Food For Thought - Emotional Distress

[MajestyJo]

Thursday, December 1, 2011

You are reading from the book Food for Thought

Emotional Distress

In the past, we translated emotional distress into physical hunger. Physical hunger was something we could deal with when emotional pain was too much for us. The reason our hunger was not satisfied by any amount of food was that the hunger was really distressed emotion.

If as children we were unable to recognize and express our distress, we buried it. As adults, we may still have ignored painful feelings and tried to make them go away with quantities of food and drink. Eventually, we became so dishonest with ourselves that we did not know what it was we really felt. We may have pretended for so long that everything was fine that we believed it. The telltale sign that all was not fine was our compulsive overeating behavior.

When we abstain, we sometimes fear that we will be overwhelmed with the emotional pain that is no longer buried with food. By turning this distress over to our Higher Power, we are able to survive it and learn from it.

I give You the pain that I cannot handle.

[saved1]

When the heart weeps for what it has lost,
the spirit laughs for what it has found. :idea:
(Sufi proverb)


Before I came into this program, I had thrown God out the window. In fact, I was plain angry at Him. Where was He when my only brother was killed in a car accident, when my only nephews were lost to me for many years as a result? Where was He when my parents died, when I went through my ugly divorce, when my step-son committed suicide, or when I had two major car accidents? I didn't know how to deal with all the feelings around the grief, loss and pain. I was spiritually bereft, although I didn't know it then. All I knew was that I was depressed a lot of the time, and had this great big hole in my soul that I had to keep feeding so I wouldn't have to feel the pain or deal with anything in my life. But the truth was that no amount of food could relieve that constant ache, and all that happened was that I felt more and more fat, bloated and miserable. The food that was supposed to take away all the pain of living was really causing me more pain.

When I came into program and heard the three letter word, God, I nearly ran away. I'm a very rational, logical person so it was really hard for me to believe what these crazy people were saying, but I was desperate enough to keep coming back. I had to act as if I did believe that I could recover and that a Higher Power might help me. When the miracles started to happen, my faith began to develop, and I slowly realized that my Higher Power was always with me. I now have a far better way to fill that hole in my soul, and it is a far more satisfying and saner way than filling it with mountains of food.

One Day at a Time . . .
I pray to keep my Higher Power in my heart and in my soul, because if I do, my life will be enriched immeasurably in ways that food could never do.:281:

~ Sharon S.~


STEP TWELVE
Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps,
we tried to carry this message to compulsive eaters
and to practice these principles in all our affairs. :1:

[saved1]

I try to avoid looking forward or backward,
and try to keep looking upward.:169:
Charlotte Bronte


If only I would remember to keep my focus on God and today, not yesterday and not tomorrow. The past is just that ... the past. I can't change any of it, the good memories or the bad. They are just memories. I don't have to forget my past; I just have to stop hurting myself by constantly agonizing over what I consider mistakes and failures. :24:

Tomorrow is in God's hands. What better place for it to be! I have to learn to trust God to hold me in the palm of His hands, the same way He holds tomorrow. He isn't going to drop me or close His fist around me so tightly that I can't breathe.:183:

We are all created with the ability to make choices, and He gives us that freedom. He will hold us securely, and help us make the right choices, if only we let go and let Him.:4Comfort:

One day at a time . . .
I will forget yesterday and tomorrow. I will not look backward or forward. I will look up and put myself in God's care, knowing He will hold me safely in the palm of His hand.:281:

Debbie K.

(Share-Perspective)

[saved1]

Don't listen to friends when the Friend inside you says, "Do this!" :281:
Mahatma Gandhi

The Oxford dictionary describes intuition as "immediate apprehension by the mind without reasoning." Well, I certainly never acted on intuition for most of my life because, in order for me to make any decision, it had to be based on cold hard logic. I would literally make a scientific "if - then hypothesis" based on all the possible consequences of any action I was contemplating, and by the time I'd looked into all the possible negative outcomes, I'd more than likely have talked myself out of it. Part of the problem was fear that if it didn't turn out well, I would not be taken care of. How could I trust that my Higher Power would take care of me, seeing I had for a long time been angry at God and believed that He was definitely not there for me? :undecided:

One of the miracles of the program has been my returning belief in a Higher Power who is always there for me when I need Him. I am slowly learning that I just need to turn my will and my life over to Him on a daily basis as it tells me in Step Three, and amazing things are beginning to happen. Because I wasn't able to do this for many years, I had blocked my intuition, which we are told is the way in which we are in direct contact with our Higher Power. Slowly, the intuitive thoughts are returning as I work on a daily relationship with my Higher Power, and I am now more able to act on them, knowing that I will always be taken care of.:85:

One Day at a Time . . .
I will continue to turn my will and my life over to my Higher Power knowing that my connection with Him, my intuition, is getting stronger each day, and that I am more able to do God's will for today. :1:

~ Sharon S.

[saved1]

Courage faces fear and thereby masters it. :cool:
Martin Luther King, Jr.

I've never been a brave person and was always very fearful. I would watch movies where the hero would rescue the heroine, or where someone would climb Mount Everest, or perform some feat of daring, and I would be totally in awe. I was afraid of the dark, of rejection, of failure and of most other things that I was convinced took courage. No way would I go parasailing or deep sea diving as that seemed to require the courage that I lacked. I didn't understand then that people who do those kinds of things are not totally without fear, but they have a way of overcoming their fear and still doing it anyway.:281:

When I came into the program and learned that I would have to do an inventory and then, worse still, make amends to the people I had harmed, I was paralyzed by fear. Eventually I realized that, even though I feared doing these things, all I had to do was ask my Higher Power for strength and guidance and then do the things I'd most feared. Perhaps these weren't the feats of daring that I had seen heroes perform, but for me they were great victories, and in being able to do them, I knew that I was developing courage.:15:

One Day at a Time . . .
I will continue to walk through my fear with my Higher Power at my side, knowing that I am developing the courage that I thought I lacked.:1:
Sharon S.

[schell08122008]

I have been going through a lot of emotional upheaval lately and am not coping with this through working the program. This has been causing me to revert to my eating disorder again..it is getting to the point where I am using food and my weight to cope with fear and anxiety..I have been turning this over to God..but we are given free will..I am taking this to extreme..I have been purging myself as this was one of my ways to relieve pain..each day is a gift, as i am given a chance to not behave like this again..I pray, God , let your will work in my life today..let me make the right choices when it comes to abusing food..Thanks for being here everyone..Peace Schell

[Pythonpappy]

I have been going through a lot of emotional upheaval lately and am not coping with this through working the program. This has been causing me to revert to my eating disorder again..it is getting to the point where I am using food and my weight to cope with fear and anxiety..I have been turning this over to God..but we are given free will..I am taking this to extreme..I have been purging myself as this was one of my ways to relieve pain..each day is a gift, as i am given a chance to not behave like this again..I pray, God , let your will work in my life today..let me make the right choices when it comes to abusing food..Thanks for being here everyone..Peace Schell

I'm not trying to tell you what to do, but for me, God's will did nothing for me ..... at all ..... and it never will ...... until I start taking Action to do what it is His will inspires me to do ... then and only then did the results of my daily pattern change to that of a peaceful and serene person ... when my thoughts and actions during the day were directed to do the next right thing ... go to meetings, talk to others like me, listen for what helped them, help someone else in order to get my thinking on them and out of me ... these have become a way of life for me now and I hang onto this the best way I know how ... conscious contact with God throughout the day, every day ... and with that, the right choices come ...


Great share, thanks, and God Bless,:42:
Pappy

[MajestyJo]

Dear Schell, I found that I had to take the thought and the action to my Higher Power. Remember He does answer knee-mail. We are powerless over our addiction, what ever sustance it may be, anything that comes between us and our Higher Power. It isn't that He isn't answering, you can't hear Him when you block Him out. I had the same problem with food and my computer. I had to ask for a change of thinking and help with changing my actions. His will is for us to try to be the best we can be in today. Some days we fall short, but all we can do is pick ourselves up and try again. Remember a day can start any time. He will lead, guide, direct, encourage, strengthen and love us but we can't wait for Him to do it for us, we need to turn it over and make the effort for ourselves. The help is there if we surrender, reach out and accept it.

[schell08122008]

Thanks Pappy and Jo. Good stuff. Pappy, though I pray, I do know I must take the action. I definitely have not been doing this lately. I have not been listening to direction..Like Jo said, everyday is a new day..and I can start over anytime I want..I actually meditated yesterday..I felt I listened..I didn't want to go to my meeting last night, but your post I read yesterday about the 'silence' we keep got me off my butt..IN A Hurry!!! I broke that silence at the meeting, it felt really good, I am not alone! I even got another girls number at the end..I can't only rely on one person as we all can fall..The whole fellowship is part of recovery..don't know why I forgot this...I love this forum..y'all are incredible..Peace Schell