8 years and back

HI Mullen103, welcome to the Forum.

Your post struck a chord with me my friend - I have stopped gambling for over five years now after gambling for twenty.

The first thing I want to say is extremely well done for reaching eight years; that is a remarkable achievement and, although you feel a world away from it at the moment, you should be enormously proud of yourself.

I have also been a part of this Forum for seven years and have seen many people in long-term recovery post something similar, where they slipped and don't know why.

It isn't complacency; you would have tackled and conquered that after eight years, it is the fact that you allowed yourself to "numb out" your past experiences and suffering - for one moment, you put the world and all you have been through "on hold", and just did it.

Now, you find yourself wanting to chase losses again; you feel like all your hard work has been thrown out of the window and it doesn't really matter if you relapse again - again, many others come here, unbelievably depressed, talking about starting from "Day 1" again.

But why does it have to be "Day 1" for you again my friend? This doesn't have to be a negative experience if it stops you gambling again for good - you might read this post again in ten years and think of this as the "final hurdle" you had to cross before truly finishing for good, forever. If that is the case, then this would have all been worth it - and that is what you have to do now my friend; make this experience mean something, make this your "Part two" instead of "Day 1".

If you visit GA and have stopped for eight years, then you clearly know your onions, and you have all the answers my friend. But you still have to analyze that moment, that second before you started again; what emotions were you feeling? Did you truly "zone out"? You must of dealt with many, many situations involving financial pressure in these gamble-free years; was it something else that contributed to this slip?

I admire you my friend, and I think you have done amazingly well. If you want to move forward and draw a line under this, then I would make it mean something as I said - turn this negative into a positive and move forward.

JamesP

Hi James

Thanks for the reply.

I think your right in the fact that I have numbed out the experiences of gambling previously with it being 8 years ago and due to my life being considerably better than I was in those dark days could no longer relate to the bad experiences anymore.

Whats done is done but im going to start again and im determined I cannot gamble because obviously the same uncontrollable urges and actions came back.

Wouldn't recommend a fall to anybody but maybe needed for me to realise and relate again as I was finding it hard to relate to people stories in GA. onwards and upwards again.

You're welcome Mullen103, no trouble at all,

I understand completely; I feel so emotionally distant from the person I was, that I feel those acts were committed by another person.

I fell after eight months on my first true attempt; i'm not sure I could handle it, mentally and physically, if I slipped again. But that helps, that slip helped me enormously because it was almost too much to take; I hope this is the same for you my friend, I sincerely do.

JamesP