My paternal grandmother was full-blooded Tarahumara, the tribe of indigenous people in northern Mexico known for long distance running. My daddy was a runner, and he's always told me that there is a runner somewhere in me too. I never believed him.

A few months ago, I signed up for a 5K training program with my 16-year-old son. I don't even recognize myself as a person who would do this. When I started attending OA meetings a year ago, I was so large and out of shape that I could barely walk a mile. I was morbidly obese: 5'2" and 267 lbs. I was pre-diabetic and at a high risk of stroke. I changed my whole life so that I could live. Over the last 20 months, I've not only lost a little over 80 lbs. by attending meetings, doing service, and working the 12 steps with my sponsor, I’ve gained enough confidence in myself that I am willing to try things I never would have before.  Not only do I hardly recognize myself physically, I hardly recognize myself emotionally or spiritually either.

I feel so much better, but make no mistake: I am still obese, and I hadn't even attempted a jog in over a decade. I was terrified to go to the first group practice. I was scared the other runners would think I didn't belong there. I was afraid of looking stupid. It was much like attending my first OA meeting.  I thought that I would be the only big person there.  I thought I would walk into a room full of thin people who would silently judge me.  I was wrong about OA, and I was wrong about these folks too.

The group has been so encouraging and supportive, exactly like my fellow OA members.  I am by far the slowest runner. There are a couple of senior citizens that lap me every practice. I notice this, but I don't care and neither does anyone else. I feel strong. I feel proud. I feel the Tarahumara blood flowing through my veins. I’ve been delayed by the onset of plantar fasciitis, but I’m going through physical therapy to get back to running.  There are second chances in running, just like in OA.  I'm going to run in a 5K in the fullness of time. It’s going slower than I’d like, but that’s ok too.  Nothing beautiful blooms overnight.  I’m working on my OA program, and I’m working on reversing the injury my disease did to my body.

I may be the slowest runner, but I am a runner, and she’s happy, joyous, and free.   I'm dreaming of crossing the finish line. The runner in me is laughing with joy.

Angelina
Dalton, GA

On a Saturday morning 2 days after Thanksgiving the year I turned 18, I walked into my first OA meeting.  Having “binged my brains out” for two days, disgusted with my body, desperate and utterly defeated by the disease, I found my way into the rooms of the OA fellowship.

I remember feeling as if the people gathered in that musty church fellowship room with the thin, fraying red carpet, had somehow, unbeknownst to me, gotten hold of my journal and been reading my musings.  How did they know all those details?  Did they follow me for miles when I sought a particular flavor of an item I had to have; watch me in the laundry room of my college dorm where the vending machines were located; see me bike ride dozens of miles after horrific carb intake; eat out of huge kitchen pans I had access to and go through the cafeteria line as many times as I could before feeling humiliated; see me eating my roommate’s homemade irreplaceable food; read my mind when I was telling a date goodbye, obsessed with what I would eat when they were finally gone; go from 1 fast food establishment to the next buying my favorite items at each place; see the bags full of food I got before writing a paper or studying for an exam?  When I worked at a restaurant, did they see me eat off people’s plates after I cut off their last bite?  Did they know the paralyzing fear I felt on the inside trying to exude confidence on my face?  Did they know how much I loved and believed in God but questioned why He’d abandoned me in this one gigantic area?  Had they known when I was a young ballet dancer growing up, that I never felt thin enough or good enough?  How did they know my level of desperation?
 
No where except in the loving rooms of Overeaters Anonymous have I ever experienced the unconditional healing love I still find there, now 35 years later.  Yes, I am now 53!  I’ve grown up in Overeaters Anonymous and HP willing, will grow old in our rooms!  There’s truly nothing else quite like it.  My work through the steps, countless times, sponsors, sponsees, service, meetings, and all the ups and downs of this journey have given me a lovely opportunity to live!  OA has taught me how to be a student, wife, divorcee, wife again, mom, employee, friend.  In all the roles I’m assigned, the 12 steps give me a road map, a guide like no other.
 
Learning to do life without excess food or other compulsive behaviors isn’t a walk in the park.  It’s flipping hard, often.  Those difficulties don’t compare to the tragic life story I would have had without recovery.
 
In a couple of weeks I have the honor of being one speaker at a retreat in a nearby city.  The topic I was assigned is one of my all-time favorite sentences in the Big Book, on page 132:  “we are not a glum lot.”  It also says on that page:  “we absolutely insist on enjoying life.”

If putting our drug of choice, food, down, working the steps, and being in the fellowship of OA didn’t make life LOTS better, why would we stay?  These things make my life immeasurably better.  I am truly, really-I-mean-it, happy, joyous, and free today.
 
My top suggestions for recovering are:  1)  put your “alcoholic foods” down to be entirely abstinent, 2) work with a sponsor whose recovery you truly, deeply desire, and 3) attend as many meetings a week as it takes for you to feel a deep connection to recovery.

I came to OA before the internet and cell phones.  There are a host of online and phone meetings now, as well as podcasts that have years’ worth of recordings.  We all have tiny hand-held computers:  cell phones!  If you have the desire, you will have the recovery!
 
Go to any lengths!  Come join a host of friends on this “road of happy destiny!”  It is “broad, roomy, and inclusive.”  It is a highway full of love, recovery and miracles.

                                                                                                                        Colleen P.
                                                                                                                        Chattanooga, TN