A few days before I came into FA, I had stayed up yet another long night and consumed an entire family-sized dessert. I then proceeded to empty the garbage can with my bare hands in order to hide the package of the sugar/flour item. It was an out-of-body experience that night, as though I hovered above myself, watching in disbelief what I had become. Food had taken over my nights, and obsession with food and weight had taken over my days. I know now that I have been a food addict since childhood, when I used to stockpile sweets under my bed. I wanted to have some comfort for the many nights my parents spent fighting violently.

I have long been an isolator and felt so alone. Food was my constant comforter and companion, while also being my mortal enemy and abuser. For most of my life, I have struggled with depression, anxiety, and what I now know to be mania as well. All this led me to feel like such an outcast and a misfit. I became driven indoors and, over the years, my addiction progressed and grew.

When I walked through the door of my first FA meeting, I weighed 196 pounds. I was desperate and depressed and had run out of hope for my life. I think the only information I retained from that night was to find someone who had what I wanted and ask if they would sponsor me.

We had such a small group at the time that there was no one local who could take me on, so I grabbed the phone list and started making calls that night until someone got annoyed with me for calling too late. The next morning, I woke up early (no small feat at the time) and started calling again until I found someone from California to sponsor me. It seemed so surreal to be handing over my food addiction to a person so far away.

One day at a meeting, I realized that I had also been abusing laxatives and colon cleanses. I had been buying herbs, digestive remedies, and liquid concoctions at health food stores, and it just about knocked me over to realize that I had been living with a form of bulimia. What a revelation out of the layers of denial.

FA has been my 18-month spiritual journey from relying on substances toward turning to God and my fellows. I sometimes have to pinch myself that I wear a size 4/6, weigh 135 pounds, and that I have been that way for more than a year.

FA has made my life happy, joyous, and free. I have friends all over North America who I adore and who accept me with all of my beautiful flaws. I’m no longer disgusted with myself, and I am stepping from one miracle to another. When I put my knees on the floor in the morning now, I smile, knowing that there are going to be all kinds of new wonders that day.