new to all this

Hello Danielholt87,

Well done for joining the forum. There's lots of advice on here, lots of stories that you might associate with as well as lots of successes staying away from a bet.

You asked for advice. Firstly, there's no easy route, it will take effort on your part, but you can make it as easy or as difficult for yourself as you like.

Three things are needed to place a bet. You need time, you need a place and you need money. Take away any one of those things and you can't do it. The easiest one is to give your money over to someone else and not have access to it. If you have a partner or a parent give them your card, your bank details, or just get your wages paid into their account. What I would do is then sit with my wife on payday and together we would pay bills, move money to the right places, so saving pots, debtors, holiday fund, and so on. If I needed something I had to be accountable. So I would take £3.00 a day for example to get my lunch, but I would bring a receipt to show it. Nowadays there are cards that you can get for various shops that allow you to buy without carrying cash but you can't use them except on food items.

At the moment with the lockdown, the only place you can gamble is on line. So take away the place and you can't gamble. As many people are reluctant to go technology free, try putting some blocks in place so that you can't access any gambling sites. Gamstop is a site that will allow you to self exclude from all online sites for up to five years. Do that. You can also have software on your phone, tablet and laptops which block the access of gambling sites completely. Gamban and Gambloc are a couple.

The final one is time. Either fill your time so that you can't bet or be accountable for your time, but realistically, at this moment , because it can only take seconds to place a bet then for now getting rid of the money and place will work for you.

Once the lockdown is over then there will be bigger challenges, but the principle is the same.

Honesty in recovery is really important. Tell your partner, tell your parents, don't leave anything that might come back to haunt you later on. It might be hard having had bailouts before but being able to tell someone will take a great weight of your shoulders.

Give the Gamcare advisers a call. Talk about your feelings, talk about why you escaped into gambling. Join the chat forum and talk about yourself. See that you're not alone.

Finally, for me at least, once the lockdown is over, find and attend Gamblers Anonymous. I cannot praise them enough and they've saved my life as well as many others. Compulsive gambling is about so much more than money and at GA we understand that. There's no judgement, just acknowledgement that I'm just like you. There is also a twelve step program about change that can be worked, but my advice is put gambling down first of all and get a clearer mind. Then start the recovery side of things.

I mentioned earlier that you can make it as easy or as difficult as you want. By that I mean all the advice I've given us standard advice. There's lots more but let's not complicate matters. How easy or difficult depends on how willing you are to implement change. So many people say that they can do this but not that, or think there's no hope so why try. The thing that stopping gambling does is give you hope, something you probably don't have at the moment.

Keep this diary going to remind yourself and to let people know how you are doing. Any questions please just ask.

All the best,

Chris.

Dan,

best of luck and please use this website as a sounding board to fight the urges. I never thought I had a problem until I actually won a large about and just chased it away. It was like an outer body experience- and now just 10 days later I’m starting to understand my problem. I’m lucky enough to have stopped without going into to hole but my mind is telling go back and get those winnings! It’s a constant struggle but baby steps work. I’m not going to bet for an hour, then four, and before we know it the day is gone. We just need to stay busy and focus on what really matters in our lives - family and friends. Dedicate yourself to rebuilding those relationships and I hope you will find peace. Regret and guilt is no way to live.