I'm Back

I feel bad for you Urgh but it sounds like you managed to stop. I thought, I could moderate the problem - but it just does not work. Everyone is different but I now take pride in every day I don't gamble. Good luck in whatever way you decide to tackle this but the good news is you are here!

Hi urgh I can relate to your story I am 26 now and it feels like i have been gambling on & off since before the dawn of man

I think back in 2014/15 was probably my worst gambling year to date think I was losing between 2 & 300 a week in the casino must of racked about 3 or 4 grands worth of debt up in about 6 weeks needless to say that type of lifestyle had to stop I remember falling behind with a couple of loan repayments and the banks started refusing me anymore credit ( something im still grateful for to this day ) because at that point if id had access to more then id probably be in 25 grand + worth of debt by now

I entered into an individual voluntary arrangement in mid 2015 to pay the debt I owed , to be fair I didn’t step foot in a casino for about 18 months I couldn’t because I was broke I was still doing some sports bets it was about the only form of entertainment I could afford I hit a couple of decent wins but overall it just seemed to keep me around even or in small profit but was a lot more fun than watching the wheel go around and around in the casino

2015 & 2016 were very slow years i was living with my parents and doing very very little with my life I was in an awful job I hated , was skint and single ……can remember organising one night out in my hometown each month and that was all I had to look forward too lol life was pretty dire

By the end of 2016 after giving it my all i finally managed to escape my sh1tty job and got one closer to home , after I did that loads of pieces of my life started just slotting together I met my current girlfriend in early 2017 , moved out of my parents house and eventually manged to move in with current GF life is far better than it was and I have some money In the bank

I had a lapse/ blowout this Christmas I had 2 weeks off and discovered live online casinos Blew the best part of a grand on blackjack and roulette it was a degenerate and stupid thing to do and its given me a big wake up call and made me realise again life will only improve when you allow it too

ii guess the moral of the story is Gambling is a negative thing to do when you want to progress in life

best of luck for 2019

Nipped

I'd focus on the very positive aspects of being gamble free and use the feeling of your lapse to keep you that way..

Thank you for all your comments.

nipple, you sound like you're tryin and have reduced your gamblin, so that is always a positive. Christmas Eve I won a little bit and on boxing day I'd blown it all. I thin a lot of gamblers mess up at Christmas, we are all looking for a bit of extra cash to see us over.

I never stopped, the longest stint I had was 9 months, but I have had long periods where i have managed to svae up money. the past year has not been great, probably lost around 6k last year, I only earn 20k so it is a lot.

urgh wrote:

I have had to increase my overdraft facility online, and thank goodness it worked straight away. I have a £100 to last me till the end of the month. The bad thing is that increasing my overdraft was instantaneous and it is a danger now as I can increase it to 5k.

I wish you the best of luck. Hopefully you can continue on the right path. Life can definitley turn around.

The above quote from your post is slightly worrying. It seems to me, and I might be totally wrong here, but you're kind of setting up your excuses already. You seem to be pre-empting increasing the overdraft to 5K to fund the addiction. I'm sorry if that's not the case, but do you think there might be a part of you that feels that way?

My best advice with regards to overdrafts is actually to make them as small as you can and keep it that way. I'm not sure if you can contact your bank and ask them to maybe remove that option of increasing it to 5K as it may act as an uneccessary temptation. I understand why you increased the overdraft limit this last time to prevent fees from incurring, but overdrafts, even arranged ones, can be the devil.

Thank your for your concern Martin. I have never really had a rock bottom moment, maybe I need it.

In all honesty I am quite confident I won't ever go past 5k, I do have a failstop which is something that has always helped me not get into debt. In all my years I've never taken out cards or anything.

If I was in a bad tilt like a few years ago it would have been a bad situation. As it is, right now my savings are locked up in a fixed rate bond and I have no acccess to it. If I have to be objective, my gambling has reduced with age, but it is still a stubborn problem.

I wish you all the best. I hpe 2019 will be a good year for us all.