Several years ago I was in a serious car accident and broke all the vertebrae in my neck, with severe impact to the spinal cord. I was in critical care for weeks before they could even do surgery. My family had been told that I would never walk again, but during surgery the doctor discovered that it was an incomplete spinal cord injury, and that with lengthy rehabilitation I had a chance to walk again. He said it would take a lot of hard work, but it could be done. I was in two years of physical rehabilitation, five days a week. I had to learn everything over again: how to dress myself, write, feed myself (an important activity), etc. With all I went through to fight my way back to health, mentally, spiritually and physically, I still couldn’t stop eating. Hadn’t I proved I was a person of will... Continue Reading
I recently had a case of the flu. I thought at first it was a bad cold coming on, but when the fever and chills started, I knew I was in for a battle. It is never fun to be sick, and staying abstinent can be a challenge during those times. My stomach was queasy, food tasted like paste, and my disease yearned for the comfort foods of my childhood. Thank God for the structure of this program. I knew it was important to try to eat my three meals each day, even though I didn’t have much of an appetite (quite a sensation for a food addict). In the past (at 297 pounds), I would have gone most of the day without eating, then eat and would have eaten a huge bowl of hot liquid comfort food and flour products. As I had a clearer sense of what my... Continue Reading
Last night, I had a very interesting conversation with my 16-year-old daughter who was sharing with me her feelings regarding a situation with her friends at school. I have been in program for six-and-a-half years, and thinking about this interaction with my daughter sent me back twelve years ago, to when I was in the food, my life was unmanageable, and I was a raging mum. That day, my two-year-old son was sitting in his high chair. My then four-year-old daughter must have done something wrong—I can’t even remember what—because I was yelling and screaming at her, my tense, red face so close to hers that she was walking backwards. I was throwing the tea towel on the floor, pacing back and forth from the kitchen to the living room, waving my arms in the air like a mad woman. I caught the look on my son’s face and all... Continue Reading
Snow Day! Those two words light up the lives of students and teachers alike. Having been an elementary school teacher for 24 years, I have experienced my fair share of snow days, but there is quite a difference between a snow day in FA recovery and the “snow daze” that I used to experience prior to finding Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous. Before FA, I spent 18 years in the classroom and my average weight during those years was around 325 pounds. A day off from school was synonymous with a day of unapologetic bingeing. The binge always began the night before the snow day with the grocery store run for “staple foods”. Prior to FA, my definition of staples included boxes and bags of sugar and flour products, a whole host of salty items, and a minimum of two twelve-packs of diet soda. I went to any length to... Continue Reading
I’ve been in the FA program now for over six years and it’s been such an interesting ride. I remember when I first came into Program, I was willing to go to any lengths to be in a right sized body and not to be crazy about food anymore. I bought my scale, had my food written down, and all my groceries were in the refrigerator, I had my meal plan and I was ready to go for the week – only to find myself back at the store a day or two later because I didn’t have enough veggies. What?!? I ate them all?!? They didn’t turn to green slime in my ‘crisper’? This was a new phenomenon. So off I went, weighing and measuring my food, calling my sponsor at 6 am every day, going to three meetings a week and doing everything possible to stay abstinent. Every... Continue Reading
