I'm so happy to say that I'm more than 30 days abstinent. It's a wonderful feeling. I'm finding that without having food around as a crutch and strategy for avoidance that I have all these feelings of anger coming up. I never realized how angry of a person I was before, but it's all coming out now. I guess I was just eating before the feelings could come to the surface. I often feel irritated, annoyed, and frustrated. Oftentimes, I cannot even figure out why.

I'm glad that i'm not turning to food to deal with this, but I really am at a loss as to what to do to start dealing with these feelings. I can't make the anger go away, but I'd like to deal with it more effectively.

How does one learn to deal with feelings after a liftimes of pushing them down with food?

-Ann

Well done Ann. Great to hear about your milestone! And I can relate to your feelings of happiness – every day free from COE is precious and hard-earned.

And boy can I relate to the unexpected anger. I kind of knew mine was down there somewhere – never really felt it in early AA, because of course I had my ‘food fix’.

My sponsor tells me I must acknowledge the anger in me, then pray to my HP to have it removed. This also involves praying for the person or institution I’m angry at!!! Sounded silly to me at first, but it works. And I need to do what works because I believe what OA tells me, that I’ll eat on unresolved anger.

On a deeper level, I’ve made a decision to go seek help from a therapist who works in food related therapy so that I can work through some stuff from my past.
I’m waiting for an appointment, because I’m so sick of having my past hurt my present.

Back to the day-to-day anger – like you, I’m amazed at how resentful I get even over small things. The other day, I was sitting beside this guy at an AA meeting and I wanted to hit him! All because he had a cold and kept blowing his nose. I hated him! Why could he not stay in bed and stop spreading his virus! Of course it was all about me – and how I did not want to get sick.

I had to pray for him. Even my prayer sounded angry – along the lines of – get this guy out of my head now!! But it was a prayer nonetheless. And it worked.

Funny thing is, I did get sick yesterday, and I think my aversion to my food plan and veggies was connected to this 24 hour bug that sent me to bed at 7pm. I don’t think it was my AA friend passed it on, I had sore bones and fever and felt ‘fluey’. I had been driving myself very hard all day – study, gym, cycling etc, and was SO self-critical for feeling tired.

How to be sick and look after myself and stay abstinent is all very very new for me. I used to eat my way through virusy things before!! That sounds nuts to a normal eater, but that’s what I did. Last night, I had to pray to know what to eat. Dinner did NOT appeal to me at all, yet I knew I needed something. Ended up having chicken soup and some oatmeal crackers, and I had to laugh, because this seemed like just the kind of light meal a ‘normal’ eater would eat!!

I slept for 12 hours straight. My HP kept my work phones quiet. I feel a lot better today.

Searsha--Thanks for that reply. I am finding that I'm feeling very much the same way. Annoyed at my husband because he didn't put away the milk the second he finished using it. Irritated at the lady in line ahead of me at the store because she's taking so darn long to write a check. Frustrated that I have to wait at the longest traffic light in town when I'm already a few minutes late for the appointment. You get the idea. Let's just say that I'm feeling quite impatient lately. I hate feeling this way.

I would've definitely been raging on the inside by the guy with the cold. I hate that type of thing!!!

I will start doing some prayers at these times. I can't avoid these situations, I live in a world with others. I hate that I feel anger when the world doesn't work the way I'd like it to. It's a very selfish, me-centered way to be. That's what bothers me the most.

Sorry you were feeling sick, but I'm glad that you did what you needed to do to get well. Another lesson to be thankful for.