Understanding my addiction

Well lets challenge that and be honest when you consider it

If someone gave you a thousand free pounds when your entire family was on vacation in Spain and you had all the time in the world on your hands. Would that make you tempted to play?

Now I can not answer that for you only you can do that but I can see someone who is explaining how he could not stand it anymore came clean and moved on.And now you are surprised how easy it was and is.

Was becoming an addict not easy or was it hard work? I mean it is about playing, losing winning losing excitement angst desperation chasing losses and starting over and repeating and then in between that big doses of depression?

When a woman gives birth. There is normally some pain and screaming etc but this will in time be exchanged for how great and wonderful it was (not generalised for every woman of course) Ie the brain forgets the hardship or the pain and replaces it with the positive of the experience.

Your brain is not going to remember with time passing so clearly what the fuss was all about. In fact it will try and change that very story to something more positive because your subconscious minds task is to protect you and bring you pleasure.

But if you go back to that thousand pounds at the start of this reply and started putting that money back into circulation you would most definitely start to remember what it was all about.

There is a great expression in NLP called the map is not the territory. It means in short that your thinking is not the same as mine or anyone else reading this. We are all individual meaning making machines.

I am pretty sure I have read here in the forum of others with similar experience to yours. There are also many who have a completely different ones. We should just know that they all exist and they are all different.

Thank you for reading this.

Best

C

Hi, I totally get where you are coming from. I gambled heavily for over 5 years, got in deep with the debt gambling half our life savings aways as well as racking up the credit cards. I wasn't brave like you and only stopped when my wife found out, but, yes this was the trigger to not having to gamble any more as the reason for keeping going was to win back what I had lost before I was found out. We all know how stupid an idea that is chasing the losses with no hope of winning such a big amount. Being found out was like a ton weight being lifted off my chest.

The stopping gambling was the easier part, coping with the fallout from it all was the worst, but with the support of my amazing wife, getting all the blockers in place and some therapy arranged by Gamcare I can happily say I am now 18 months gamble free and can't believe how lucky I am to still have my wife by my side supporting me. I no longer have access to any of our finances which doesn't bother me and gives my wife peace of mind.

You mention your debt, I contacted Stepchange who have been amazing and am now on an affordable repayment plan with my credit cards. It will take nearly 9 years to pay off but has made it far more manageable.

If the blockers weren't there would I be tempted to gamble again? The honest answer is I don't know so the safeguards will stay in place forever.

Well done on your progress so far, all the best

Thanks both.

Ultimately I guess dealing with the addiction and staying ‘clean’ will be easy until the day it’s not. As easy as it feels right now, I have no doubt that it would only take 1 bet to turn my whole life upside down……when you break it down, although it feels ‘easy’, I probably wake up every day on the precipice of disaster just like every other gambling addict that’s given up, I just haven’t been as aware about it- sorry that all sounds a bit sensationalist but typing this out is cathartic and likely helpful to me.

for context if it’s of interest People have known I’ve been an addict for a long time and thousand upon thousands has been given to me to bail me out etc etc…. but in recent years I somehow fooled everyone (or at least they just wanted to believe everything was ok). 

In a 7 month period, I lost over 100k borrowed from two people who had no idea what was going on. These are people  who are not friends and family or financial institutions. I tell you what, I wish I did owe institutions. I’d find it a hell of a lot easier dealing with letters, knocks on the door, court papers etc then owning two individuals that need that money to move on with their lives. 

Like everyone else with this addiction, I feel I could write a best seller when you look back on all the s**t I’ve done because of my addiction. 

let’s keep fighting the fight.

cheers