Overeaters Anonymous

by Robert
(Arizona)

My 28 year old fiance is an Overeater. What is an overeater you might ask. Honestly I had no idea there was a difference between someone who was just fat and an overeater. My fiance helped educate herself and me along the way to her recovery.

An overeater is someone who has a food addiction. This is very similar to someone who is addicted to heroin, or addicted to whiskey. It is an addiction to food that not only tastes good, but makes you feel good. Some may even argue that an addiction to food is more difficult to deal with and recover from than an addiction to illicit substances because food is available everywhere. It is on tv, it is in the paper and your body NEEDS it. Overeaters however do not eat to live. They live to eat.

Just like alcoholics have AA, overeaters have OA (Overeaters Anonymous). My initial perspective on this was that it was a crock of nonsense. "Just stop eating babe! Put down the fork! It's not hard watch me!" were things I was thinking before I understood what compulsive overeating was about.

When my fiance joined OA I thought it was a cult. She was constantly on the phone with sponsors making outreach calls and worrying feverishly about her food. She ate more salad than a rabbit and I in turn was forced to eat more healthy fare.

Then the transformation started. She was no longer a sad woman who took comfort in food. She began to see food as a choice, not a necessity. The McDonald's sign no longer called to her; not because her willpower was stronger or because of some hypnosis, but because she realized that she neither needed or wanted it. Her mood improved. Our relationship improved! Her weight dropped along with her blood pressure.

She explained to me that OA helped her realize that the problem was not just her relationship with food, but her relationships with people and events that also influenced her relationship with food. Before OA, if she was upset she would eat. After starting her recovery with OA her ability to combat stress in a healthy manner improved drastically. All of a sudden we were talking about our feelings instead of bottling them up and swallowing them with double-cheeseburgers.

Overeaters Anonymous without a doubt helped her step back from the brink of crippling depression (see women and depression and depression warning signs for more information) and put her on a better path. No matter what I thought at the beginning of her eating disorder recovery I am ecstatic at the process and the results. Now she eats to live, and that is a life worth living.