Overeaters Anonymous may be a misnomer.

The organization, which hosts meetings in southeastern Connecticut every day of the week and twice on Mondays, does provide a place where people who overeat can find support and spiritual guidance. But it's also a blanket 12-step program for anyone with unhealthy or disordered eating, says Eileen, a woman involved in organizing local OA meetings.

Because of the anonymous nature of the group, interviewees are being identified only by their first name.

"It's not what you eat, its what's eating you," Eileen said Monday, repeating one of the mantras repeated at the meetings, which follow the same structure of similar programs like Alcoholics Anonymous.

The local organizers of Overeaters Anonymous meetings think there are more people out there who could benefit from the support of a group dedicated to helping them stop their compulsive eating, and they've invited "anyone who has a problem with compulsive eating or wants to learn more about OA" to a Nov. 18 workshop in Gales Ferry.

It's an effort to persuade people who are on the fence or who haven't heard of the program to try coming to a meeting, said Mary, who attends a regular meeting in Gales Ferry on Saturday mornings.

"I have been for years a member of a typical diet club," Mary said. "I would get it and do it, but I could not quit ... I needed the support of another group. What was missing was the spiritual end."

A spiritual belief is key to Overeaters Anonymous, as it is in other 12-step programs, she said.  

"They say that the act of compulsive eating is physical, then the cause of compulsive eating is emotional," said Mary, who has been attending meetings since she asked an Alcoholics Anonymous speaker she met at work if there was a similar group for overeaters nearly 20 years ago.

She was assigned a sponsor who counseled her through her struggles to avoid excessive eating, and now acts as a sponsor to other members of the group.

"The solution, they say, is spiritual," she said. "For me that works — I'm one of those that can honestly say I'm a different person, a better person."

Mary said she has mostly stopped eating compulsively, though she says she has "slips." She was always a praying person, she said, but "I didn't admit to God that I had this particular problem."

Overeaters Anonymous meetings don't encourage members to believe in one god over another, and don't ascribe to any particular denomination or religion. Atheists can think of the group dynamic as their higher power, or pray to a hypothetical one.

"It's not really cut and dry," Mary said. "We mention the word 'god' but we're not a particular religion."

A typical local meeting will attract a handful of people, Mary said, mostly women but also usually a couple of men. Eileen said she suspects many more people struggling with their weight or unhealthy eating habits — like binging and purging or uncontrollable snacking — are out there.

"We would be really happy to have them there," she said.

m.shanahan@theday.com

If you go

Southeastern Connecticut Intergroup of Overeaters Anonymous workshop: 9 a.m. to 12 p.m., St. David's Episcopal Church, 284 Stoddard's Wharf Road, Gales Ferry.

Weekly Overeaters Anonymous meetings:

Sunday — 6 p.m., Grace United Methodist Church, 10 Park Ave., Westerly.

Monday — 7 p.m., Union Baptist Church, 19 High St., Mystic; 7 p.m., St. Paul's Lutheran Church, 56 Great Hammock Road, Old Saybrook.

Tuesday — 7:30 p.m., St. Mark's Episcopal Church, 15 Pearl St., Mystic.

Wednesday — 6 p.m., The William W. Backus Hospital, 326 Washington St., Norwich.

Thursday — 6 p.m., Lawrence + Memorial Hospital, 365 Montauk Ave., New London.

Friday — 9:30 a.m., First United Methodist Church, 23 Willow St., Mystic.

Saturday —  10 AM to 11:15 a.m. at St. Luke's Church on Clark Lane, Gales Ferry.