Let's Dance

Hi my name is Pamela and I am a recovering addict.

Wow, I can hardly believe 28 days have passed since I first posted about this addiction. Today is my 29^th day of food-sobriety and I feel terrific. I never knew I could feel so free while taking better care of myself. In AA and NA they use the serenity prayer as a mantra in each meeting. I decided to start each day incorporating that into my morning talks with my Heavenly Father. ­

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, (like the ingredients in processed food that triggers a binge in my body, or the fact that stress can be a trigger for me too.) The courage to change the things I can (I can change the way I react to those triggers and I can change what I eat so that most of those triggers are avoided. I can get enough sleep, and drink enough water so that my body is operating fully charged and fueled properly) and the wisdom to know the difference (I must do what I can do this day, this moment, unless I am healthy and walking in food sobriety, I cannot be useful to anyone else.)

Step 4 says this, “Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”

When I first read it I didn’t think that really applied to food addiction. I mean, overall I am one of the most moral people I know. I don’t even watch TV that has violence or illicit sexual themes, I don’t get drunk, I don’t use drugs, I don’t usually cuss, I love my country, my mama and my dog, I don’t cheat on my husband…Yep, I could go on and on. Moral inventory seemed more appropriate for people who struggle with bad morals. But, I want to do this with integrity, so I decided to ask God to show me anything I needed to recognize as immoral in my life, or anything that was hindering me from the freedom to live healthy and food-wise in sobriety.

We tend to label things according to what we find to be moral, but none of us is without sin, therefore no one is completely moral. Lusting after Nutty Bars, Committing Gluttony with French onion dip, following a binge with sloth thereby keeping every calorie preserved in our hips and many other practices of the food-addict are all immoral by God’s standard. If we really allow God to show us the truth of our lives and take that FEARLESS moral inventory, we will recognize the things we CAN change with the help of God.

The good thing is, I already took a moral inventory at the same time I admitted my powerlessness over this addiction in step one. The hard part is, there is still more God is revealing to me as I walk in my sobriety and these steps are not a group of instructions that you follow one at a time until you have worked all 12. All 12 have to be worked all the time. Initially you have to come to understand them one at a time, but I believe these steps are more like a dance than a lesson plan. Thankfully most dances I know don’t have 12 steps to learn, but this life of sobriety is like, 1-2-3-Kick…repeat.  Every day that I dance in food sobriety is a day closer to understanding how much God can use me when I am not under bondage to unhealthy foods and stress induced habits.

Let’s dance!

Step 3: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, (as we understand Him.)

I am amazed at the difference in my body and my mind after just over two weeks of food-sobriety. Truly I have not ever gone two weeks without even one of the foods my body is addicted to. I have lost weight many times and have eaten “healthy” for months in a row; but not without cheating at some point, even in the first two weeks. I didn’t call it cheating, I justified it using the mantra we have been taught since birth, “everything is fine in moderation.” That is just not true. At least not for me, and not for someone addicted to unhealthy ingredients in processed foods. Moderate amounts of healthy, natural foods are great, but just as you wouldn’t feed on moderate amounts of arsenic, consuming moderate amounts of chemical preservatives, fillers and trans fats is not healthy and leads us off the path of food sobriety.

I bought into the idea, hook, line and sinker. It’s health-seeker-friendly actually, even though it is fallible. We would love to believe that if we usually eat healthy, here is nothing wrong with cheating once in a while. That works for millions of people, but it does not work for an addict. The idea of moderation made me believe that weight-loss and healthy eating were something I could manipulate and control through games of just- one-bite, okay, maybe one, and well, it’s a special occasion.  There was no way, as an addict, that I could limit myself to those games. Even IF I stopped at one in public, the binge that came later left me feeling like a failure and clouded with depression over my poor choice and lack of willpower.

My solution could be called bulemia by some, but I believe it was more of a symptom of the addiction. I could hide my binges if I kept losing weight. I could deny the lack of control, if there was one thing I could control. Yes, I am saying it…for the first time publicly. The binge/purge cycle that began in high-school never left my thoughts and while for years I did not surrender to the practice, as an adult in my late 30s and early 40s it became a controllable defense against the cycle of
addiction I had yet to realize.

I knew I had to stop. I couldn’t keep throwing up all the time without causing more damage to my body and it wasn’t working anyway. My weight loss had come to a stop and I was actually gaining weight, again. So, I stopped purging out of fear, but binges didn’t stop. I still craved my drug of choice; processed, sugary, fat laden foods.

Honesty is key. I have always known the scripture that tells us, “The truth will set you free,” I just never equated eating with dishonesty. Although, there is really no other way to describe baking a cake in the microwave, eating the whole thing and hiding the box in the bottom of the trash can so no one will notice. I cannot excuse telling the sixteen year old in the drive through that I was taking dinner to my husband in the field so they wouldn’t look at me funny when I ordered two extra value meals. Indeed my addiction had caused me to explain away odd behavior and unhealthy patterns, and in the thick of it, I didn’t even realize it was just plain dishonesty. I was not only addicted to those foods, I had become a liar too.

Today is different. This is a new day and a new life. I choose this day to walk in wholeness, wellness and food-sobriety. I choose to allow my will and my life to be fully in the care of God.  Today marks my 17^th day of food-sobriety and the completion of step 3 in the 12 step cycle. The bonus? As of this morning, sobriety has led to a 17-pound loss of unhealthy toxins and fats from the body that belongs to God, on loan to me for as long as HE wills.