Devil in my ear

Trying to explain to myself why it would be a bad idea to just by a couple of 10 pound scratchards every payday, I might win enough for our spending money on holiday, treat us some way... now I have excluded myself from online bingo which was my worst enemy, just a click of a button and several thousand pound gone sometimes. My thoughts are...now that's gone why can't I just do 20 pound a month on lottery/scratchcards... I did actually tell my husband the way I was feeling, the human part of me could understand why he said I am just looking for other avenues and another way to gamble somehow and how would I feel resetting my days back to zero, good point! The gambling addict in me got angry... but what if I could control it, just do 20 pound a month? I am still trying to make sense of this addiction, it really has got me beat sometimes.

Hello again,

Almost everyone on here would advocate a full stop to all forms of gambling. Of course, that's the ideal solution...but then we look at 'normal' people spending the odd pound on scratchcards etc and think..."What if I could be like that too?"

It's a question I've thought about a lot. In the past I have attracted the ire of people who don't agree with my opinions on my diary, as I've battled to manage 'controlled' gambling. But in your case, I think what you've written is clear enough; you want to play to win money in order to treat yourself. I think that's exactly the wrong reason. Buying a raffle ticket at your son's school fayre to win a plate of pork chops is unlikely to kick you off on a self-destuct (although I appreciate the possibility is there...but I think most CP would be 'safe'). Personally speaking, my ex-wife played bingo occasionally and, (no offence) as I sat next to her and played my own lines, I was terminally bored. Time has never passed so slowly. I even won once, just a few pounds. But there was nothing inside me, no joy at winning - it wasn't capable of 'pressing the buttons' , and indeed it was a pleasant surprise for me that not all forms of gambling were attractive to me.

You are setting out to gamble so that you can win extra money and change your circumstances, albeit temporarily. If you have the odd low-level win it will just make you want to play more, and the downward spiral will begin. You'll either bet more on scratchcards, or start experimenting with other types of gambling. It's a no-win situation I think. Honestly, I think you should get some days, weeks and months under your belt and then think things through again.

Good luck!

I can give you this from experience because after giving up my poison (machines), I was determined to “be normal” & carry on playing the lottery...Despite a gambling career spanning almost 3 decades on the machines, the lottery & it’s associates products had never really fascinated me until that is it became all I allowed myself to gamble on. The majority of my urges following me stopping the machines were lottery based, I guess because I continued to tell myself that that was ok...It wasn’t!

I eventually realised that “abstaining” wasn’t enough & walked into a GA room in December 2016 to start work on my recovery...I haven’t gambled since & neither have I had any real urges to!

Addiction is simple, it’s an anaesthetic...If you want to gamble, something is wrong in your mind! Get those blocks high, keep reading & learning...The more you know about why you gamble, the easier it is to recognise your triggers & find ways to overcome them!

You CAN make it stop - ODAAT

Thanks so much for the positive advice guys it was what I needed to hear, sometimes I feel I could counsel myself in my own mind but...I don't listen to me. That's why I love this forum, I do not expect replies and it is just nice to go wild on the keyboard with my thoughts of the day. But the replies help me a lot more than you probably know, I am not a very good word person, I find it hard to explain my feelings and to express how grateful I am that I am involved with such an awesome community but just knowing someone is right there with you because they have 'been there' is an enormous support, just to not feel alone helps so much.

But It is so hard, I am being temptped every day but I think I kind of knew that when I signed up to beat gambling, one day at a time... at first I felt so positive but when I had my relapse it knocked me for six and I felt so so low, that feeling that I felt the morning after I messed up was enough for me to get back on the saddle again. I did not want that feeling back again. Back in the day when I had that feeling in my stomach it made me thinkI my family would be better off without me because of my self destructivness.

Hi i really get how u feel 🙁

Hi Lau and thank you I hope you are ok, if you feel sad maybe you could do what I do and use this forum to help those feelings of aloneness, knowing that we are not alone helped me so much. There are some wonderful people here with so much good advice and stories to share, people that have been up down and all around with this addiction.

I am not sure what your experience has been with gambling but if you feel like it may help then maybe you could make a diary on here or just read some stories and take in the awesome advice some poeple have to offer here, it helped me a lot and I am only just about hanging in there because of this place.

You never know, you may help someone just by sharing your own experiences.

Best wishes,

angel x

Thank you for that lovely post on my diary Angel, along with Mixer's kind words it really brightened up my day.

Great to see your happily settled back back in on your gamble free journey. The 46 days you previously built up shows that you have what it takes to refrain from gambling.

It was a very wise and courageous decision you made to exclude from all the gambling websites. Hopefully, gambling thoughts will be less likely to prey on your mind.

Regarding scratch cards, lotteries ect., they would be frowned upon by most recovering compulsive gamblers because one thing can easily lead to another. Total abstinence is considered the best way forward because after all is said and done we are compulsive gamblers.

I was wondering how you got on with the counselling, it really helped me to go 6 months without a bet. Sadly I than acted like a fool and tried gambling again but I keep trying and hopefully my time has now come to say good riddance to this insidious addiction once and for all

Wishing you contentment, happy days and plenty of summer fun with your lovely family...stephen

Aw stephen and caughtup thankyou for your posts here your kind words of support mean an awful lot to me.

I still kick myself knowing I went 46 days then messed up and now im on day 19 which could have been 65 :/ although sometimes I do need a good kick up the b**t to keep myself on the right track. I feel a bit stronger this time round, I haven't had much temptaion now that I have self excluded from the bingo sites, amazing what a difference to temptaion those blocks can make.

I never did get counselling in the end, with work and taking my mum out on one of the 2 days I do get off work it was hard to make the appointed times, however it is good to know that if I ever feel like I need it, it's right there. But at the moment just the levels of support on this forum and reading reading reading is good enough counselling for me right now.

Would like to share what I think is a really cool quote.

Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.

Lyndon B Johnson

Best of wishes to all,

angel x

Hi Angel and well done on your excellent progress.

Great quote from Mr Johnson which is a good reminder that we must not be ruled by our past actions.

Everybody makes mistakes. Ours were quite damaging and unnecessary but it is over and done with. Our future starts now and it will be far better gamble free than if we were handing over our hard earned money to the bookmakers......

Me and Angel on the move resolute and in the groove

Trying hard to do our best sticking to this noble quest

Courage and hope with smiles on our faces

We're rocking on regardless without the airs and graces

Congratulations Angel on 123 days gamble free.

Many thanks for posting on my diary, I really appreciate the support and encouragement.

Wishing you peace, happiness and contentment as you continue on your journey...stephen x

Congratulations Angel on 159 days gamble free. Excellent progress on your journey of recovery.

I really like a verse which you wrote many moons ago on a "Poems" thread in "Overcoming Problem Gambling." I find it very moving and have re-written it below ......

"Difficult roads they can be tough

But on the forum we make good relations

To beat our addiction we are stronger together

Which will ultimately lead to a beautiful destination."

Very beautiful and it reminds of "Somewhere over the rainbow." Hopefully we will all bury the gambling in the past and find peace, contentment and happiness. Take care my friend and keep going forward...stephen

I am so sad, last night my husband was working away and I got bored and found a site I thought I was banned from but I wasn't.... I gambled a little money and won a load. I have never won that amount in all my life and I thought it will be ok if I tell my husband I had a slip when I tell him how much I won... but what did I do? I reverse withraweld it it all apart from a small amount.

I won it at 2am this morning, so all day I have been imagining what that money could do, then after a day with my mum who has dementia I got home, had a drink, was tired, stressed and the first thing I did when I got home was check if the money had gone through. It was still available to reverse and I reversed it:(

I had time on my hands, and money, I had an overdraft from one of the accounts I made for my bingo... all the things I should have tried to remove from that triangle.

Dreams of what that money could have done for me and my family. I feel so very low right now... should have put all those blocks in place rather than just banning myself from the regular sites I would go on.

Gutted for myself and my family and I really hate me right now.

No matter how much I thought I could control it, I really thought I could.. 190 days gamble free I thought I knew how to control this now, but just lying to myself 🙁

Thank you my lovely, your words mean more than you probably know. I will start again. Wishing you all the best, much love xxx

Well something I have realised in these last couple of months is what a really awful thing gambling can be, I have been and still am in a very bad place right now so I felt I needed to write some things down to get it out of my head for a moment,

My mother in law who meant the world to us all fell ill over christmas and passed away in janurary, she lives in London which is 3-4 hours away so my husband was spending all week down there and popping home at weekends for a couple of months with me and the boys staying at home. I was so very down, one for losing my mother in law and 2 for not being able to grieve with my husband.

All of a sudden it got me at my most vulnerable again. Over christmas I could feel it creeping up on me, I had been trying to register with gamstop but they were unable to verify me so I sent them ID documents so they could manually verify me and still haven't heard back from them today. I found a couple of casino sites and started rouletting away..

I have banned myself from all of the sites that I found and used, but now I have 2 more loans adding up to thousands and a couple hundred pound of my few thousand pound overdraft left. I am now getting charged 6 pound a day for that and I can't leave it like that, but the only place who will give me a loan has a very high interest rate and I would struggle very much with that.

So now I just don't know what to do, I feel ill, drained and physically disgusted with myself, If I told my husband it would break him and us, he's been here so many times and doesn't deserve this. It is especially hard to tell him after just losing his mum, he is barely staying together as it is.

Sorry to just blurt it all out but I feel I really need to do this right now, it sometimes helps just talking but I have no one I can really talk to much, I missed this place the last few months so thank you for letting me let it out.

Much love to all x