Getting Over Getting Over my Eating Order

I still lean on my eating issues. When I'm having a tough day or coping with fear, i think about what i'm eating and what i'm weighing or ...whatever i can to keep my mind busy.

After all these years, do i still nurture and fan the power of my disordered eating? Do i cling to it and actually not want to let it go?

It's different these days because i don't binge, purge and starve, as I did most of life; I'm a perfectly normal weight, not emaciated or obese, as i was, up and down most of my life. I'm a moderate eater nearly all of the time - NOT something i could have said, most of my life

and yet.

There are real life issues I need to look at and deal with and still, i turn to body image, when i don't want to look or deal with the real.

I can get sooo interested in the whole body thing - journaling and contemplating and yet, that doesn't pay my bills or get my old car fixed or find me a career.

Time to start getting into the world and getting over the old standby - the Eating Disorder

Fear, Self Confidence, Disappointment

"Fear keeps me doing what I shouldn't be doing and keeps me from doing what I should."

That's what my sponsor tells me, and it's true. Fear has kept me from doing many things -- pursuing any real career, taking better care of myself and well, developing a full and fulfilling life.

Here I find myself at 48 so unsure of myself and my abilities that I stay stagnant. I haven't courageously grown the necessary skills to do much of anything in the real world.

I just took a little hostessing job at a local restaurant for a couple of reasons -- I need to get out and it seems social, it's close to home and the people seem nice. BUT as easy as it is (i had my first night last night), i am scared that i'm not capable of ably seating people in a smallish restaurant.

AND i went after this particular job, because i'm convinced i have NO other skills. Vaguely pathetic, huh? Still, i'm doing something which is better than nothing

I kept my life tiny for, well, all my life. For the first 40 years, all efforts went toward food -- bingeing, puking and starving. Then, i blotted life out through drugs and alcohol.

Those "coping" methods are gone and now i have to face the life I never developed.

I read a lot of autobiographies about people who found their passions and achieved in ways, big and small. i always thought i'd be one of those people who found what i loved and built around it

i consider myself to have a creative temperament; however, i don't have creative talent which is, evidentally, a bit of a problem.

I've always been a dreamer, but not much of a worker.

All I can do now is be brave and hardworking for as my sponsor says, "fear keeps me doing what I shouldn't be doing and keeps me from doing what i should."

More OA sponsees

There's a therapist in my AA group who keeps referring her clients to me for 12 Step sponsorship -- women who have eating issues, often in addition to other addictions.

I can not tell you how much i love working with these women -- eating issues are my heart, i find. Sure, it's great working with alcoholics and drug addicts; yet, there's something about the food stuff that just goes to my soul.

Compulsive eating, self-hatred and body loathing were my constant companions and non-stop obsessions. "Fat Pig" was my name for myself.

I don't live that way anymore -- food (alcohol, drugs, men et. al,) won't cure anything, so I don't try to use them. I'm pretty content with my body - it is what it is and it's gotten me this far, regardless of how badly i've treated it!

I love passing the freedom on to my new sponsees.