compulsive eating will experience being thin, but many do. Instead of making assumptions, based on the fact that these people are thin, or even on their sharing about binging behaviors, I suggest asking them about their experience. Ask them if they experienced being very overweight before OA. You may be surprised how many of these people started out.

Personally, I used to weight over 270 lbs. I look fairly average now.

Go to the meetings with the thin women. They may just know more about recovery than you think.