All Posts in Ascending Order

Keep It Simple … and in ascending order please.

01 – My Name Is …

My Name Is Christina, and I Am a Compulsive Overeater When I joined Overeaters Anonymous on December 27, 1998, I weighed 326 pounds. I was abusing food and couldn’t stop. I had tried reducing my food intake, going on diets, joining diet programs, and exercising—all while shaming myself for the way I looked and behaved […]

02 – My Big “Why”

Even though I was an average-sized kid, I always knew my eating habits weren’t okay—my mom made sure of that. From the time I was 8 or 9, she warned me repeatedly: If you keep eating like this, you’ll be 500 pounds, and no one will want to date you.   (We will unpack how that […]

03 – Keep Coming Back: My First OA Meeting

I walked into my first OA meeting on Sunday, December 27, 1998, carrying more than just emotional baggage—I carried skepticism. How could this work when nothing else had? It had been the second-worst Christmas in my dysfunctional family’s history, which says a lot when you can rank them by levels of dysfunction. Beyond holiday turmoil, […]

04 – Understanding Powerlessness: OA Through the Lens of the Big Book

I didn’t always understand why my relationship with food felt so all-consuming. It wasn’t until I attended my first Big Book study that things began to click. That’s where I’d like to begin today—with a powerful line that reframed everything for me: “We, of Alcoholics Anonymous, are more than one hundred men and women who […]

05 – The Problem Is in My Brain, Not My Willpower

My Addiction Centers in My Brain One of the greatest gifts my second sponsor gave me was the permission to take my relationship with food seriously. Before that, I had spent years minimizing it—dismissing my struggle as a lack of willpower or, worse, a personal flaw. But he showed me I was killing myself by […]

06 – Simple But Not Easy

Choosing Our Path: Reflections from the 12 Steps A friend in the program recently shared a non-OA article with me about the idea of “Choosing Your Hard.” It said things like: Being overweight is hard. Losing weight is hard. The message was simple but profound—life isn’t easy either way, so we must choose the difficulties […]

07 – OA’s Definition of Abstinence

In this post, I want to unpack what abstinence truly means in Overeaters Anonymous—and why understanding the difference between a food plan and the daily practice of spiritual recovery matters. Abstinence isn’t just about what we avoid; it’s about how we live, how we connect, and how we heal. Overeaters Anonymous defines Abstinence as: “Abstinence […]

08 – Getting Abstinent (Part 1)

When I take someone through the steps, I try to meet them where they are.  Most of the people I work with are like me in that they overeat, either bingers or volume addicts.  As we work on identifying trigger foods and behaviors we also work on their own healthy relationship with the foods they […]

09 – Call a Friend (Getting Abstinent Part 2)

The Beginning Was Brutal: A Closer Look at My First Week of Abstinence In a previous post, I shared how I began my abstinence journey—but this time, I want to go deeper. That first week of abstaining from my addictive trigger foods was nothing short of intense. Between withdrawal symptoms, emotional landmines, and navigating everyday […]

10 – Step 1 Overview

Step 1 – Admitted we were powerless over food – that our lives had become unmanageable Christina’s Version Admitted we could not refrain from abusing food—food made our lives (or parts of it) unmanageable. Personalize It Once I start abusing food, I can’t stop. If I stop, I can’t keep myself from starting again. Step […]

11 – Let’s Talk About Sanity

Step 2 – Came to Believe That a Power Greater Than Ourselves Could Restore Us to Sanity Do I continue to abuse food, or do I accept that I need a higher power? The choice should be easy—but it isn’t. Questions to Ask Yourself Ask yourself the following: Do I believe that I am addicted […]

12 – Contempt Prior to Investigation

📚 Why I Use the Big Book in My Recovery As you read my posts, you’ll notice that I refer primarily to the book Alcoholics Anonymous—commonly known as the Big Book. I know many people have challenges with this text, especially since it was written nearly a century ago. So why do I make it […]

13 – A Brand New Idea

Embracing a New Path to Recovery Recovery is rarely a straight line. It’s often a winding road filled with resistance, revelations, and the gradual surrender of old beliefs. Joseph Campbell once said, “We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” […]

14 – Do I Say OMHP Instead of OMG Now?

I heard a few speakers describe the addiction problem and the 12 Step solution by saying we have a physical illness that requires a spiritual remedy.   My experience of being an active compulsive eater was throwing all my best ideas at my problem and not having anything work for any real length of time.   I […]

15 – Praying to a “god” I Don’t Believe In

My First Steps in Overeaters Anonymous My first sponsor, TS, walked me through all the steps. She may have tried to convey that I needed to continue working on them, but that wasn’t something I took away from our time together. After about two months in OA, I was releasing weight, following a food plan, […]

16 – And This Is Why…

Why All This Talk About God/HP/god? When I first came to this program, I was overwhelmed by how often people talked about God, a Higher Power, or some kind of spiritual connection. I didn’t know what I believed—or if I believed anything at all. But over time, I realized that this spiritual element wasn’t just […]

17 – Step 2 Overview

Step 2 – Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. Christina’s Version Became willing to believe that there was a power bigger than myself and humans in general that could get me off the food abuse merry-go-round. Personalize It If insanity can be explained as doing the same […]

18 – Being convinced, we were at Step Three…

An exercise I like to work on with the people I sponsor comes from the a-b-c statements on page 60 of the Big Book.   “Our description of the alcoholic, the chapter to the agnostic, and our personal adventures before and after make clear three pertinent ideas: (a) That we were alcoholic and could not manage […]

19 – Hard Truth

Step Three: The Brutal Beauty of Letting Go We’re stepping into the part of the Twelve Steps that doesn’t coddle us. It asks us to be honest—brutally, uncomfortably honest—not because we’re bad people, but because growth only happens when we drop the illusions. In “16 – And This Is Why…” I talked about the importance […]

20 – The Fine Line

When the Wounds We Didn’t Cause Still Hurt In my post “19 – Hard Truth” I wrote that we often cause our own pain. But today, I want to explore that more carefully—because there’s a difference between taking responsibility for our actions and blaming ourselves for things we never owned. Disruption and Doubt My regular […]

21 – Step 3 Prayer

If you’re convinced that you’re a compulsive eater—or at least that, at this moment, you don’t have another solution—then you’re at Step Three. In my post  18 – Being convinced … we explored Step Three through the A-B-C statements found on page 60 of the book Alcoholics Anonymous. Step Three begins when I accept the […]

22 – Step 3 Overview

Step 3 – Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him Christina’s Version Decided to quit trying to be the boss and rely on a higher power instead. Personalize It I make a commitment to get through the steps and learn how not […]

23 – Step 4 Is My Favorite—Even If That Makes Me Weird

Uncovering the patterns that keep us stuck—and how to break free Most people dread Step 4. I love it. In this post, I’ll share why inventory is the turning point in recovery—and how you can make it work for you, no matter your format or fears. This step is foundational for the next few posts […]

24 – Step 4 – Resentments Columns 1, 2 & 3

“Taking time to look at how I have been treated and how I have treated others is hard – stuffing my feelings is hard”  (Christina H – 06 – Simple But Not Easy) ✨ Guiding Statement Note: There are many approaches to completing a Fourth Step inventory. I choose to follow the instructions outlined in […]