When I entered the doors of FA at 155 pounds, I was broken in many areas of life, not just with food. As the AA Big Book says, alcohol was but a symptom. In the same way, what I did or didn’t do with food was but a symptom of far deeper personality problems that I have had from the get-go.

I found FA after talking with someone from another food program I was in, who had been in FA for a few months. She talked about how she found help from the unity and structure of FA, and from FA’s definition of abstinence.  She said that the clear-cut directions were helping to keep her abstinent, one day at a time, on life’s good days and bad.

My eating began as a little tot, when I was told that I rummaged through open pantries and crawled with anticipation and delight to the next sugar and flour item I could get my hot little hands on. This progressed to weight obsession in adolescence and bulimia, starvation, and over exercising throughout my entire teen years.

Before FA, eating sugar, flour, and quantities made me want to kill myself.  I experienced ups and downs and mood swings while ingesting sugar and flour, which was all of the time. I was literally addicted to food. My personality could go from rage to tears in a minute.

These shaky emotions came out in many of my personal relationships, especially boyfriends. I tried to hide the bulimia, and never ate the way I wanted to eat in front of others, so the men in my life got the brunt of a very unhappy, needy, selfish brat without a Higher Power. I made food and men my Higher Power, especially after dates when I was disappointed that “he” didn’t fill me up or rescue me on a white horse.

I often wouldn’t wait for a date to be over to start eating or obsessing about what I was eating and drinking. Once the food called my name, I had no ability to be natural in a conversation…to get to know the other person. After my high school years of mostly abusive, angry, cheating, and possessive relationships, plus the steady progression of my food addiction, there were only many first dates.

I have lost 40 pounds in FA, but have spent a long time on my journey towards abstinence and surrender. I took a lot of time to decide if FA was right for me. Then I needed (and still need) time to get to know myself, and to recognize the power that helps me not eat addictively and want to kill myself with food obsessions. I am thankful I didn’t date for over a year when I did get abstinent.

Today I do have a man in my life. Gratefully, he is not my Higher Power. He does support my program and decided to come with me to the most recent fellowship convention. Being the food addict that I am, I expected that I would get a few dances with him and my friends in FA before he left. But he wanted to leave, and I just couldn’t understand it. I got the words from my Higher Power that I needed to say goodbye.

I didn’t understand why he was so uncomfortable in the moment, but I decided to go enjoy myself anyway. It was interesting, seeing my thought patterns when he did leave, and I started to dance. I had cheating thoughts, thoughts like I wanted to end it all and find someone new because he was tired and probably a little intimidated to dance in front of all the beautiful FA strangers.

What a drama queen I still am! But I had my fellowship friends, who helped me process my thoughts and feelings. The cheating thoughts left me, and I went to bed abstinent, in peace, and feeling like a million dollars.

Just like FA has taught me that I am enough, I do enough, and I have enough without the food, I have also learned that I am enough, I do enough, and I have enough without a guy. He is a good man and it is an adventure learning how to live in a healthy relationship. Today we are more in love than we were at the convention, and have had a few conversations since—real conversations.

What a comparison it is, when I think back to the recent past, when my only form of communicating with men was to hit, scream, or cheat. FA saves not only my life, but also the lives of those who love and care for me.