This was my eleventh Christmas in recovery and the first Christmas without my mom. Not that we had been terribly close, but over the last four years, she had become a bright spot in my life. Then one day she was found dead in her garden, and all I have now are memories. Our last phone conversation was full of love, mutual caring, and tolerance. We were really listening to each other. The last couple of times I had seen her, I had pocketed my pride and my childhood pain so I could show her the love and affection I had found through FA recovery. I made my amends to her, and whenever I visited, I stayed in close touch with FA, via my outreach calls. My mom became loving and caring and did not control me at all. What had happened? That was not the kind of dragon I had known her to be in the past.
On Christmas Eve, I held her card from last year and enjoyed the love and affection that poured out from her simple words. How could I ever have ignored her love and only seen the negative? Well, I was very sick. My life started to turn around when I found FA. This is as much a landmark in my biography as my mother’s sudden death. I called number after number, left voicemails, wrote emails with greetings and good wishes for abstinence and peace, and kept in touch with FA members, even though I did not really feel like talking to anyone. It was hard to know that FA members were busy with family gatherings and festive dinners.
I went into the kitchen and prepared my meals—just plain, simple food, as usual. I thanked God for an abstinent meal. Here I was, a 49-year-old recovering food addict, single with no kids, with an unspectacular job and a hobby. However, I considered myself a winner in life, because I no longer hurt myself with food and was able to feel peace. I felt particularly grateful for all the drama and trauma of life that had brought me into FA. I welcomed the solitude and the beauty of silence, sitting in the dark with the warmth of a candle.
The telephone rang, and people who had received my messages called me back. I happily gave support to people with family tensions, those who were tempted by the food, and FA members who were depressed and hopeless. I shared my sadness with people who, like me, had recently lost a loved one.
My sponsor is not breathing down my neck, but I make phone calls out of love, compassion, and gratitude, and because I need to share about my life issues and hear about the lives of others in order to stay abstinent. Before I joined FA, I was busy eating, not eating, dieting, purging, running, hiding, denying, hating, and controlling my weight and body. I thought of myself as fat and ugly (although I now realize that I wasn’t), and worrying about debts, broken relationships, the future, and other people’s mistakes.
Today I am a busy person, but before I get wound up and obsessed with things like house cleaning, taxes, shopping, family issues, etc., I make FA phone calls to help me slow down and get out of my little world. I like to hear how a friend is doing since we met last, how someone’s exam went, or how another fellow is doing with her abstinence after she has been struggling. I want to stay in the stream of recovery forever. This cannot be done alone, that much I know.