May 9, 2012 -- 8:19AM, arabianhorselover wrote:

  I am also a slow learner.  There are some things I just can't seem to get past.  I have felt "less than" for as long as I can remember.   I have used food to try to fill the void in my life ever since I was a teenager.  I am 51 now.  I have never really believed that God could love me, or that I was loveable to other people.  I have spent my whole life kicking myself and feeling unworthy of happiness and peace.  I am trying to immerse myself in the program now, but I still don't feel like I deserve it.  I feel that my behavior with food has been sinful, and that to say I am powerless over it is letting myself off the hook way too easily.

Can anyone relate?  I am female, by the way. 

Female or male, it doesn't matter!  I don't know anything about food addiction but I certainly can relate to the feelings.  In AA we talk alot about defects of character. 

If, as I, as you were growing up, you were not working on developing those positive spiritual characteristics, our defects begin to appear such as fear, resentment, guilt, and other self absorbing traits.  The more we ignore them the more they grow and we don't know why.  So, as an alcoholic, alcohol gave me some comfort, allowed me to live with me, masked over how I really felt, and allowed me to continue living in my defects. 

As low self esteem developed it continued for years and got to a point that I felt this was all there was to live and I really didn't deserve any better.  Once in recovery I had to realize that where I had come to took a long time.  It was a process!  Where I wanted to go through recovery too was a process.  The time required to recover is different for each person depending upon the degree we admitted to who and what we are, how much we could accept the recovery process in our person daily lives, and the degree we were willing to give of ourselves. 

This isn't the easier, softer way through life.  It's easier to wallow in self pity and let live drag us down.  But we are well worth the effort it takes to discover what great people we can be!  If we become willing to make the effort our success becomes an inspiration to many others.  Life will take on a whole new meaning and we will have purpose  ...

Good luck!  Hope this is of some help ...

May 10, 2012 -- 8:09AM, arabianhorselover wrote:

  Thank you for your reply.  It is just so hard because God's timing is so different from ours.  I want this whole problem to be over with.  I want to be okay now.  I am so tired of the pain.  It is so hard to be aptient with the process.  I always feel like I'm not getting anywhere, and yet I know that I have changed so much over the years.  I have made a lot of progress in a lot of ways, and yet I am still up to my eyeballs in the food. 

I hear you!  As I said, doing what is best is never the easier, softer way.  But in the end it is well worth the pain and effort!  And to the degree that we hold on to old ways of doing things the harder we make it for ourselves! 

I was in the gym today and someone had on a Tee shirt that said 'Practice, Practice, Practice'!  And I thought, what simple yet profound advice I've heard a 1000+ times.  Nice to be reminded of what we really already know!  It's kinda reasuring ...
Just know that a day at a time, you will get there if you stay the course!  Lots of luck, if that's the correct word .....