When I first found FA two months after moving from Italy to London, life became easier for me. With FA I found structure, support, and a family. I discovered a group of people who understood exactly my disease and the way my brain worked, especially around food.

Before I found FA, I had spent the first two months in London in a miserable state, slowly realizing that my “geographical cure” was not working. I had been drowning in fear, loneliness, isolation and, of course, food.

I still remember the first time I heard someone qualify in that little church room in central London. I wanted to cry. I finally understood my behavior of so many years: I had a disease. Now I realized that I had a solution, and I wasn’t alone anymore.

One of the biggest, fastest, miracles I experienced in the program was being able to sleep through the night again, something I hadn’t been able to do for many years, as a night binger and bulimic.

The years after that weren’t perfect, even with FA. I had many ups and downs, including loss of jobs and health issues. I got tricked by my sick mind many times, which told me that I could do it on my own, that I was different from all the other food addicts, and that if I had enough will power I could learn to eat normally and stop my bulimic behavior.

The biggest challenge for me was moving back to Italy after five years spent in London, where I had fellowship around me. I needed to go back home to Italy to take care of my health, and I needed the support of my family to do so. I was scared for my abstinence and recovery, but I knew it was possible, since I knew there were many frontier [term previously used to describe an area far away from an established in-person FA fellowship]members with continuous abstinence.

I kept working with my sponsor, but kept breaking my abstinence every few weeks or so, never able to get back to my 90 days. I kept being told that I had to “surrender” and ask God for help. I got angry and resentful every time I heard that. Why couldn’t I get it anymore? It was so easy at first, the so-called “honeymoon period,” Why was it so hard now?

During the next year and a half, I kept relapsing and feeling more and more hopeless. Looking back, now feel so grateful that I never left FA. I knew, even though I wasn’t staying abstinent, that I could no longer be out there on my own. Not being abstinent with the program was better than not being abstinent without it. Leaving wasn’t even an option for me. But I felt so flawed and broken, like I didn’t deserve other people’s love. How could anyone love me if I felt so disgusted with myself, and what I was doing with food? I can see now that I was using my body like a trashcan, filling it up with food and emptying it out.

I thought I hit rock bottom many times, but I kept going. I was thinking that maybe God had a plan for me, and eventually something was going to come out of all this pain.

Then I finally found my relief. I hit what I understood to be my “rock bottom.” I had gained over 40 pounds (20-plus kg), almost had my heart stop from the extreme effort of purging, and I had isolated completely from my family and friends. I got down on my knees on the side of my bed, crying and pleading for God to help me. I couldn’t take it anymore.

I got my answer. I finally understood, again, that I had an addiction and a disease, and I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. If I wanted to recover, I had to surrender completely and start from that first step. I started to work on the steps, and that was the answer for me.

I now fully get that I am powerless over this disease, and only my Higher Power can restore me to sanity.