Hi Alan, the dust will settle. I had a lot of embarssement in the first few weeks, the getting caught, the confessing it all, the admitting I'd brought financial problems to my mrs as well as myself - the whole thing made me feel like a naughty school boy combined with the lowest pond s**m all wrapped up into one emotional idiot.. After that came the following orders element for my own good. I had to relinquish access to money (I am now on pocket money for food and travel, which started off as humiliating, moved to inconvenient and is now amusing). I was also frog marched around where I live and had to walk in and self exclude from the best part of 10 places with my girlfreind standing next to me giving me the death stare. I also promised to immediately go to counselling and GA, given up became a full scale effort and thats what it should be.
You mentioned the embarassement self excluding, nobody in the bookies (or wherever) cares about that, they are wrapped up in their own world of gambling, or they work there - either way their opinion, if they have one, matters not. Self exclusion, saying your bit in front of others in meetings for the first time (if you do that), facing up to debt, confessing to people (if you choose to) is all on the cards, but its all positive. I can assure you that goes away and after a while taking those steps help you fight back and show you what you're are prepared to do to face the problem, if you have the strength to manage things like this then you have the strength to give up. I look back on those embarassing situations as a right of passage now, without doing them I wouldnt have given up. So embrace it, deal with these things with pride as you are fighting back. And good on you mate, you are on the road to sorting it all out and making your family proud.
The eomotion comes from dealing with everything in one hit - I was a wreck the first month, write a list and knock them down one by one. It might help you get a bit of control.
Saw you popping up on a few threads...how's things me old mucker? Hope you're A OK x
Ooh, now I'm confused (it doesn't take much!)...just realised this isn't your diary and can't find the real one! Did you delete it? No matter...I'm trusting you're well and all's good in the hood xx
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