AS BILL SEES IT, Question 4b

Do you feel you were doomed by your compulsion?  What have you done to accept it?

When I treated what I was doing with food, as a problem with weight, I know I was doomed to failure.  Each diet I've been on always produced the same result; gaining all of the weight back plus another 10-15 lbs.  I couldn't see a way out because I thought I'd tried every diet there was.  My diabetes was out of control and I was miserable.  Then someone suggested a 12 step program for compulsive overeating and I felt shame.  I never saw myself as an overeater and I certainly didn't want to admit it to anyone else...but I was desperate.

The very first night I walked through the doors was the beginning of my acceptance.  (At each additional meeting, I have learned to accept more.)  The meetings remind me I have a problem, it's not about my weight and a diet won't fix it.  They also help me to keep my memories green; I need to remember the pain I was in that brought me to my knees (surrender).

Something else I've done to learn to accept the fatality of my disease is my step work through the A.A. Big Book.  Until I did this work, I didn't understand the "grave nature of compulsive overeating [alcoholism]"  A.A. Big Book, pg XVI.  My original intention was to go to meetings, learn what they had to offer, lose the weight and leave.  What I received instead changed my life completely.

I read (and learned) about:

• the mental obsession (my need to eat something whether I'm hungry or not and how it can come out of no where.
• the allergy (to specific substances)
• the phenomenon of craving (physical cravings once I eat my substances)
• what I was doing with food and why I was doing it.

All of this was explained to me in the A.A. Big Book.  It also offered me a solution; if I want to do the work.  After watching people change before my eyes, I wanted what they had.  I saw them get the glow.

"Life will take on new meaning.  To watch people recover, to see them help others, to watch loneliness vanish, to see a fellowship grow up about you, to have a host of friends - this is an experience you must not miss.  We know you will not want to miss it.  Frequent contact with newcomers and with each other is the bright spot of our lives."

A.A. Big Book, pg 89

Watching people in the rooms change and be happy was the biggest turning point for me in my decision to accept the fact that I am a compulsive overeater and need help from the 12 steps and fellowship.  

I was ready to do the work.