Abstain and maintain.Stepping forward never back.

You talk so much sense. I love your philosophical view to all this. I find it very sobering and grounds me when I feel despair.

Recovery or rediscovery. Love it. Thanks so much.

Morning dear diary.
Signalman your words truly humble me.
So my old friend I am off to work in twenty minutes to face a 13 and a half hour day off the back of a 16 and a half hour day yesterday and this week I have worked a full week before yesterday, I feel privileged and proud to do so.
Yesterday cycling the 13 miles to work at 3am was forty five minutes of pure joy, I saw 13 urban foxes, the funniest a young one sat in the middle of the road eating a pile of sick someone had left just outside a night spot and as I past it didn't even move, just looked up as if to say what are you doing out at this hour lol.
I roasted a huge whole wild boar yesterday for the local shoot hence the long day, it took 12 hours to cook and surpassed their expectations and on top of that we had a full dining room last night.
Todays rain will hopefully be a blessing, I have some fantastic meat to roast and will do my best to make it the best it can be.
Pay day today and financially I will see my effort rewarded.
Addiction lurks, it will I know try to capitalise on my tired state later but I am prepared for it to come knocking.
What has it to offer??
Nothing but despair and destruction.
It can return to the depths of my mind where it belongs.
It inspires me to live
It drives me to want to achieve
It offers a sobering choice
One that doesn't always come easily but the outcome is profound.
Right the first alarm just sounded.
Up and at em..
Today I have a choice.
Abstain and maintain.
Duncs stepping forward never back.
I wish you all well.

duncanmac wrote: Morning dear diary.
Signalman your words truly humble me.
So my old friend I am off to work in twenty minutes to face a 13 and a half hour day off the back of a 16 and a half hour day yesterday and this week I have worked a full week before yesterday, I feel privileged and proud to do so.
Yesterday cycling the 13 miles to work at 3am was forty five minutes of pure joy, I saw 13 urban foxes, the funniest a young one sat in the middle of the road eating a pile of sick someone had left just outside a night spot and as I past it didn't even move, just looked up as if to say what are you doing out at this hour lol.
I roasted a huge whole wild boar yesterday for the local shoot hence the long day, it took 12 hours to cook and surpassed their expectations and on top of that we had a full dining room last night.
Todays rain will hopefully be a blessing, I have some fantastic meat to roast and will do my best to make it the best it can be.
Pay day today and financially I will see my effort rewarded.
Addiction lurks, it will I know try to capitalise on my tired state later but I am prepared for it to come knocking.
What has it to offer??
Nothing but despair and destruction.
It can return to the depths of my mind where it belongs.
It inspires me to live
It drives me to want to achieve
It offers a sobering choice
One that doesn't always come easily but the outcome is profound.
Right the first alarm just sounded.
Up and at em..
Today I have a choice.
Abstain and maintain.
Duncs stepping forward never back.
I wish you all well.

Seriously man... I'll say it again. Inspiring. You are recovery incarnate. And by that I am not implying you are fixed... By your own admission it lurks always. What I'm saying is that I truly appreciate how you look addiction in the face and instead of joining hands with it... You tell it all the amazing things you are now doing, achieving and appreciating as a result of your previous romance with it, then you show it the door. I keep posting disparaging messages re how gambling has taken more than just money from me... Happiness, hope, self-esteem, confidence, clarity of thought, integrity, pride... What's truly incredible for me to know is that I feel violated and barren now but one day i could live life with a grace and humility (like you) if I stay strong and stay on this path. Thank you again from the bottom of my heart. You write beautifully.

Evening dear diary
Signalman fella it's there, keep on keeping on. I have seen it work in many forms, for me it's through graft, hard graft, but I've seen it in other shapes, by giving your all to others, by looking out for them, sharing with them, equally I have seen folk strip back their lives and just graft enough to get by.
There's for me no cap that fits all.
No method is the answer.
Surely the outcome is all that counts and that is to find a way to live without feeding addiction.
I have a glass half full.
Fella I would happily give you half my glass if it would see you right.
A fella far wiser than I once said you just have to keep on keeping on.
I understand what he meant today.
The day you truly want to encounter your addiction you will gift yourself something amazing and you will have the opportunity to share your findings.
Please keep the faith that you have found.
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.

Morning dear diary.
Well a long day cooking yesterday and I am on route back now for an early start and early finish.
Because today that suits my needs.
Yes I am tired but I have been here before.
My reward will be a long steam and sauna this afternoon.
The mornings have turned cold lol I just took the hounds out and they had their coats on yet still kept looking back towards home.
No doubt they have navagated their way into our bed!!
Sarah is on an early today so it's empty.
I have noticed how quiet the forum is, I sincerely hope that it's due to folk being busy enjoying recovery.
And nothing more.
Right station approaching.
Better to ramble than gamble eh!!
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.

Dear diary
Since January 2012 this forum has helped me to grow a better understanding of the addiction I will live with for the rest of my life, I am saddened with the news that many authors can't log in to the forum because its suffering from some technical issues.
The authors are the folk that have given me a greater understanding so I hope things will soon return to the way this amazing place has always been.
In my early days I would post here a few times a day and I know the response I received helped me to remain abstinent.
I fear that if folk are unable to communicate with like minded folk addiction will gain control.
So I implore the administrators to please find a way to again open the doors to the reason this forum exists.
To help the folk who want and need a place like this.
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.

Morning dearest diary.
I have been processing the fact that this platform is it still seems suffering from huge technical problems and it has had an effect on my mental wellbeing in a negative way, I don't understand technology very well its not something that I have had a great deal to do with in my working life, I have often joked that I am a mechanical man in a digital world.
My over thinking sinical mind has raged with thoughts that the sponsors of the forum have sabotaged it, a way to dissolve the issue of gambling addiction my mind told me.
I over think things, I have an imagination that runs wild, I have lived with it for as long as I can remember.
Most of all I am angry at the inability to communicate with like minded folk.
To understand that there is a space for us to express our emotions, a place to offer and receive advice.
A spoke in the wheel that offers the addict the opportunity to wheel forward.
If I haven't posted here it renders my wheel buckled.
I believe that is the same for a great deal of folk.
I would like that opportunity to be extended to anyone who needs it, wants it.
So I write this post as a plea.
Please return the ability for the folk who need this forum, that they are again able to use it.
To anyone needing help who can't log in, reach out to another.
Whether that is ga, a friend, loved one, heck even a stranger please don't isolate yourself.
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.

It's dreadful isn't it?

There are many vulnerable people who have a real need for something like this.

It is utterly immoral to even think that this site is still advertised for those vulnerable people and for them to make that brave step forward only to encounter problems is even worse.

I, too, have noticed the lack of communication on here and this is really sad. Something like this would have irritated me in the past to the point of going out to gamble but not this time.

I am too far in my recovery journey for this. And so are you.

Like duncs says, anyone who is able to read this please do not isolate yourself.

Reach out.

NT

Bugg...er just wrote a post Duncs but disappeared. So here’s a quick random jist of it.

Check out the terminology ‘ radical acceptance ‘ it pretty much relates to accepting reality, and not resisting what you cannot or chose not to change, ie saying yes to life just as it is. Reading and practicing it in things that have bugged me has helped me to see things that in reality is trivial as there’s diddly squat I can do.

Have to rush - ciou for now

Morning dear diary
Paul good to see you fella.
Nt likewise.
To the moderaters I doff my cap.
Thanks for fixing the forum.
I am delighted.
I have a whippet patiently watching every word I type.
I wanna run, I wanna run!!!!!!!!!
Who's the boss..........
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.

No more captcha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Can this be true!!!!
Result.

Morning dearest diary.
So a day off today, it's my birthday, 44 years old, I had a lovely day off yesterday to boot, one spent with my beautiful wife, we had some errands to run and just spending time in her company is awesome, we will have been together as a couple for 27 years next week. I remember that first date as if it was yesterday.
I have tried to fookety foojk it up many times over the years but our love still grows, for that I am truly humbled and will never forget.
Today life with Sarah feels like we have a level playing field.
That is the result of the effort we give.
I have a few hours in the chair today, more ink to mark the journey I walk.
I want life, I choose life, I love life.
Yes I live with a demon inside, I will forever, I accept it's presence and will continue to let it see what I have without answering its call.
The table has turned 180degrees.
The same opportunity awaits every one who wants it.
As my old shiny friend used to say.
Never give up on giving up.
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back

Happy birthday my man. Warmest regards to you.

Afternoon dear diary.
Signalman thanks for the kind wishes, as I said to the lad in the gym last night when he wished me a happy birthday, I guess when you get to a certain age you try to forget it's your birthday lol.
So I had a really good session in the chair yesterday with my tattooist he got a good bit of my upper arm covered and with a few more hours work in a couple of weeks booked the tattoo that was there will be a mere memory. I am delighted with the design and even more delighted to again have spent a few hours in the company of such a decent fellow.
We talked a great deal in the last hour of the session about addiction, me from an addicts view and him from the point of view of a victim, another innocent victim of this addiction.
His ex partner and mother of two is still an active compulsive gambler, to listen to the life he was led for two years was truly sobering and in truth again it would be like ripping pages of my own life story.
But that true with a great deal of compulsive gamblers is it not, the lies come too easily, the deceit and denial.
I lived that life, danced progressively to a tune that only ever benefitted addiction.
The question I am most often asked by non compulsive gamblers is why can't you walk away when you are winning??
The response I give always the same.
I cannot win because I cannot stop.
The life mantra of the compulsive gambler.
I also shared the fact.
How do you make a compulsive gambler a millionaire??
Simple start him a billionaire.

I offered some advice, the main thing don't help to feed addiction.
He gives money every week for the keep and bills, I said you should food shop and pay the bills. Because I know that money was simply fuel that fed addiction.
Cut off the fuel and the fire cannot burn.
I finished with the fact for me that an addict can only arrest addiction when they are ready, intervention just doesn't work.
I was grateful for the chat, it was enlightening and humbling.
So today is mental health awareness day, a day where I hope that the powers that be will see the terrible state of mental health services and actually do something about making it better, more accessible and as an outcome something that creates a better system of care to mental health patients.
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.

Morning dear diary
Two long days at the stove done and three more on the bounce to follow, without doubt back to back to back 13/14 hour days are a great deal easier when you are doing something that doesn't feel like work.
Equally this is the first time in my life that I have worked a job that isn't salaried so that makes it a great deal more worthwhile.
Sarah went off to her job before me this morning, a job which has given her a new zest for living.
Addiction is cornered, it's got no avenue to run down to re enter the fray, the tables have turned because as an active gambler that was me the one cornered running down a blind alley.
Today I will enjoy the light.
Abstain and maintain
Duncs stepping forward never back.