ollieacompulsiveovereater

I don't anticipate posting all that much here. But this will be my online journal for my recovery from compulsive overeating program.

I have some other blogs but, due to anonimity concerns, I don't want to make recovery related posts there.

A brief introduciton to me: my top weight was 320 lbs; right now I weigh 190-195. I've been 188-195 since the winter of 1996.

I've included some before and after photos; the before was in 1992. The after photos were taken in 2004 and 2005 respectively. The track photo was from 2004; I was doing the 3000 meter racewalk.

So, for my first post, I'll share something that I read from the website Graysheeters Anonymous. I think it makes some great points about this "love" stuff that you hear so much about; I much prefer "clarity":

http://www.greysheet.org/nature.shtml

[...]As years went by -- and there were about 7 of them before I was able to actually put down the food -- I watched the blossoming in the regular rooms of OA of so much so-called LOVE, and so much GENTLENESS! I watched the Big Book and Step workshops multiply. I watched overweight people leading these Big Book and Step workshops. I saw very little abstinence. I watched the ABSTINENT people in NYC regular OA (maybe one in 30?) being very low-keyed, very quiet. I STUDIED them, because they were my only hope. The ones with a few years were never available to sponsor. They didn't laugh. They rarely smiled. It was damn hard being abstinent in a room full of food-drunk people dumping about everything, except about not picking up that first compulsive bite, no matter what. [In AA meetings, there's a convention that "if you've been drinking or used any mood-changers today, we ask you not to share in the meeting -- but rather, approach one of us after the meeting to speak with us."]

When I found the small Cambridge GreySheet Group in NYC in 1989, I was "circling the drain" -- coming perilously close to a return to bingeing. At that time, there were some pretty hard-talking people with relatively long abstinence here. I was attracted to them, because they were clear as a bell, and they always seemed to take responsibility for themselves -- something I find immensely refreshing, appealing, and inspiring. FOR ME, IT'S A PROMISE OF RECOVERY!

These abstinent greysheeters were NOT attributing their recovery to the LOVE they received. They were attributing it the CLARITY and BOUNDARIES they were shown and guided to implement. Clarity, truth, boundaries -- you have these, the love takes care of itself. THAT gave me HOPE -- that had the ring of TRUTH to it, for me. A message with depth and substance. After all, if I'm a VICTIM, and I give power to those mean bad guys the world is well supplied with, then I'm more or less condemned to remain hurt, abused, and in the food. Being the supersensitive person that I am, if I had waited till someone was nice and gentle and loving to me before I started to take responsibility for myself, and picked up the set of tools that is laid at my feet, it just might never have happened! [...]