Over the telephone, the nurse said to me, “Your husband does not want the breathing mask or the feeding tube.” I rushed to the hospital to be by Roger’s side. As we held hands, I asked him if he was at peace with his decision. Roger nodded and whispered, “Yes,” as he had lost his voice. Needing to give my beloved husband peace of mind. I said in a loving voice, “I understand and accept your decision.” His shoulders relaxed. Then I had to ask him where he wanted his ashes to go and if he wanted a funeral. The hardest thing I ever had to do in life. We continued to hold hands as the love of my life whispered, “Kiss.” We had two touching kisses granted by God. Then a peaceful look spread across Roger’s face. The nurse came in and gave him pain and sleep medication. He... Continue Reading
When I try to calculate the amount of weight I have gained and lost from age thirteen to forty-nine, it doesn’t make any sense. I want to believe the amnesia of this disease has made me miscalculate. But the truth is that I have swung between fifteen to fifty pounds every two to five months for the past thirty-six years. The most conservative estimate I can calculate is 1200 pounds of weight variation. The clothes sizes filling my closet were from 6 to 14, which meant I did not stand out as extremely heavy very often. My disease was beating me up less obviously, but not less viciously. I was a slave to progressive binging. I tried to control my disease with extreme restricting over and over and over again. I could not gather myself up to restrict again. The only hope I clung to for thirty-five years was that... Continue Reading
On my sponsee’s third day in program, he said, “I’m starting to have thoughts like, this is stupid. This is never going to work. This is too much work and it’s too hard.” I could identify with him. It took me a long time in recovery to learn that the voices in my head were not the “real me.” I was embarrassed to tell anyone about the thoughts in my head. Before I joined FA, my thoughts would tell me, you are a wimp. You ran three miles yesterday, so run three miles today! You don’t deserve to eat. You will never be good enough. If you make any mistake, cover it up. These voices were what ultimately led me to bulimia and chronic dieting. I wanted to eat what I wanted, but I didn’t want the food to show up on my body. I thought that if people knew... Continue Reading
One thing that is important to me in my recovery from Food Addiction in FA is that I stay ‘in love’ with our program. Negative thinking, fault finding, murmuring about the tools, not only does not put my program first and support my growth, it can also lead to me to leave the program that is saving my life. My top weight was 233 pounds. Today I weigh 136 on a 5’8” frame. The longer I have the grace to stay in program and take the right actions to stay abstinent, the better and better my life keeps getting. So, why in the world do I even worry about ‘loving’ this program? Because I am an addict who uses food as a drug. And like all good addicts, I want what I want, when I want it, the way I want it. Program interferes with this and my addict loves... Continue Reading
Every night ended with the same demoralizing and endless stampede of negative thoughts: What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I just eat right? I know it’s not good for me, but I can’t stop. I have no will power. I guess I just don’t care enough. Every morning would start with the same lofty promises not to spend money I didn’t have, to be more loving and less irritable, to be more compassionate, and to work out to make up for the horrible choices I had made the day before. I would invariably break all my commitments. No matter what the consequences, or how much guilt or embarrassment I felt, I couldn’t seem to will or think myself better. My issues with food were my complete and total preoccupation. I was consumed with how to lose weight, how to maintain weight, and how to avoid everyone when I gained it... Continue Reading
