As long as I keep it awake it can't get me !

Wolfgang

Fella recovery is a bespoke journey, there is no right or wrong way to go about it, it is the end result that counts

Arresting the destruction that is the compulsion to gamble.

There is no cure but a re training of the brain.

Funny for me all the time I went at it, for those twenty years I relentlessly threw my hard earnt away I was ashamed of every loss, I feared nobody would respect me if I confessed to being a losing gambler.

Truth is that was addictions way of holding on.

Today I am proud to say I gambled and it beat me up,took all I had to give and more, gambling all the time I gambled won.

Today abstinence makes me the same winner.

I DID WIN BECAUSE I DID STOP.

that is the reward on offer for all of us, best of all there are no stakes to place, just a choice to make

I hope you keep making the right one for you fella

Duncs stepping forward never back

Hello Duncanmac,

Thank you for you repost.

Yes you are definitive right in saying it doesn't matter how as long as it does the job.

For myself I came to the conclusion that I just need to talk about it, in what way ever to let it not take control of me.

Since my relapse my partner asks me every day "have you been gambling ?" If this would have been the case years ago, I would have reacted angry, but not now anymore. Now I can take it easy and just answer the question truthful with "no I haven't"

Don't really know what to write at the moment takes for me sometimes to long to translate in my head from German to English and also have to get some work done.

You all have a good and gamble free day be back soon

Wolfgang

Been reading this morning through a few posts in the forum because it turned out that I haven't to work before after 12.00 today.

Some posts I was thinking yes right that's me, is exactly how I've felt when I was gambling and after.

Some others sorry can't agree with you.

That's why sometimes I just can't replay to posts because I don't know then how, without getting a bit offensive. Then again it might be that exactly the posts I'm not replaying to are the ones which reflecting myself the most and it's the side of me I don't like.

However in a way I think it doesn't matter what you post here as long as you stuck to the forum rules it's ok. Most important is that it makes you feeling better and helps you out of your crises and away from gambling.

I'm not in a crises right now and don't feel any pressure to gamble but what's in my head is that I think me and my partner have slightly different views about my addiction. And often I get to the point where I think " hang on, if the money I've gambled is not the fact, how can she say I've gambled our wedding fund away when yet what I really did was gambling my tax return and about £1000 of my earnings." It's probably me who is looking at it the wrong way, but it's on my chest and I can't have a conversation with her about it.

Don't know if I can post here because nowhere else it seems to work 🙁

This is very confusing, I can post here but when I try to replay to posts or try to ask something on the ask Gamcare forum then it's just not working though 🙁

Not my day today 🙁 didn't gamble but should have get my car back today repaired and with new mot and needed it actually tomorrow and now I have it back but still no mot on it and is still not drivable and cost at least another 80 to get it fixed 🙁 and I don't know am I right but I have the feeling my partner thinks I do that on purpose.

Feeling down at the minute

Here I'm again,

At least I can here just writing down how I feel.

And at the moment I just feel like crying but hang on didn't I say earlier that I'm not the winging type ?

Doesn't matter I'm angry and frustrated and need to put it somewhere and maybe it helps when I just put it here in my diary.

Ended up now having a row with the missus over my stupid car the car is actually not stupid is just broken.

I don't know what's going on with me or maybe I do know and this makes me just more angry.

I think I need a councillor or what you call it here.

I've been down a few times in the past and thought by myself it was easier to deal with it at the time when I was still gambling at least then I had not to think about who is wrong or who is to blame.

And now is where I have to admit it's not so long ago since I relapsed but I do see the things totally different compare to my missus but I can't tell her.

How it is at the moment I'm looking not optimistic in the future and I'm not even worried about that I might gamble I'm much to awake and angry to make this mistake but I'm scared about everything else.

Hi Wolfgang,

Don't worry about coming across as whinging, personally I view this as the place to let those feelings that I don't share anywhere else come out. There is that blokey part within many of us who think that the answer is just to bottle it up, get on with it and ignore about whatever the issue is. It's okay to be angry, frustrated and upset, but the key is not to let that drive you back to gambling.

Gambling places a veil over our eyes, so that when that veil is lifted and we stop gambling, we realise how bad we let things get. I guess what I have come to realise is that gambling doesn't just hide the problems, but also amplifies them, making them bigger problems than when I actually had some money or time to throw at solving the problem.

All the best mate,

Ryan

I should be asleep but it is one of this nights yes I'm tired but my head is full of thoughts and so instead of sleeping I read as much of your diaries as I can and thank you for your post Ryan I won't let it me driving to gamble.

But reading through all your posts showed up to me how much easier it is these days to ruin a persons life through gambling and how easy it is through credit cards and payday loans to get to the money to do so.

Might sound strange to you but I never had a credit card and never wanted one even with the amount of credit card application forms I get weekly in the post I could easy fill up mine and my neighbours blue bin.

Also I've never played any online slots or other online games for real money I've never trusted these things. Not that you can trust any slot machine or roulette table but somehow it's still limited.

I remember one night when I was at the hight of my gambling I lost 1200 Deutschmark in one night in a gambling hall in Berlin what wasn't even my money I was so depressed that I wanted to go and burn every single gamble hall in Berlin to the ground. Ok I didn't and a few days later I've been in there again to lose the next load of money. And not that there are no gambling halls left in Germany but over the years the German government screw the taxes for the owner higher and higher and put more and more limitations on the plan with the result that more and more gambling halls had to close down. Ok it was not the golden solution but it still made it a bit more safer for gambler like me.

But these days you don't even have to leave the house, what should be your safe place, to financial ruin yourself and others, what makes it more scary than it ever has been. This means 24/7 full pressure on a gamblers mind and is in my opinion criminal !

I might to you sound like somebody from the Stone Age but I've never thought about this before I read all the sad stories here. My wishful hoping is that every single gambler on this Planet comes clean because not only is it a happier life for us but also the real thief's and liars have to go and find a real job to please their needs.

Maybe I can sleep now. I wish you all a good night

Wolfgang

Hi Wolfgang - Have just been reading your various posts with interest - sorry I have not been around for a few days but life is a bit hectic (in a nice way) at the moment.

I hope you were able to sleep more soundly after your last post. Other people have found that the euphoria of giving up gambling dissipates after a while and you can get a bit gloomy - so that is natural. You also made the point that you agree with many people but not with others - that is the nature of any obsessive disorder - so many similarities and shared experiences but at the same time we are all so different and have to cope with our particular demons in different ways.

I was interested in your description of the gambling halls in Berlin (my favourite city by the way after London!) - do you have betting shops there too as in London? I don't remember seeing any on my last visit.

I hope you start to feel better soon - you have come a long way in such a short time so you should be giving yourself a pat on the back!

Best wishes,

Joanna

Hello Joanna,

Thank you for your words and I'm happy for you, that life seems to treat you right. Wasn't really any sleep at all last night and not that I want to keep moaning, but apart from that there are no signs of my personal demon and I don't want to underestimate this, things are just not going right.

I love my missus to pieces but to be honest at the moment I'm so angry over the way she put things out that it's eating me from the inside out.

And if I wouldn't know the answer already, I would ask myself why did I tell her ever the truth about me, what I did right from the beginning our relationship. But even this is what she put here in the family forum totally different into words.

I start questioning my relationship and this is killing me.

I love her and I want to get married to her and now there are so many buts. At the moment I get even angry when she texts me and I can't tell her the reason because I believe it would just turn more and more into an argument.i can't even talk to my family about it. I really don't know what to do and that's actually not me.

By the way I can't really tell you are there betting shops in Berlin or elsewhere in Germany I guess there will be the odd one but I've never been into betting and have therefor never watched out for any.

Best wishes and a lovely Eastern

Wolfgang

Hi Wolfgang - Sorry to read that your relationship is going through a bad patch and that it is obviously causing you distress.

From reading other people's stories on here I can see that anger, disappointment and distrust often get in the way of partners expressing their true feelings. Often it is the inability (and who can blame them?) to really understand what it is like to be a compulsive gambler trying to kick the habit. There is also a lot of fear about what the future may hold for the relationship and will it survive? I know that I can only generalise in your case, but I would say that it is obvious that there is a lot of love between you and your girlfriend and that in time when she sees how serious you are about your recovery you can both start to relax a bit more.

Best wishes to you for Easter.

Joanna

Hi Joanna,

Thank you and yes you are right I do love her very much and I know that she loves me very much and maybe time is what it need.

Ich wuensche Dir und Deinen Lieben sonnige

Ostertage und Deinen Enkelkindern froehliches

Eiersuchen 🙂

Wolfgang

Note to myself: take it easy Rom wasn't build in one day neither

Not my best day today, but hey a day without gambling is a good day already and everything else will sort itself out in time

Read through many posts and it does me really good thank you to you all for this

I wish you all a gamble free and happy Easter

Wolfgang