Acorn

Out of relapse, for today

I don't want to be blogging right now, but I realize that I need to update the previous post, about my being in relapse, 'cause for today anyway, I'm not anymore. I can't have such a dangerously misleading headline being what readers see first.

For 46 days, I've been abstaining from foods and food behaviors that are unhealthy for me. In early December, I went away to Acorn Food Dependency Recovery Services, a Florida-based group from which I've sought help for more than 20 years, and I've been better since.


Mary Foushi: "Food was just a small part of it. But it was the part I needed to start with."

Welcome to another installment of "10 Words or Less." Today's participant counsels clients who are struggling with food severely enough that they choose to remove themselves from home, family, and work for a period to get help. She is an author and cofounder of ACORN Food Dependency Recovery Services, based in Sarasota, Fla., which has developed a unique mode of treatment that I call "itinerant rehab" to help thousands of self-identified food addicts to regain their footing.

Name Mary Foushi
Born when, where "Nov. 18, 1952, in Milford, Del."
Anything unusual about the circumstances "Of the five children born in my family, I was the smallest, yet I ended up being over 340 pounds."
Family circumstance "I am in a long-term relationship with my partner, Phil Werdell, and we're going to get married on March 1, 2014.
What has been the overarching condition of your life? "Obesity, and it still affects me today," despite that she's maintaining a 195-pound loss for more than 21 years.
Can you give me an example? "I was recently invited to lead the OA retreat, and one of the first things that came up in me was fear that they would think, 'She's not in recovery. Look how fat she is!'"


Postcards from rehab, Part II

Taxonomy upgrade extras: 

For my October installment at my Toastmasters club, I decided to contrast my "other" rehab experience with what I shared in September. In the first one, treatment came on a 92-acre wooded campus with staff our the wazoo. About 10 years later, the venue was a rented chalet in southern Indiana and the staff was Phil and Mary. Very different, but both were vital to my recovery.

 


ACORN, Shades of Hope to collaborate

If you've read "Fat Boy Thin Man," you know about Acorn Food Dependency Recovery Services. Chapter 6, titled "Itinerant rehab," is based on my spending five days in Acorn's treatment program, based that week at a rented vacation chalet somewhere in southern Indiana. Acorn has also conducted its programs in Illinois, Florida, Massachusetts, Maine, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, as well as in Iceland and Canada, and I'm probably missing a few, too.


Food addiction workshop

Taxonomy upgrade extras: 

This post relates to the one immediately before it, but I wanted to give it its own headline: The acquaintance between Dr. Tarman and the Acorn folks has led to a five-day food-addiction workshop at the Renascent Center in Toronto beginning Oct. 20.

To register, you can call Sandra Elia at 416-986-0006. 


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