Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous

Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous (FA) is a twelve step program, based on the principles of Alcoholics Anonymous. Its members are people who could not control their eating behavior or were obsessed with food.

FA was established in 1998 by former members of Overeaters Anonymous. As of 2009, the organization consisted of about 300 local groups and over 4000 members in 5 countries.

FA believes food addiction is a disease of the mind, body and spirit for which there is no cure, but that can be arrested a day at a time by adapting to a disciplined way of eating and the 12 step program of FA. FA believes that when people abuse food by using it as a drug, their lives become unmanageable.

FA also believes that food addicts have an allergy to flour, sugar and quantities that sets up an uncontrollable craving and that the problem can be arrested a day at a time by the action of weighing and measuring food and abstaining completely from all flour and sugar.

FA defines abstinence as weighed and measured meals with nothing in between, no flour, no sugar and the avoidance of any individual binge foods.

The FA program emphasizes adherence to a strict food plan. Members attend three meetings each week and are not allowed to share at a group level during those meetings until they have achieved 90 days of abstinence from food addiction.