I received this over the transom, and am happy to pass it along. I know no one personally who has reached out to ABA, but I do know people who have gotten help from food-related 12 Step groups, and I could not endorse them more strongly.

Anorexics and Bulimics Anonymous is a fellowship of individuals whose primary purpose is to find and maintain sobriety in our eating practices, and to help others gain sobriety. ABA is not allied or affiliated with any other 12-step fellowship or organization. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop unhealthy eating practices that we have come to realize are progressively destroying our lives, physically, mentally, and spiritually.

In this group we discover that our insane eating, starving, exercise and purging behaviors are addictive in nature — that is, out of our own control — and that we actually use these behaviors, and the inner physical changes resulting from them, to numb our emotions and escape from ourselves.

In doing so, we also fall out of touch with others and out of step with the universe of which we are a part, and we deprive ourselves of the opportunity to be fully alive in our present time and space.

Furthermore, we learn that we are carrying out these insane eating, starving, exercise, and purging practices in obedience to a deceptive immensely powerful voice within our own minds. This is the voice of a disease that is chronic, progressive, and potentially fatal. The first action of this cunning and baffling disease is to cast us into a state of unawareness, in which we fail to recognize that we are in mortal danger when we carry out its insane commands. We learn that the payoff we receive from this disease for our obedience to its demands is nothing more than a mirage: an illusion of control over our lives and our future.

We learn that the disease’s principal weapon is overwhelming and paralyzing fear, and that it holds us in its lethal grip by inducing profound guilt and shame within us. The disease lies to us at every turn. It even convinces us that we are to blame for our own sick condition, that we freely choose to do the insane things we do, and that we are unlovable.

In this circle of healing we learn, one step and one moment at a time, to awaken to the truth about our disease, to recognize its lies, to see how it entraps us, to trust in a Higher Power who loves us unconditionally, and to turn our will and our lives over to this loving Power.

As we recover, we come to experience this Higher Power — the Spirit of life itself — at work within us, empowering us to live without any illusion of control. We also learn to truly own our lives and to take charge of ourselves in a way that had not been possible before.

Our program is deeply spiritual, but not allied with any religion. We have found it applicable to our healing journey regardless of our religious beliefs, for we know that our eating disorders are primarily mental or spiritual diseases, although they comprise a physical component. More specifically, we have
a mental obsession that compels us to restrict our food and/or to binge and purge, coupled with a physical “allergy” in our bodies that ensures we will continue restricting or bingeing and purging, once we have began.

Link.

ABA Phone Meetings

1. MONDAY NIGHT PHONE MEETING

8:30-9:30PM EST
Dial In Number:

(712) 432-0800

Access Code:

1039142#

2. THE NEW WEDNESDAY NIGHT PHONE MEETING

(Discussion Meeting)

8PM-9PM EST*

Dial in Number:

(712) 432-0800

Access Code:

1039142#

3.

**THURSDAY NIGHT**

(STEP STUDY MEETING )

8:30PM-9:30PM EST*

Dial in Number:

(712) 432-0800

Access Code:

1039142#

4. FRIDAY MORNING PHONE MEETING

(Discussion Meeting)

11:30AM EST

**
Different dial in Number**

(518 ) 825-1300

Access Code:

22657#