Pamela C.

This speaker has been recorded at an online meeting of Addictive Eaters Anonymous. You can email us at contact@AEAinfo.org
Hello, everybody. My name is Pamela. And I am an addictive eater.
And while I was sitting waiting for the meeting to start, I thought, I'll give myself a head start by seeing what one of the readings is for today. So I just opened up AA literature and in Addictive Eaters Anonymous, we use Alcoholics Anonymous literature, and they have a book called The Daily Reflections. And is it October the fifth?
Well, it must be definitely God. Because I've read October the fifth, and I realize it's now October the sixth. But I'll read the second half, which is
a member's own experience of the literature. And he says, or she says, ’I have more than enough to handle today, without dragging along yesterday's baggage too. I must balance today's books, if I am to have a chance tomorrow. So I asked myself, if I have erred, and how I can avoid repeating that particular behavior? Did I hurt anyone? Did I help anyone, and why? Some of today is bound to spill over into tomorrow. But most of it need not, if I make an honest daily inventory.’
So that's October the fifth part of the reading, because I just needed a heads up on what to share to this evening. So that one's called ’Yesterday's baggage’. And I was also aware that a few of the people I've spoken to this week, I've talked about a real need to cultivate emotional sobriety. And that sometimes when I can't get a hold of my sponsor, or another reliable, long term, sober member, I will, I believe it's God's will and my will, that I sit still, when I am disturbed, and I give myself a good talking to. And I was actually trying to find that quote from the other AA literature. It's called ’As Bill Sees It’. And in it Bill actually says, you know that sometimes we have to give ourselves a good talking to, in order to pull ourselves out of self pity, and worry, and anxiety, and resentment. You know, when prayers aren't enough, when I'm waiting for God to help me, when I'm waiting for a power greater than myself, to help me. Sometimes I have to use good old fashioned self-will correct use of self-will, to have a good day and to escape, worry and anxiety. So I've been a member of the fellowship for three decades.
And I have to say that without it, I would be a mess. And I probably wouldn't be here. And I probably wouldn't be here because I think I would have exploded with the food. You know, and many of our members suffer from anorexia, bulimia, average eaters who are bingeing at sorry, average-looking-sized people who are they don't look underweight or overweight. And they could just be struggling with food, eating addictively and all of the other addictions that go with eating problems.
Now, I didn't know that at the time. And I just struggled along in the addiction, thinking that I was just a bonny lass. And, you know, I was encouraged to eat, because my family of origin saw that as abundance. And if you were eating, it meant you if you were good, you weren't ill, you must have a darn good appetite. And it's there, and it's cheap. And if you're eating, you're not out on the street committing crime. So it was easy for me as a struggling self hating person to just seek food as my solution. And like I say, it was cheap. And it was, it was available, it was so available in my family of origin, it was abundantly available. And I would spend my whole time trying to figure out what to eat next, while I was eating, you know, we had a corner shop that was less than a quarter of a mile away. And I would go to that corner shop and steal food from and I can remember their names, they're dead now. Mr And Mrs Dovi. We used to call i the Dovi shop. And it had every imaginable... soft sweeties, and they were old. And, you know, it was so easy to get away with stealing. And then at the top of the road that was another less than a quarter mile away was another shop. And I don't remember the owners of that shop, but on the way to school, and on the way back from school, I would join in and distract Mrs So and So and steal her refresher chews, you know, fizzles or whatever. Because it was my way of coping with life, I just
So that monster just grew into adulthood. And I tried to get away with it by compulsive exercise. And by taking Dospan, I think it was called Dospan, which is a, which is a drug that takes away your appetite. I tried to deal with obesity and eating by all of those crazy diets that are on the market, even now, regularly talked about. And you know, I did not know that this was an addiction, and that I had an illness. And that I had a predisposition to eating to making myself feel good by just thinking about food and putting it in my mouth. And having it hit the back of my tongue, my palate, and then just wanting more and more of it. And my whole life was you know, I was just obsessed. I think that I lived most of my life in blackout. Because most average people can talk about episodes of their school or their friends or, you know, neighbors and parties and events. And I seriously I I don't remember most of my childhood, because I think it was spent under the duvet, in the kitchen cupboard eating.
And I wasn't interested in
relationships with others. I was just interested in the food, and I did have about a Labrador. And he and I would spend lots of time running around the local park and walking into the
The Town Center and back again, I spent a lot of time with my Labrador. But it was just on a hunt for food, you know, and
it just got worse and worse. And I, I was lucky. Because my GP had heard that addictively eating in that way is an illness. And he pinpointed me into these rooms.
So I came in, and with the help of a sponsor, and a complete,
I completely understood that my way was not working, that the knowledge I had about diets and food and nutrition, and exercise, were not working, and that I needed to empty my very clever mind, of all the knowledge that I had about food and nutrition. And all the knowledge I had about relationships and finances, I was just ready, you know that it was hurting me too much. So eventually, I asked someone to help me. And I saw that the root causes of the eating problem and, you know, the drinking, and the spending, and the exercise, and the casual relationships. The root problem was always fear. And I'll put in brackets (self loathing), because I didn't know that it was okay not to know, I thought, because I didn't know and I didn't have the skills, that I was a terrible person.
But it turns out, it's part of the illness. So step four, revealed to me the self hate, and the fear. And, you know, I just, I enjoyed writing it down in black and white. I wasn't afraid anymore. Because I saw these people were getting well, not just well, they were living a life of freedom. How do you live? How do you not eat when you go to the cinema? Or you attend someone's wedding? Or you're dancing? How do you not eat? How do you not drink? How do you just be present for somebody's wedding or the theater? Or if a girlfriend wants to talk to you, you know, and I saw that those members were doing these things. And I, oh, boy, did I just want that. I just wanted to live a life to be attractive to be slim.
But most of all, to be free from the torture of thinking and eating food all the time, I just wanted freedom. And here I had a group of people who were doing it. So I was just ready. I just said, ’Okay, here I am.’ And my sponsor made it clear. You know, she just said, ’You've been around a long time. And you might think you know, what your problem is and what the solution is. But I really want you to empty your mind of what you think you know, and just do some of the things that I'm asking you to do.’ And so yeah, you know, that has been the solution. And the steps have healed me. And I immediately connected with God, I choose to call the Power greater than myself, God.
And I talk to it each and every day. I read about it each and every day, many times a day, because I worked out that I ate many times a day. Therefore I need the solution many, many times a day. And I worked out that God speaks to me in the silence and that it's okay to pause and pray and to
depths of despair when I wasn't eating, and I had bills to pay, and I had a marriage to, to heal, you know, how did I get through that, how did I get through work? Colleagues and changing in the family suddenly stopping my loud, obnoxious behavior and calming down, you know, and the people in my life getting used to that?
And the answer is they don't have to change, I just have to change. And I accepted that I'm a sick person, and that this program is healing me. And I keep coming. And there are no days off. Because as soon as I let down my spiritual laurels, that illness will be back in my head, telling me that I'm not good enough. And I need something to take the edge off, you know, which is a complete lie. So life is good. I have no idea how long I've spoken for. So I'm going to stop there because I've just looked at the time and it's almost 20 past. Thank you for asking me to share.