Eating Disorders - OA for May 2014
 

Some is never enough. When are we going to stop and ask ourselves, when is enough enough. My disease is more, and only through the God of my Understanding and the Twelve Steps, have I been able to stop abusing myself?

Wouldn't be clean and sober today if I was't committed to the program. No matter what is going on in my life, I know that my God is with me and I have the tools of the program to deal with each situation as it comes.

Always makes me smile when I see the word normal when related to addiction. It may be normal for an addict, but not when compared to others. That is why it is best to identify and not compare.

Who is to say what is normal? A cycle on the washing machine?

I had problems accepting my humanness. I looked it as a cop out to people in recovery. An excuse to not work their program and working the Steps and applying them.

Today I was sharing with a lady in laundry. "Stuff" doesn't fill the void, I need to fill it with spiritual food.

When I find myself reaching out, and I am thinking more, I know that I am in my disease.

As the song says, `Slow down, you are moving too fast.` When we get addicted to busy, we miss out on today. We need to take time to smell the roses or any other flower that comes your way.

Something I didn't do well. One of the reasons my two marriages failed. Partly because I got slapped if I didn't say the right thing and because I didn't know I had a right to say.

Have always had troubles with anger. It was a real danger, because it was many layered, had deep roots, and there was a lot of compounded anger that went way back and I hadn't dealt with it. You can't change what you don't know is there. It was one of the reasons that I had to do more than one 4th Step.

How often have we taken the credit and thought ourselves to be the Big Cheese, when in fact what we have comes from our Higher or Lower Power, depending on who we are listening to in the moment.

Self-pity isn`t good at any time, be it food or anything else. I found it took a big dose of gratitude and prayer to get out of it.

We need to change our thinking. Change the old tapes and make new. Make new habits, that will serve you well in recovery. It was our best thinking that got us to the doors of recovery. As the slogan says, "Nothing changes if nothing changes."

So important, to listen to our body. When I feel hungry and empty, I have to ask myself is it physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual food that I need.

Making healthy choices, makes for a healthier me.

I will to Your Will, not mine. First things first, my God.

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

You are reading from the book Food for Thought

No Doormats Here

When we work the Twelve Steps, we grow in self-respect. Abstaining from compulsive overeating gives us new self-confidence. We no longer need to feel either inferior or superior, but we can take our proper place as an equal to those around us.

Many of us used to let ourselves be manipulated because of a lack of self-respect. We may also have tried to manipulate others. Once we have taken an inventory and gotten rid of past guilt's and defects, we embark on a new way of living. Just as we do not try to control the behavior of those we live with, we also do not permit them to control ours.

We are responsible to our Higher Power and responsible for our own actions. We look for opportunities to serve and to give freely of what we have been given. We respect the new life that God has chosen to give us, and we intend to use it as He directs. Saying no to requests and demands, which interfere with and jeopardize our program is sometimes necessary for our recovery.

Thank You, Lord, for self-respect.

Love the last line. I like the thought that it is bonus to quit abusing ourselves by overeating or not eating, and God's Gifts to us each day as a result of that abstinence, we are give many addictions gifts of joy and the freedom from active addiction.

Not sure if it was in the book I read today or a TV show, but someone shared the same sentiments that I lived by for years, `Rules are meant to be broken.`

Prayer works. It helps if I get honest with myself and look at me and the true nature of my disease. It generally encompasses many things, and one can lead to another.

Habits form over the years, and many of them are old tapes. We need to make new ones.

Keeping my space safe is important. It is also important that I go to safe places, places that won't trigger me or tempt me to leave my program behind and decide whether or not, I will pick it up later.

Resentments eat up the soul. They erect a barrier between us and the God of our understanding, until such a time, as we can surrender them to our Higher Power.

I was told to pray for the person I resented, and ask for them, all that you would wish for yourself. My sponsor said that I needed a change in attitude when I told her that I prayed that they got everything they deserved.

My goal was always to lose weight. Because my mom died so young, as a result of her disease, I went through most of my life thinking, to gain weight was to die. My sponsor was the opposite, for her, to lose weight was to die because of anorexia.

In today, my goal is to make healthy choices. My goal is to live life without the compulsive/obsessive nature of my own disease.

When I started to make healthy choices and cut down on the size of my portions, the weight came off.

One of the saddest things that I have ever seen, was standing in line at the grocery store, and a teenager was in front of me with five boxes of Ex-Lax. I hope and pray that she is still living in today.

My spiritual adviser told me many years a go the same thing. She said, "When God is guiding, you will know." If you don't know, the timing isn't right, all the players aren't in place, or it is not good for you to follow your will in the moment. Wait on your God, your God's Will not mine.

Think thin, but not too thin. I like meat on my bones, and I think bones sticking out of my skin, means that I am abusing my body and in active addiction.

I found that when I ate healthy and made healthy choices, I lost weight, but more importantly inches.

No matter what the substance is, that uncontrollable desire to keep using, means I am in active addiction.

As they say, "It isn't about what you eat, it is about what is eating you."

This is an old post, yet one that will come up in June:

God is a Verb. A verb is an action word. It is up to me to make a decision to turn my life over into my God's Care. I believe the 12 Steps and Traditions, were divinely given. a god given gift for those who suffer from the disease of addiction, what ever the substance happens to be.

I had the thought also that sometimes action is "No action" and just because I get the thought of using, doesn't mean I have to following the thought up. Also, just because I have a feeling, doesn't mean I have to act on it. That is what I did wrong for years, act, react! I can stop, hesitate and meditate before I verbalize or take the next right step.

This reminds me of the times I use to say, The devil made me do it.

This goes along with the old reading I just posted.

As I have said many times, I can be my own worst enemy.

Like all recovery programs, it is not a quick fix. You can't put a band aid on it and expect it to get all better. It took us a long time to get to where we are, it is a progress, not perfection, one day at a time. I qualified at 27, didn't come into recovery until I was 49, that is 22 years. This year, I will be 23 years clean and sober in August, my God willing. You would think I should be darn near perfect. ;) I am still working the program, one day at a time, especially when it comes to food. I have to work on my emotional sobriety, and it has been a long time habit of shutting them off by stuffing with food. It was a coping skill, addiction allowed me to shut them down and stuff them.

As I was told in recovery, "Just because you have a feeling, doesn't mean you have to act on it." My action was make them go away, whether it was a pill, alcohol, food, relationships, etc.

I believe in miracles, I AM ONE!

They say if we don't give it away, we will lose our recovery. That is why motto, and what was told to me, "I share because I care."

I was told if you share with one person, you only have to take 1/2 of your issues home. Think what relief you get when you go to a discussion meeting or share your story at a speaker meeting. I always found, that when I was asked to share my story at a meeting, that it is good to share with others, but even better to have my words come out, to lessen any internal chatter and I can set some order by listening to myself, when I open my mouth. It is sometimes very surprising what comes out.

Whenever I hear the word patience, I think of my mother saying to me as a child, "Patience is a virtue, have it if you can."

Some thing I was very short on, wanted it, and I wanted it now, if not sooner. God and I still have to work on it.

One of the biggest lessons that I learned in recovery. Making healthy choices. Qaulity not quantity, allowed me to establish healthier eating habits.

I also found the same thing in the fellowships of recovery. Someone with 3 years could have quality sobriety, as someone who had 30 years. The program works if you work it. It is a one day at a program. The past and what you did, whether in recovery or before recovery, it is about choices in today.

One of the biggest lessons that I learned in recovery. Making healthy choices. Qaulity not quantity, allowed me to establish healthier eating habits.

I also found the same thing in the fellowships of recovery. Someone with 3 years could have quality sobriety, as someone who had 30 years. The program works if you work it. It is a one day at a program. The past and what you did, whether in recovery or before recovery, it is about choices in today.

Do for yourself what you would do for others. Just don't spoil yourself rotten, it could become an addiction.;)

My friend called the other night and I wasn't able to talk to her, because I was in too much pain and had to go to my bed. Later when I woke to post, I got the message "rose quartz" as to what she needed. She phoned while I was out and called her, didn't have time to talk long because I had to get ready to go to the sleep disorder clinic. Told her I loved her and told her to look up Rose Quartz on her computer. She had a rose quartz bracelet, so she can meditate with that.

They are still having court appearance of her son's murder.

http://www.healing-crystals-for-you....z-crystal.html