Newcomers

WELCOME TO OA


Overeaters Anonymous offers a program of recovery from compulsive eating using the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of OA. Meetings and other tools provide a fellowship of experience, strength and hope where members respect one another’s anonymity. OA charges no dues or fees; it is self-supporting through member contributions.

Unlike other organizations, OA is not just about weight loss, gain or maintenance; or obesity or diets. It addresses physical, emotional and spiritual well-being. It is not a religious organization and does not promote any particular diet. If you want to stop your compulsive eating, welcome to Overeaters Anonymous

ARE YOU A COMPULSIVE OVEREATER?

Now that you have found Overeaters Anonymous, you may want to make sure our program is right for you. Many of us have found it useful to answer the following questions to help determine if we have a problem with compulsive eating.

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Have you answered “yes” to several of these questions? If so, it is possible that you have, or are well on your way to having, a compulsive eating or overeating problem.

Please select from the following:

WHAT CAN YOU EXPECT FROM OA?

What happens at meetings?

When you arrive at the meeting, you will find men and women who share a common malady—compulsive eating—and have found a common solution: the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of Overeaters Anonymous.
You may see as few as five or as many as 50 people at the meeting. Many members attend more than one meeting a week. You will be warmly welcomed. The meeting usually opens with the Serenity Prayer, and you may hear some other readings. You may hear a speaker open the meeting; or someone might read from approved OA literature. Other members will share their experience, strength and hope. You will have an opportunity to introduce yourself as a newcomer, if you like. Because of our principle of anonymity, anything you will say will be held in confidence. This provides the safety you need to share your experiences honestly. You may want to ask someone to be your sponsor. A sponsor will help you work the Steps of the program to achieve the recovery you seek. When members share, you may hear them refer to some spiritual serenity. OA is not a religious program and does not subscribe to any specific religious ideology. Someone from the meeting you attend may call you to answer any questions you may have about the program. You will also have an opportunity to get phone numbers yourself to reach out for help. Because OA is self-supporting through member contributions, a basket will be passed during the meeting. There is no fee for attending a meeting. OA is not affiliated with any other organization or institution and takes no donations except from individual members. The meeting usually closes with the Serenity Prayer or an OA reading. If you find that the meeting you attended does not feel right, try a different one. It is a good idea to attend at least six meetings before deciding on a meeting that is right for you.

What you WON’T find at OA meetings are:

Weigh-ins
Diets and Pills
Packaged meals
Dues or fees
“Shoulds” or “Musts”
Judgment

What you WILL find at OA meetings are:

All kinds of people, women and men, who will welcome you.
OA’s diversity policy makes clear that anyone who has a problem with eating is welcome.

If you decide that you are one of us, we welcome you with open arms. Whatever your circumstances, we offer you the gift of acceptance. You are not alone anymore.

WHAT ARE THE 12 STEPS AND 12 TRADITIONS?
The Twelve Steps are the heart of the OA recovery program. They offer a new way of life that enables the compulsive eater to live without the need for excess food. The ideas expressed in the Twelve Steps, which originated in Alcoholics Anonymous, reflect
practical experience and application of spiritual insights recorded by thinkers throughout the ages. Their greatest importance lies in the fact that they work! They enable compulsive eaters and millions of other Twelve-Steppers to lead happy, productive lives. They represent the foundation upon which OA is built.

Twelve Steps

  1. We admitted we were powerless over food — that our lives had become
    unmanageable.
  2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
  3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we
    understood Him.
  4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
  5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our
    wrongs.
  6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
  7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
  8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to
    them all.
  9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so
    would injure them or others.
  10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly
    admitted it.
  11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God
    as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the
    power to carry that out.
  12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry
    this message to compulsive overeaters and to practice these principles in all our
    affairs.

Twelve Traditions
The Twelve Traditions are the means by which OA remains unified in a common cause. These Twelve Traditions are to the groups what the Twelve Steps are to the individual. They are suggested principles to ensure the survival and growth of the many groups that compose Overeaters Anonymous.

Like the Twelve Steps, the Twelve Traditions have their origins in Alcoholics Anonymous. These Traditions describe attitudes which those early members believed were important to group survival.

  1. Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon OA
    unity.
  2. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority — a loving God as He
    may express Himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted
    servants; they do not govern.
  3. The only requirement for OA membership is a desire to stop eating compulsively.
  4. Each group should be autonomous except in matters affecting other groups or OA
    as a whole.
  5. Each group has but one primary purpose — to carry its message to the compulsive
    overeater who still suffers.
  6. An OA group ought never endorse, finance or lend the OA name to any related
    facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property and prestige divert
    us from our primary purpose.
  7. Every OA group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.
  8. Overeaters Anonymous should remain forever non-professional, but our service
    centers may employ special workers.
  9. OA, as such, ought never be organized; but we may create service boards or
    committees directly responsible to those they serve.
  10. Overeaters Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the OA name
    ought never be drawn into public controversy.
  11. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need
    always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, films, television
    and other public media of communication.
  12. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all these Traditions, ever reminding us to
    place principles before personalities.

For more information about OA, please go to the OA.org website.

Here are three brief readings we recommend to start with


For further information on the tools, please visit the Tools of Recovery page on oa.org. All images used on this website were obtained through resources in which there is no attribution required.

Syracuse Overeaters Anonymous

©1984…2013 Overeaters Anonymous, Inc. All rights reserved.Rev. 5/2015