Carry the Message
A Collaboration between the Virtual Region, Region 1, Region 2, Region 3, and Region 6
PROFESSIONAL OUTREACH
Resources
Share your continued recovery with your healthcare providers.
Many professionals and organizations come into contact with individuals sick and suffering from compulsive eating and compulsive food behaviors. These professionals may be in the fields of medicine, mental health, dentistry, clergy, community groups, government agencies, non-government organizations, colleges, and universities. It is our obligation to carry the message, so that others may learn about OA, as long as we honor the Tradition of maintaining anonymity at the level of press radio, television, and other public forms of communication.
We suggest sharing the guide When Should I Refer Someone to Overeaters Anonymous? This can be purchased as a print version at the OA Bookstore, Amazon, Apple, or Barnes & Noble to send electronically. If sending the guide electronically, it is advisable to let the recipient know you have purchased it and sent the link, so that it is not mistaken as spam. When you go to this OA bookstore page you will see links to the trio of online platforms, as well as instructions to send it directly to your health provider.
In some instances, intergroups sponsor the purchase of the guide. To do this, a group could buy 25, 50, or 100 links.
- The links would be kept on a master sheet and can be sent to members upon request by a service person.
- The links can be distributed to intergroup representatives to take back to their meetings.
- The links can be distributed at a Carry the Message intergroup event.
In all cases, the follow-up needs to be emphasized and a policy sent for non-redemption of the link, if it is not redeemed after 30 or 90 days.
Also, consider handing this publication to your health care professional: Professional Community Courier.
Professional Outreach Committees
Learn ways for your service body to reach out to healthcare providers and other professionals in your area. Guidelines for Professional Outreach Committees
Carry the message at local health fairs. Help healthcare professionals and the public learn about OA. Guidelines for Health Fair Participation
Customize presentations for a company health fair. Professional Trade Shows Manual
Many of us have found it helpful to share the benefits of working the Steps and the changes it has made in us physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
We share our experiences, which may include:
- Weight loss or weight gain
- Freedom from food and body obsession
- Doing activities physically we weren’t able to do before
- Resolution of trauma-associated issues
- Body image issues addressed
- A new love for oneself
- Freedom from negative emotions that used to cripple us
- Having forgiven ourselves and others for harms done
- Freedom from using food emotionally
- Cessation of procrastinating
- Becoming productive
- Having healthy, intimate relationships
- Physician’s reduction or elimination of prescription medicines no longer needed
- Being less reactive and more accepting
- Listening and getting along with others
- Increasing altruism
We can share how often those closest to us saw the changes in us before we did. We have also discussed the benefits of our specific focus meetings and literature in our recovery, including a list of specific focus meetings we have attended:
- Compulsive eating
- Undereating
- Food addiction
- Anorexia
- Bulimia
- Binge eating
- Overexercising
- Medical issues including diabetics and bariatric surgery
- Medical Issues focus includes persons who are Diabetic or who have undergone Bariatric surgery
Sharing OA literature you find helpful is a good idea, such as Overeaters Anonymous, Third Edition, Body Image, Relationships, and Sexuality: Personal Journeys to Recovery in Overeaters Anonymous. This may open discussion topics on how the program works.
Of course, some of us have discussed or done our 5th Steps with these professionals and discussed our character defects. Others have come to OA while working in other 12-Step fellowships and have experience with addiction counselors and others familiar with other 12-Step fellowships. These are times we can ask if the professional would be interested in learning more, and offering information to them or others, including their colleagues and associates, who may benefit from sharing OA, and letting them know we have program fellows available to share literature, to speak to newcomers, to groups, and to their colleagues.
Again, underscoring a key item to offer the professional, community-based organizations, and their staff, can include ways of acquiring the guide, When Should I Refer Someone to Overeaters Anonymous? Offering program links to oavirtual.org and oa.org, including mentioning that the bookstore at oa.org contains all of our program literature, are integral in sharing OA information. Mention “I’d be happy to send you a link to some information, including the invaluable electronic guide for professionals entitled, When Do I Refer Someone to Overeaters Anonymous? I can email it to you or upload it to my chart.”s
Having thanked the provider, we send literature, along with links for referring their patients.
Let the provider know he/she is welcome to share our contact information (or our intergroup’s contact information), with anyone we can help, including sample letters and emails that health professionals often use to share OA with their patients. Links for the professional may include access to OA flyers, posters, business cards, displays, pamphlets for patients, and links to newcomer meetings.
If available through your intergroup or region, offer opportunities for speakers, scheduling newcomer orientations for referrals, setting up OA booths at events, and creating virtual or in-person special meetings or events.
If you’ve gifted the professional with the electronic guide of When Should I Refer Someone to Overeaters Anonymous? let it be known, so it is not mistaken as spam. Share the purchase link, and other OA literature, by means of your patient portal. When you go to this OA bookstore page you will see links to the trio of online platforms, as well as instructions to send it directly to your health provider.
Look for opportunities to follow up.
- Check-in at your next appointment.
- Follow up with a phone call.
- Send a follow-up email or message.
- If appropriate, have your Public Information / Professional Outreach Committee follow up to schedule a speaker, special meeting, virtual or in-person event, and set up a display table at a community or employee event.
- If patients, parishioners, students, employees, or anyone interested in OA is referred, ensure you or someone can speak by phone or over Zoom before they attend a meeting or event.
