A Story of Recovery:

I Am One of Them Too

I am the daughter of a classic alcoholic. I was born in 1946 and grew up in Houston, Texas. For most of my childhood and adolescence, I watched my loving, brilliant father slowly deteriorate from that vicious disease. I felt every feeling imaginable about his drinking, but one thought never crossed my mind: that I had inherited some biological or behavioral version of his disease.

What I consciously remember was the thought that I would never drink like he did. I fought him and his drinking. I poured the liquor from his hidden bottles down the kitchen sink. I confronted him and sobbed with despair and rage. My ever-nurturing mother was a classic enabler. She fed him, cleaned him up, protected him, and earned the living that supported our family. The truth was that she loved him very much and did not know what else to do. Near the end of his life, he found AA and lived several of his happiest years, clean and sober, before he died of emphysema and lung cancer, from decades of smoking.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, I experimented with drugs and had constant opportunities to drink alcohol. But I found that with both alcohol and drugs, I could take it or leave it. They didn’t call to me. I could even smoke once in awhile without being hooked. With a certain self-righteous superiority, I thought I had escaped the family curse.

During my twenties, I was slim and very active; I have no memories of over-eating or under-eating. Then I got pregnant at age 29 and gained 40 pounds. That was the beginning of three decades of my weight going up and down. Each time I lost weight, I would regain even more.

By my late forties, the struggle with food and weight was intense. It was affecting my work, my confidence, and especially my relationships. In 1999 I was almost 200 pounds. The joints of my legs and feet hurt daily.

Then I found a book in the hospital where I worked that listed all the Twelve-Step groups for every addiction in the New York/New Jersey area where I lived. I turned to the pages about food and knew I had come home. Within a few months, I was sitting in Twelve-Step meetings once a week, and the weight was falling off. I was reading the Steps and the Traditions, and accepting the truth of my biology.

I am a food addict, and my disease is as virulent as my father’s—it’s just that my drug of choice is different. Who knows the exact science of genetic inheritance? I hope that medicine and science will continue to learn more and more about the spectrum of illnesses of addiction and all the variations of compulsive behavior. But my recovery does not have to wait for science or society to tell me about my illness. I have now lived it through two generations, and I need no more evidence of its destructive power.

After about 18 months of recovery in that original Twelve-Step program for food (not FA), the promises were coming true in great heaps of rewards. I met a wonderful man who had become my partner, and I was finding work that I loved. I was planning a move to a new country, Australia. I left the food program and the supportive fellowship and assumed that now I could do it on my own.

Within a couple of years, all the addictive eating habits were back: portions getting bigger and bigger, never feeling satisfied after a meal, solitary eating, often eating in between meals, late night eating in front of the television, constant caffeine, and lagging energy. And, of course, as a direct result of that eating, my personality started to change: more irritable, less effective at work, loss of confidence, no joy in intimacy, self-hatred, shame, confusion, and a manic effort to lose weight through exercise. I was once again emotionally, physically and spiritually in great distress.

One would think objectively that I should really have been happy in Australia. My new marriage was very good. However, I was in therapy, seriously working on the issues of adjustment around immigrating to this new country.

Suddenly, in one session, I just stopped. What I was talking about seemed so false. I cried, “It’s not Australia, it’s not the move, it’s the food!” I spoke of how miserable I felt over the way I was eating and how I was feeling about my body. My therapist (bless her) stood up and went to her computer. She had just received an email from a friend of hers in London, telling her about FA in Australia. Certainly a moment of grace!

Two months later, weighing 215 pounds at age 62, I was sitting in FA meetings in Melbourne, awestruck by the beautiful people sharing at the front of the room. The structure was rigorous, more so than my previous program, but everything made such sense to me.

I have now been abstinent and steadily working Program for over two years. I weigh approximately 148 pounds and physically feel healthy and free. I joined an AWOL, which is so valuable to my recovery. I work the tools daily and find that my spiritual fitness, my serenity, is in direct proportion to my quiet time with my Higher Power. I recognize that I am still young in my recovery. I am here to stay this time.

Now when I read the AA Big Book, bittersweet memories of my father often arise. I wish I could give him a big hug and tell him I understand. His story could be in that book. My heart is filled with compassion and gratitude for those who have gone before me. I am finally ready and so willing. I surrender to reality and this time, I fully accept that “yes, I am one of them too.”