Step 1 is backwards

For me, step one looks backwards, some of the time. My life was unmanageable by me, and eating gave me relief. I made a conscious decision, at the suggestion of my parents that if I ate, I would grow and not be picked on. But I took it to far, and that did not help. The reason I was being picked on by the other kids was because my parents were frugal eccentrics, not just poor, and would not buy us kids decent close, but rather mother dressed me in her sowing, which were not that great. It was not until I refused to go to school that father bought me close. We can deal with harassment in a number of ways. One way is avoiding contact. By then, I was grossly obese, and remained that way, likely due to the insulin/leptin effects.

That experience was a "defining moment", more like several years, that had a major impact on shaping my life, and shaped my personality. I did not associate with anyone more than necessary. That trained me to be "low human contact need". I did not need friends, and was better by my self than with others. Mind you, by grade three, I was an attacker, so nobody wanted to be around me anyway. That did not mellow out much until I read "How to win friends and influence others" when I was 19 or so.

Now that I understand the overfeed / insulin / leptin issue, the physical part of the overeating problem, and take the appropriate measures, as much as I can, it is possible to see the personality issues. These likely developed as defence. That is why it is so critical to give up overeating before the program can really work. But coming to have a concept of god is the next step. Once we have a concept of god, or in my case a definition of god (ignostic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignosticism), we have something to lever off to obtain more motivation. We humans try to do right, and to follow the "will of natural laws" is going with the flow. Then we need to clean up the past and fix up old relationships that need to be fixed, and continue this into the future.

So you frugal minimalists, eccentrics, religious freaks, control freaks, fear mongers, irrationals, and the like, what effect is your life style having on your children? I survived (gratitude for), but how well? Some do not survive. Oh, well.

But what do I know? Be well, eat real food, breath deeply, smile easily, and enjoy what life has to offer.

Rewrite the steps to suit

When new people come to the program,
they frequently try to rewrite the steps
to suit them,
without understanding the effect of the steps,
as they are.
Here is one more attempt.

http://aaagnostica.org/2013/10/20/the-proactive-twelve-steps/

My response is as follows:

Your step one is, as far as I am concerned, out to lunch.

I am a non-theist, inside OA, so I know nothing.
To me step one is admitting defeat,
and accepting that I need help,
not just with food choices
but with other areas of life.
This forces a teachable attitude,
and humility and need to listen
and understand.
This is the foundation for growth,
the search for knowledge,
wisdom and serenity.

When I came in,
I was a troubled person,
deep in ignorance, distrust,
self-sufficiency, greed of modern culture
and without any peace.
I was troubled physically and mentally.
I am now at peace with the world.
My belief system does not require
that you beleive as I do.
You can believe what ever you like.
Thank you for letting me vent.
Keep up the good effort.

I did not see the purpose in
going beyond that point,
as I have no clue as to
the purpose of his steps are.

Community

Step one suggests that our
personnel issues go far beyond
just the food
to other areas of our life.

Unmanageable may be a suitable term
for the alcoholic,
but what about the food overeater,
regardless of the actual cause
and manner of overuse.

Habitual bad diets (ignorance based overeating),
food addicts (substance based addiction),
compulsive overeaters (behavioral addictions),
undiagnosed allergy (physiological driven overeating)
emotional eaters (psychological overeating),
ritual eaters (philosophical overeaters),
etc. and all the other forms have separate causes.

Is it logical
to try to apply
just one treatment
that never identifies the problem,
and just applies a brutal one-size-fits all solution?

Is this something that the
"OA community" would like to address?
or are we going to keep our heads in the sand,
and bleed members?

Step 1 Revisited

Here is a previous posts about and related to step 1.
http://oathursdaynightgroup.blogspot.ca/2011/10/step-1.html
http://oathursdaynightgroup.blogspot.ca/2012/09/to-what-lengths.html
http://oathursdaynightgroup.blogspot.ca/2012/02/step-0.html

When I came to the program,
I was desperate. I could not stay
on any diet any longer, but having
cycled through about 75- to 100 pounds
7 or 8 time in my life, I knew any
diet would take the weight off.
I had my problem down to not
being able to stick to a diet.

I had no idea that I was addicted
to wheat, carbohydrates, sugar,
omega 6 oils, and the like.

Admitting I was powerless over food
was not the issue, but that my life
was unmanageable was less apparent.
It did not take much thinking to see that,
I was on compensation at the time and
could hardly walk for back pain.
I had time to read, in fact, I did little else.

Diving into service and studying the program,
AA bb, AA 12x12, AA comes of age,
and the OA stories, and first 7 pages of text
were all of our literature then.
Kay Sheppard book had just come out.
http://kaysheppard.com/
Within about 6 weeks I became abstinent
and in the next 2 years lost nearly 100 pounds.
But life was unmanageable all the time,
obviously, as soon as I started looking.

I went into the program with my
"ideology of origin" and a
concept of god being a set rules,
that if I could follow them,
then I could recover.

Step 1

Step one is a big undertaking. This is when we need to recognize that some foods are addicting or produce addiction like behavior. In my case, those food are sugar in all forms, grains, especially wheat, cheese, and nuts. Omega 6 oils are also an problem, so I include these in the food that I should not consume. My life was and is unmanageable when it came to food. All I need to do is eat any of these, and I am right back craving them, until once again, I get them out, steel my resolve, work some more of the program, and get back to life free of these addictive food. Yes, I do occasional eat them. I am not cured. The trick is to dust off the crumbs, and get to a meeting.

Wheat was the hardest of the lot to give up. First I gave up sugar, which was difficult, but I was truly addicted to wheat. When I gave up wheat, my hands started working again, and I lost weight rapidly. I have not eaten any wheat knowingly since giving it up. Sugar, I let a bit in, when it is down the list of ingredients, or I just have a taste. The other grains are not much of an issue; oats makes me itch; and I never ate much of others. Rice and corn are less of an issue, but rice raises my blood glucose rapidly, hence must be limited severely.

I now tend to eat meat and green vegetables mainly, with a few roots and the odd bit of fruit. Then there are the days when I fall off, and eat a bunch of fruit, excessive amounts of cured meat, cheese, nuts, fruit and the like. Get up, dust off the crumbs and go to the next available meeting, or now write a post.

All this proves that I have no control of myself with respect to food. I know that specific food are addicting, through the dopamine pathway, and specific foods cause insulin spikes, cravings and other things that drive me to the food. These details are not important to the only known treatment: abstinence.  That is the zero step.

Would any one like too share your strength, hope and experience? Please do so in the comments.