I first came to FA weighing 215 pounds. I was a complete mess. For over six years, I had one foot in FA and one foot in the food. I would think: Am I really a food addict? Do I really need to go to these lengths? Is FA really the solution to my food problem? I saw myself as different from all the other food addicts in the rooms, which exempted me from having to do what they did. No one had ever binged on as much food as I had, no one felt a food craving as intensely as I did, and no one had the hard life I had, which entitled me to eat. I had some periods of abstinence— 90 days a few times, six months a couple of times, and 11 months once, but invariably the self-pity and that strange mental twist would lead me back to the first bite. Then I would go on a binge to end all binges. I thought that time would be my last binge before I got abstinent again. I had to eat everything in the universe to “get it out of my system” The following day I would wake up devastated by what I had done and full of resolve to be abstinent. I used the same resolve I mustered in the past when planning to start a diet.

I still thought I had the power to decide when or if I would overeat. In fact, I thought I had even more power over food than I had before, because I had these neat FA tools at my disposal (food plan, sponsor, meetings, phone calls etc). I also thought I had discovered the formula for starting over at date one of FA after I binged. I knew the exact food plan to start with and what sob story to tell a potential sponsor. I thought I could manipulate the program and the people in it to pick up the food and put it down at will. During the six years I was doing this, I experienced the biggest weight fluctuations ever— down 60 or 70 pounds in abstinence, then up 80 to 90 pounds while I was in the food. When my husband and children came home each day, they were never sure which wife/mother would greet them—the disciplined, happy, abstinent one, or the vacant, dishevelled, unmanageable, bingeing one.

During this time, my son had severe behavioural problems at school. He was very disruptive, rebellious, and sometimes even aggressive. The teachers and principal called my husband and me on a regular basis. We had many meetings at the school to discuss strategies to deal with him. We took my son to various therapists and programs, but his behaviour just kept getting worse and worse.

One day on the playground, one of his teachers approached me and said, “We just don’t understand it. Your son seems to be fine for a period of time and then suddenly, for no apparent reason, he goes completely off the rails and his behaviour becomes unmanageable. Can you shed any light on this?”

Later, G-d gave me the clarity to see that these fluctuations in my son’s behaviour correlated almost exactly to the fluctuations in my abstinence. When I was abstinent, he was okay at school, when I went back into the food, his behaviour deteriorated.

Of course when I look back now, it seems obvious. When I picked up the food, I would binge late into the night to postpone facing the cold reality of the morning after. I would oversleep in the morning and wake up late, full of dread about the day ahead and irritable from a food hangover. I would run late getting my children ready for school and would blame them and start screaming and shouting to hurry them along. This is how I would send my son off to start his day. I was always in denial about how serious my food addiction was, the effect it had on every area of my life (not just my weight), and its impact on the people around me.

This pattern of abstinence and breaks continued and progressed. I reached a point where all my so-called clever tricks for getting abstinent weren’t working. I would resolve to be abstinent and then the mental twist would hit: What’s the point of being abstinent for one day? One day is not going to make a difference, or today’s not a good day to get abstinent, it’s XYZ’s birthday. I’ll get abstinent tomorrow.”

I reached the point where I could not stop eating at all. I took bags of food to work that I kept at my feet to dip into throughout the day. My desk was strewn with food wrappers. I didn’t care. I would make a plan to drive to a particular shop for certain binge foods, but would have to stop along the way to eat something because I could not even wait to get to my planned destination. I even once abandoned my car when stopped at a traffic light because I noticed a food store by the side of the road.

I put on 45 pounds in one month! I thought I could shock myself into abstinence by doing very shameful, extreme things with food. I experimented with letting myself eat whatever, whenever, and however I wanted. I tried eating food that I could not afford, food that was against my religion, or food that did not belong to me. Nothing worked. There was always one food item I hadn’t yet experienced or one more excuse. I was still going to FA meetings and making outreach calls. I thought I would be this ghost who would forever haunt the rooms of FA and never “get it.”

Thank you G-d, the day finally came when I ran out of excuses, sob stories, and rationalisations and felt beaten by the food. I started calling to find myself a sponsor. I was quite notorious by this time and I must have made about 20 phone calls before a woman agreed to sponsor me. I made two decisions with this sponsor that I had never made before: 1) I would be completely honest with her, and 2) I would take whatever suggestions she gave me.

Now, two-and-a-half years later, I cannot believe how my life has changed. I have been 130 pounds for a year and a half. There are large parts of my day when I don’t even think about food.

My son is thriving. He started at a new school, won a scholarship there, and was accelerated by skipping a year. He has friends today. He does not consult any therapists or attend any programs. He is a regular 12-year-old boy.

One of the biggest gifts I have been given in my abstinence is the ability to be useful to others in FA and in my life. I wake up at 5 a.m. to meet with my Higher Power and take sponsee calls. I greet each day with optimism, curiosity, and a weighed and measured breakfast.