A Story of Recovery:

Jobless Not Hopeless

Through college I struggled with doing FA and maintaining contented abstinence. I so often let my diseased negative thoughts grab my serenity and take me on a ride down ungrateful lane. This cycle happened over and over during my first six years of FA.

My weight didn’t go up too much most of the time, but I saw clearly how my grades and all of my relationships suffered when I wasn’t working my tools, taking my sponsor’s suggestions, and getting relief from food obsessions and compulsive actions around my abstinent food.

I had difficulties with my first teacher-credentialing program, but I made it through most of my program the second time around with flying colors. I did eat towards the end of my time in school. This massive binge humbled me into the realization that there really was no way I would finish school if I was in the food. I had a choice to make: eat or finish school.

I finished, and began the next leg of the journey of becoming a teacher. I had no idea about what the economy would do. The layoffs began that spring. Thankfully, I was rehired at the same school. The next year, I was laid off again, but I wasn’t rehired at the same school.

This was a very sad and uncertain time for me, but I got through it with my sponsor urging me towards gratitude every day. I kept myself busy doing service, staying committed to my basics, and taking actions by applying to as many teaching jobs as possible. I used my fellows for constant support and talked to teachers in FA who understood.

I got called back to a new school three weeks into the year. At the end of the year, I got laid off again. I was relieved and happy for the layoff because the year had been particularly challenging. FA and my Higher Power saw me through every step of the way, each and every day.

Even though it looked like I would be better off financially this past summer, I feared that it wouldn’t be enough to fully sustain me. There were weeks this summer when I literally had just enough money to buy groceries for the week.

God came through again when I received a phone call from a woman who had my resume from an application that I had submitted years ago. She offered me a tutoring job, and my roommate introduced me to a family who needed a babysitter.

The first month or two of being laid off was filled with trust that something would come through. I figured if I didn’t get my own classroom, I would sub or just continue working as a tutor or babysitter, and try for temporary employment.

I do keep my program first, family second, and job third on my list of priorities, but in my heart, I really wanted to teach come fall. August rolled around and the tension grew. My faith was getting weaker. There were some tear-filled phone calls and lots of talks with God. I suffered from self-pity and food obsessions. I started thinking all of the escapist thoughts that I know so well. I wondered, Why me?

In my self-centered fear, I often forgot about the other teachers everywhere who were going through the exact same experience as I was. In my doubt, I started thinking it was all about me. I took the layoff personally and started resenting the “system” that I had to work for. These are the types of thoughts that, before FA, used to stay stuck in me and led me to my top weight of 155 pounds plus a lot of bulimic trips to the bathroom. This extreme negativity also drove me to stop eating enough calories for my body, and at times I got very thin and unhealthy. I am now nearly 40 pounds thinner than my heaviest weight, and I don’t worry about my food.

Through this layoff time, many talks with my sponsor got me to just keep looking at the facts. She suggested, in the way I now thankfully can hear, to diligently keep the faith and that I would find a job. FA has always guided me to gratefully work and make enough money to put food on the table and keep paying my bills.

The day I was going to call the temporary agency, two days before school was to start in the district toward which I held all those resentments, they called me and offered me a job at a new school. With the guidance of my sponsor, God, and circumstances that can only be described as divine intervention with a host of angels leading me along the way, I was reemployed.

My fellows had assured me that God has perfect timing. I believe that a force for good was looking out for me to have gotten me through all of my confused and heartsick feelings while I kept abstinent and grateful. It is a complete miracle.

It’s been a whirlwind start to a fabulous year. I wouldn’t trade a minute of all the challenges I have had. The pain wasn’t enjoyable, but it has made me appreciate my abstinence and my students.

I drive to work with a smile on my face. I figuratively pinch myself throughout my days at school just because I am so grateful for the willing and eager children I get to have the honor and privilege of sharing an abstinent life with. My experience also has urged me to completely admit, in the depths of my soul, that I really am only responsible for making a decision to stay abstinent and work all of my tools each 24 hours. After that, God really is working out the rest.