My Weekend

My weekend ended up seeming to be ok to me despite feeling a little sick (a cold) and feeling a bit depressed. I did manage to be abstinent all weekend (3 meals and no binges). When I did feel depressed and discouraged, I did what I ought to do and went to a meeting and talked to my sponsor. I was able to express some frustration and the meeting topic seemed to fit exactly what was on my mind. I came home, ate lunch and went to the gym with my daughter. There are massage chairs at the gym and I like to reward myself with a massage after a work out. I am a little tired now but it is a good tired. I think it will be early to bed with a book.

I've been reflecting a lot on a passage from the Big Book that my sponsor shared with me earlier in the week, It is from page 30 and it says this:
"The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker (or eater). The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.
We learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics (compulsive overeaters). This is the first step in recovery. The delusion that we are like other people, or presently may be has to be smashed.
We alcoholics are men and women who have lost the ability to control our drinking. We know that no real alcoholic (compulsive overeater) ever recovers control. All of us felt at times that we were regaining control, but such intervals - usually brief - were inevitably followed by still less control, which led in time to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization."

I've been watching people at work snack at their desks. I look at them with envy wishing I could have the control they have. But I am coming to accept that I am different. I am definitely prone to many forms of addiction, food just being particularly troublesome at this point in my life. Being abstinent this weekend, I am feeling pretty good about myself right now though I couldn't have done this on my own. Being in OA is teaching me how to rely on others in the fellowship and how to reach inside of myself for a power greater than me. Recovery is not something that happens overnight so I must be patient and not expect immediate results. I only have today and I'll deal with tomorrow when it comes. I do know that I feel a lot better after being abstinent than after a binge on chocolate bars. It is a horrible feeling when I get angry with myself for not sticking to my plan and giving in to the cravings. I try to take note of the positive feelings as much as possible so I will want to do what it takes to get them.

A Couple of Steps

I enjoy all the spiritual steps but I always have a hard time sharing about them in the meetings. I always feel like a misfit when discussing them because a) I don't call my Higher Power God and b) I am interested in Buddhism. I always have to adjust the language of recovery literature to match my own conceptions. I don't mind doing this. Just sharing about it is a challenge.

"It is when we try to make our will conform with God's that we begin to use it rightly. To all of us, this was a most wonderful revelation. Our whole trouble had been the misuse of willpower. We had tried to bombard our problems with it instead of attempting to bring it into agreement with God's intention for us. To make this increasingly possible is the purpose of AA's Twelve Steps, and Step Three opens the door." (12&12 pg 40)

Now I don't try to align my will with God's but I do have a spiritual tradition that I try to follow. Buddhism tells me that the Noble Eightfold Path (right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration) will help me to overcome suffering in my life. There are also the 5 Precepts which are:

1. We abstain from killing any being - people, animals and all living creatures. It is our intention to offer safety to all beings, everywhere without discrimination.
2. We abstain from taking things which have not been freely given to us. Things not given freely belong to someone else.
3. We abstain from sexual misconduct defined as sexual abuse, extramarital affairs and sexual relationships with those who are underage. It is our intention to protect others and ourselves from sexual harms.
4. We abstain from lying. The essence of Buddhist practice is to seek the truth. Lying creates and perpetuates delusion. Lies have the capacity to create physical and emotional harm. It is our intention to prevent potential danger.
5. We abstain from intoxicants which includes even small amounts of alcohol and recreational drugs because they cloud our ability to be mindful. They can also contribute to breaching the conduct specified in the other four precepts. Our intention is to prevent potential harm to others and ourselves.

I have heard also that "making a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him" also involves making a decision to carry on with the steps. So, for me, doing step 3 is following the Noble Eightfold Path, the Five Precepts and doing the steps and following the principles taught by 12 Step methods to the best of my ability. Is it easy? No. Do I believe that by following these guidelines "a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity"? Yes. That means I have accepted the principles of Steps 2 & 3 and am ready to move on with the steps. I have started Step 4 (Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves." I will save Step 4 for another blog entry.

Even though I get Steps 1 through 3, I am still struggling with overeating. I ate too much chocolate and too many TimBits yesterday and I am thoroughly frustrated. It reminds me of a quote from the Big Book on page 64:

"Though our decision was a vital and crucial step (Step 3), it could have little permanent effect unless at once followed by a strenuous effort to face, and to be rid of, the things in ourselves which had been blocking us. Our liquor is but a symptom. So we had to get down to causes and conditions."

I am hoping that steps 4 & 5 will rid me of this urge to overeat or at least give me the strength not to overeat. That being said, it is a new day and a new start.

No Control

Let me introduce you to Sock Monkey. He is going to be my mascot as I work the steps. Right now Sock Monkey is overwhelmed with his problems. That is how I am feeling too. No matter how hard I try, I can't stay away from that gosh-darned first bite. Right now I feel so angry and so frustrated but not to the point where I want to throw in the towel. I believe in Step 1 so thoroughly that I really don't need any proof. I want to do whatever is necessary to stop this behaviour that is driving me insane. Since yesterday I have been going over every possible reason that I am having this problem from thyroid issues, medication, a job I don't want anymore and on and on and on. All of these things might be factors but one thing is for certain. I can't withdraw from life to work on this problem. I have to continue to function and take care of my responsibilities through all this. So I enlisted the help of Sock Monkey. He can be my mini sponsor and encourage and inspire me throughout this path.

A Thorough Step 1

It is for me very important to do a thorough Step 1 even though I am already convinced that I am an addict, alcoholic and compulsive overeater. It is not hard for me to relate to me eating as a disorder that I need help with and turn to the 12 Steps for help. I have been trying to control my eating with no success. In fact I have had the opposite of success. The scale is telling me the opposite of what I want to hear. (My scale does not actually talk.) I have lacked discipline where exercise and dieting have been concerned. Instead I have been more obsessive about food. I read diet books and plans and magazines and websites while eating things I should not. I finally decided that I already know enough about food - that no new book will tell me something I hadn't heard somewhere else. I need to address the mental and spiritual and physical aspects all together and OA looks promising. I relate to what everyone says and, though I haven't met any, there is apparently fellow alcoholics in OA as well. Imagine that - an alcoholic that switches addictions!

"The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death." (Big Book pg 30)

I just realized something. During my adult life I would switch addictions. I drank heavily and it took its toll on my psyche when I was young. Then I had children and didn't drink anymore. Then came food and I vowed I would never drink out of control again. Then life and stressors came and I was overweight. I started drinking more and eating less and I was overjoyed with the weight loss. Then what I didn't want happen happened. Drinking and marijuana use and pill use took their toll and I was flattened like I never was before. Then I quit the mind-altering substances and joined AA. Then I started eating more and more even though I had vowed that I would never gain weight again. But here I am powerless over my compulsions. My experience has shown me that "no alcoholic ever recovers control" (Big Book pg 30). Like the Big Book says, "I have tried every imaginable remedy" (Big Book pg 31). I give up! The Big Book also says that "if we are planning to stop drinking, there must be no reservation of any kind, nor any lurking notion that someday we will be immune to alcohol" (Big Book pg 33). For me this applies to food. I am willing to try anything. The steps worked for drinking. I believe they can work for food.

The Big Book hints on a solution to come later in the book. It says:

"Once more: The alcoholic at certain times has no effective mental defense against the first drink. Except in a few rare cases, neither he nor any other human being can provide such a defense. His defense must come from a Higher Power." (Big Book pg 43)

I say, "Bring it on!"

Step One Again

It was easy to see the critical nature of alcoholism. Over a period of time I could no longer be a goodmother. I could no longer earn a living. I could no longer be present with what was happening around me. I could no longer face the world. I no longer wanted to live. In fact, with the help of alcohol and a few other mind altering substances, I lost my health and all of a normal life. It was a long climb back from the abyss that couldn't have been done without the help of AA.

Now that I am dealing with overeating, I am not faced with the same dire set of circumstances. But I am affected just the same. My health and well-being are both affected and both will suffer with more weight gain. The more I try to control my eating, the more I cannot control it. Dieting and exercise consume my thoughts but not my actions. The bigger I get, the more I want to stay in my home and hide. I don't want to buy clothes. Nothing feels comfortable. Discouragement waits for me at every corner. That is because I am impatient and want immediate results. I just want the problem to go away on its own. If I ignore the problem, maybe it won't be there anymore. I want to blame other things for my weight gain such as the stress at work and the unavailability of healthy food in the vending machines. If I wasn't so tired from work, perhaps I would have more energy for exercise and planning meals, etc. Work is a good thing to blame but life is not stress free. If it is not one thing, it is another.

I can trace my weight gain to a couple of factors. I gained weight when I got a car and no longer had to walk either to my destination or the bus stop. I gained weight when I started to take lithium. I gained weight when my job became more sedentary. Of course my consumption of junk food has gone up gradually over this period of time. I feel myself wanting to withdraw and have done that to a certain extent.

"Under the lash of alcoholism, we are driven to AA and there we discover the fatal nature of our situation. Then, and only then, do we become as open-minded to conviction and as willing to listen as the dying can be. We stand ready to do anything which will lift the merciless obsession from us." (12&12 pg 24)

I made the decision to go to OA. After having experience in AA and seeing it work in my life, I thought why not give the 12 steps a try again. I have seen the obsession to drink lifted from me. If that can happen, why not the obsession to overeat. I have tried everything I can think of to lose weight. I am open to doing this.

Compulsiveness - Part of My Step One

I thought a chubby bear would represent my compulsive overeating. But he doesn't look unhappy with himself. I am not just compulsive with my eating. I drank compulsively. I smoked dope compulsively. I drink compulsively. I buy and read books compulsively. It seems that whatever I do, it has to be compulsively or not at all.

In the book, The 12-Step Buddhist, the author recommended a three pronged approach to our recovery. I've been going to AA for 8+ years and have recently started going to OA. A 12-step program of recovery is one of the prongs - check. I recently connected with a lama for spiritual guidance. That is a second prong - check. I am being treated by a doctor for bipolar disorder, the third prong - semicheck. I don't have a regular doctor at this stage of the game which I really miss. And it is a situation that I have to rectify. But doctors are in short supply where I am and it is not an easy feat.

I've been reading lots of literature on step one. There are times when you have to start at the beginning. Mostly this is in relation to the stopping of compulsive overeating. I don't need to drink or smoke dope or take any mind altering drugs anymore. During my life I would say that booze was the drug of choice and when I couldn't drink, food became my drug of choice. Gotta love those carbs. During the times that I was not drinking, I was eating and gaining weight. I am there now. I would lose weight because I would stop eating (anorexia) when I was drinking. Both are unhealthy ways to be. My boyfriend cannot understand my all or nothing approach to life. He is always preaching to me, "Moderation!" Moderation is a concept that I find difficult to grasp. OA tells me that I must avoid all those foods that are triggers for me such as chocolate, donuts, etc. I had already come to that conclusion though I wasn't able to quit on my own. I am to come up with a food plan and communicate this with a sponsor which I do not yet have. But I just started going so that is ok. I still have my AA sponsor. I have hope that things will fall into place very soon. I am getting my ducks in order. And if I was the bear, I would eat them.