The Twelve Steps are the heart of the OA recovery program. They offer a new way of life that enables the compulsive overeater to live without the need for excess food.

The ideas expressed in the Twelve Steps, which originated in Alcoholics Anonymous, reflect practical experience and application of spiritual insights recorded by thinkers throughout the ages. Their greatest importance lies in the fact that they work! They enable compulsive overeaters and millions of other Twelve-Steppers to lead happy, productive lives. They represent the foundation upon which OA is built.

The Twelve Steps of Overeaters Anonymous

1. We admitted we were powerless over food — that our lives had become unmanageable.
   
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
   
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
   
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
   
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
   
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
   
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
   
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
   
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
   
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
    
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
    
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to compulsive overeaters and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

they are more accepting to people who have lapband. they see that after all we went through we still struggle with binges when we can (or muschies for that fact)

I just got a sponsor and she is great. So patient, (i;ve had several binges on ice cream) and she doesn't give up on me. how nice and how accepting. they know all about head hunger and are a great source of wisdom.

Hi folks. Bandana, it's great you have a sponsor now. I also have a new f2f sponsor, my previous 2 were via email. I need to start my step work over again because I notice the questions in my OA workbook are different to the ones my email sponsor gave me.:biggrin: There was me thinking I had finished step 4 lol.

I am still gonna go for a vsg wls. Once I get my passport sent off, I went to post office to get it sent Weds but my photos didn't match the strict criteria so they need to be taken again.

Hoping you all have an abstinent weekend. :thumbup:

Hi everyone I have not been on this thread for so long. But I want to tell you all what I found. I got banded in June 2008 and have had 2 fills and barley lost 15 pds. I was so disgusted I too could still binge on ice cream and cookies and soft foods. Ironically I could not binge on chicken because it would come back up in me. Anyway I was really down onmyself. A friend of mine told me abouta new group, like OA but it is called anorexic and bulimics annonoumous. Also 12 step but very intense they call it sober with food not abstinant which I thought was cool. I go on phone meetings and it is really helping. There is a entire section on binge eating and how it is a disease too. I needed more then just OA I needed something that talked about the control, and the feelings around food. I have been doing much better. I threw away my scale. If I think I am on a diet I want to binge.More later Mary

I'm afraid to go back to OA for the same reason. I started a blog to help me deal and I'm looking for support on this site. I am not interested in food nazi's either, since I am triggered by Protein as much as I am by carbs, but I want to deal with all those things that come up that drive me into the food.

IF YOUR STOMACH OFFENDS YOU, TIE IT OFF

Just wanted to clarify. I feel shamed at OA meetings, not because people shame me but because so many promote very rigid systems of controlling the food, which does not seems like freedom from food addiction to me. I am ADHD and totally incapable of being anal about anything, much less food plans and weighing and measuring and panning for carbs like a miner panning for gold. In fact, everytime I try to not be ADHD and to fit what seems to me to be a very anal approach to life, I feel shamed for being made the way I'm made and shamed for not being able to work the program the way some people do. And that makes me just want to eat. I've started a blog to help me deal with the addiction aspect of this disease as well as all the ramifications of life in the lap band lane. It's helping me and it may help you.

IF YOUR STOMACH OFFENDS YOU, TIE IT OFF

I hear you all loud and clear!

I love your blog, ifyourstomach....

Rigid plans: I was in FAA 12 step and Grey Sheet, an off shoot of OA.

I was bounced back to day 1 so many times because I failed to be abstinent from all sugar,and its substitutes, flour and wheat on a B2B basis, that I threw in the towel. Once my sponsor bounced me back to day 1 because I ate my rice 2 hours early in the evening because I had skipped lunch due to being away from an accommodating eating place and with friends. I failed to pack a cooler and cart it in to a restaurant with the people I was with.(One mom whose son was getting married toted a cooler on the plane and sat at the reception as the Mother of the Bride eating out of her cooler? Now THAT is rigidity.

12 Step has many good benefits, but some of the groups are almost cultic.The more liberal groups still ridicule and look down on those who "took the easy way out". Little do they know that the addiction is still there and the battle is the same, we just have help with the Band.

So I woke up one day having had enough and applied for Banding, finally finding the courage to change the things I can.

I am glad I did . I have lost a bit and am scheduled for my 1st fill on Tuesday.

Congrats, Bandana for locating a suitable sponsor..that is GOLD!

I hear you all loud and clear!

I love your blog, ifyourstomach....

Rigid plans: I was in FAA 12 step and Grey Sheet, an off shoot of OA.

I was bounced back to day 1 so many times because I failed to be abstinent from all sugar,and its substitutes, flour and wheat on a B2B basis, that I threw in the towel. Once my sponsor bounced me back to day 1 because I ate my rice 2 hours early in the evening because I had skipped lunch due to being away from an accommodating eating place and with friends. I failed to pack a cooler and cart it in to a restaurant with the people I was with.(One mom whose son was getting married toted a cooler on the plane and sat at the reception as the Mother of the Bride eating out of her cooler? Now THAT is rigidity.

12 Step has many good benefits, but some of the groups are almost cultic.The more liberal groups still ridicule and look down on those who "took the easy way out". Little do they know that the addiction is still there and the battle is the same, we just have help with the Band.

So I woke up one day having had enough and applied for Banding, finally finding the courage to change the things I can.

I am glad I did . I have lost a bit and am scheduled for my 1st fill on Tuesday.

Congrats, Bandana for locating a suitable sponsor..that is GOLD!

LOL. Great stories. When I first went to OA 15 years ago it wasn't like that but I saw the food nazis taking over and when I went back last year those were the only ones who spoke. No thanks. My church has a program that has so many rules that after one meeting I had an incredible headache--to which I am not prone and I was so angry. Inaddition to all the meal plans they'd added memorizing scripture and sending each other postcards and all I could think was-more guilt-I'll never be able to do this.

I also had to write down EVERY piece of food I put in my mouth(all was weighed and measured to the ounce according to the plan), commit it to my sponsor,journal every day, do step work every day,and make 3 contact calls each day as well attend 3 weekly meetings either phone or f2f. If there was a change in , say... a vegetable or fruit for the day, I had to call my sponsor, another member, or post it on a board BEFORE I ate it.

I needed the Band! I had other things to take care of rather than ME ME ME.

It took courage to change all that and I am glad I did.

I still benefit However, from the spiritual principles of 12 step because I feel a lot of it stems from the Beatitudes.

I would love to find an OA offshoot of those with WL surgery or a group which had no self- centered food nazis...some of us overweight people DO HAVE A LIFE and have others to care for also.

OK..enough kvetching about 12 Step nazis for me....remembrances tend to shade the day and rob that newly found Serenity!.

Looking forward to a fill next week.

I also had to write down EVERY piece of food I put in my mouth(all was weighed and measured to the ounce according to the plan), commit it to my sponsor,journal every day, do step work every day,and make 3 contact calls each day as well attend 3 weekly meetings either phone or f2f. If there was a change in , say... a vegetable or fruit for the day, I had to call my sponsor, another member, or post it on a board BEFORE I ate it.

I needed the Band! I had other things to take care of rather than ME ME ME.

It took courage to change all that and I am glad I did.

I still benefit However, from the spiritual principles of 12 step because I feel a lot of it stems from the Beatitudes.

I would love to find an OA offshoot of those with WL surgery or a group which had no self- centered food nazis...some of us overweight people DO HAVE A LIFE and have others to care for also.

OK..enough kvetching about 12 Step nazis for me....remembrances tend to shade the day and rob that newly found Serenity!.

Looking forward to a fill next week.

I have 4 weeks till my first fill. You are absolutely right about the serenity. I find being around people or meetings that fill me with either shame or anger takes away my serenity and drives me into the food. If Bill Wilson were to attend today's OA meetings he'd either laugh his head off, or metaphorically overturn the tables of the moneychangers. At my Alanon meetings we talked about the steps and the principles of the program and how we were working them. As we recovered we talked less and less about the alcoholic, or we talked about the alcoholic only in terms of how we were working the steps in dealing with him/her. That's how OA needs to be.

Maybe we should start our own on-line meeting, GAL-WLS (Get A Life-Weight Loss Surgery). We welcome recovering food nazis.

Actually, I probably shouldn't make fun. These people have simply replaced one type of food obsession with another and their rigid adherance to a code is all they've got. They transfer their internal shame and need for control onto others. It's just another insidious form of this disease.

Edited July 3, 200917 yr by ifyourstomachoffendsyou
grammar

Everyone,

This morning I was down 2 pounds which puts me half way to goal. Whoo hoo. I also have dropped 3 and 1/2 meds and 2 supplements. Hooray for me!

Cheri

Just wanted to clarify. I feel shamed at OA meetings, not because people shame me but because so many promote very rigid systems of controlling the food, which does not seems like freedom from food addiction to me. I am ADHD and totally incapable of being anal about anything, much less food plans and weighing and measuring and panning for carbs like a miner panning for gold. In fact, everytime I try to not be ADHD and to fit what seems to me to be a very anal approach to life, I feel shamed for being made the way I'm made and shamed for not being able to work the program the way some people do. And that makes me just want to eat. I've started a blog to help me deal with the addiction aspect of this disease as well as all the ramifications of life in the lap band lane. It's helping me and it may help you.

IF YOUR STOMACH OFFENDS YOU, TIE IT OFF

I can so relate to some of your issues with food. I too am an ADDICT, I just can't stop... Band is helping some, but I've learned (unfortunatley) to eat around it.. and now I am regaining 10 lbs... how can I post on your blog?

I can so relate to some of your issues with food. I too am an ADDICT, I just can't stop... Band is helping some, but I've learned (unfortunatley) to eat around it.. and now I am regaining 10 lbs... how can I post on your blog?

If you click on IF YOUR STOMACH OFFENDS YOU, TIE IT OFF

You'll be able to read the blog if you click on this link. You can comment by clicking on comment at the bottom of any of my posts. Start at the beginning of my blog and work your way thru it. Please comment only on the most recent blog though. I don't go back and look for comments on old posts. Thanks for your interest.

The post is good!http://www.gifthair.com:thumbup:

The post is good!http://www.gifthair.com:thumbup:

Get off this thread, you are obviously trying to build some kind of business...

This thread is for BANDSTERS only

H i Friends,

my name is Heidi and I was banded in Mexico 10/16/09.

I have a food addiction, and I need support, learning to channel my emotional eating into a more productive way of relieving stress.

So far the healing process has gone well, but I have had a heap of stress lately and I feel this intense drive to eat, eat, eat.

ugh. :drool: