Gambling on and off

Hi And Welcome.

Ah Yes Interesting because I can relate to that

My best advice is dont let the times you are off or away from gambling make you feel you have any control over it.

Its one of the delusions I set up over my forty years addiction...well I dont do it all the time I thought so I cant be that bad. Sometimes I had quite long breaks.

Through one period I could have been termed a binge gambler but the binges were heavy and seriously damaging. 

The most worrying thing is they seemed to come at me totally out of the blue...thats because I wasnt dealing with the addiction and falsely thought I had some control.

I remember setting out for a shopping trip while on a city break holiday...suddenly I was overwhelmed with the anxiety of feeling so lost, pointless and lonely that I headed to an arcade as quickly as possible... Just a casual twenty to ease my stress and confusion which turned into hundreds and hundreds from my credit card.

Left reeling from it I now know that I had developed a damage limitation numbness which is why I rode losses like that for years.  I numbed myself to it...part of it is the FALSE hope that it will balance out in the long term.

It just kept me a very depressed and jaded person. I lived life on revolving credit and I was well on the road to my second bankruptcy

I think the truth is a lot of the breaks I was recovering from the loss or working away. It was certainly no control over an addiction which would come back to haunt me time and time again

I used the delusion that time had passed and I could have a gamble again determined to do it right this time and know when to stop.

Like time was a healer to gamble properly again if you know what Im getting at.

Even when I started on this forum I was patting myself on the back for a month (truth is I was skint after being forced to pay my rent late)

Then I congratulated myself for a two weeks between relapses ( truth is I was on the dole and had blown my fortnightly amount)

Then I was actually congratulating myself for six days down to two days between relapses...still thinking it cant be that bad Ive done two days.

I was very ill with an addiction!

So please tell people close and set something up to build the foundations for abstention.  Tell them your story. Ideally you need to be blocked and monitored while living on a sandwich allowance

Strength comes when your mind heals but you can never be complacent again.

Best wishes from everyone on the forum

Hi there and welcome,

You've made a huge step coming on here and you should be proud of that, 

From experience can I maybe suggest not trying to do this on your own. There are blockers you can put in place to help. Gamban, gamstop and freezing transactions if you are able to. It really is helping me at the moment and there is such a supportive community on here. 

Good luck and keep posting ?

Kay?