Going to keep this thread now!

Was in chat last night, for the first time in a while. It was nice to see lots of new people supporting each other through their early days in recovery, but it did send a shiver up my spine to think how common this compulsive gambling is. How many new diaries appear on these pages daily!

I don't get involved in posting to many new members, just because there are so many! where do you start?!

Anyway, I am ok. Been having some low feelings this morning, and can tell already I am not at my best today. This is normal, and I will guide myself through today as gently as possible.

Hiya Freda 🙂

So pleased you got a good doctor it just makes all the difference. Hope the weather gets better so your month off has some nice sunshine. Enjoy your rest...Your doing great..big hugs

Mite venture into chat one of these fine days myself..talk soon

Love Del x

thanks paul, sa and del

had a good time gardening yesterday. i am getting a lot of feedback that tells me i should trust my own judgement more. self doubt is going to be a tough one to *** - but i like a challenge!

i have been excited by lots of things springing to life this week! nature is very therapeutic to me, and i like caring for my plants and watching them grow.

anxiety levels continue to drop, although was in a bad mood yesterday due to a tax credits bill. why do they always write to you on a weekend? the DWP are the same!

hopefully going to have a nice jaunt out with me other alf this afternoon 🙂

Hiya Freda...thank you so much for your post and good to see you are in a good place....

Never been on chat so no idea how it works if it is actual chat or just one to one posts or something....sorry..am not very puter literate.

Your post made so much sense and had to laugh as i always say to my friends that on my headstone I want it to read.."Is it me..or what?"

I always feel i'm the last to cotton on to something or that I see things differently...

You are so right about checking motivation and also not worrying about having and expressing my voice...its true that i don't want to be "right" or have a row but just to get my opinion validated as equal is all i'm looking for...

I know you understand that...

I shall be doing a lot more of that and this forum really helps to get my voice out and just on a screen as believe it or not I don't speak too much in the day and spend a lot of time driving around in my job n my own head.

Also been gardening and got it all done before the hailstones!!...very therapeutic isn't it ? ..just to absorb our thoughts and get a bit of exercise.

Keep on keeping on Freda and I know you face your fears every day with great courage....

Your a true asset to this forum and can see you have lots of friends on here who also take great comfort and inspiration from your posts..

take care and big hugs

Rach and Doo x'xx

Hi Freda... glad to hear that your aniety levels continue to drop. As for the tax credits people.. well ive never been able to fully figure out how they arrive at the decisions they arrive at... pay them back a penny a month!

I hope you continue to feel revitalised with your time away from work. I undertsand what you say in your reply to me in an early post re job. I continue to be a stress head with my work though perhaps more resilient than i was. Take care and enjoy the gardening between the showers.. S.A 🙂

P.s.. play therapy.. I will play more

thank you all 🙂

I am going to finish the gardening today, and feel happy that I don't have to think about work for a while. It is therapeutic to have no demands placed on me for a while.

Yesterday marked 45 weeks since my last bet of any kind. I am enjoying life with less drama. I have a very small amount of savings, and it will take me ages to have a really good safety net, but it feels good not to have to worry about getting half pay this month. So in this way, my lifestyle changes are beginning to pay off already. In November, we will have paid off 2 years of our mortgage. It is a repayment mortgage, so again, this provides a small buffer financially should we ever need it.

It has been a tough couple of years, we have had to be very careful financially - we have made do with only 1 second hand sofa, no armchairs for the first couple of years, sitting on the floor when people come over! no holidays, apart from the odd couple of days away in Britain. We can't afford to run a car either, and I can't afford to take lessons to learn. Living frugally is boring, and restrictive - but after just a couple of years it is paying dividends.

We are currently on target to pay off our mortgage by the time I am 56 and hubby is 53. We may even get there sooner, if I can recover more from my anxiety disorder and work a few more hours a week. Things are looking ok : )

Not feeling brilliant today.

Keep letting things rile me. I feel frustrated about so many things, and I am struggling to not let that affect my mood. I know on days like this, the best thing I can do is just remind myself that all these frustrations will get sorted in time, and I don't need to panic about them. Still, they keep coming into my mind.

Bad day. Time to just stay within today, and be gentle and kind to myself.

Hi Hun.

So with you on the living frugally but we do what needs to be done if it gets us to the place we need to be.

Kettle,biscuits,fluffy blanket,sofa you know the drill:0)

May i suggest not to keep the panic in and build up if you try and find away to let it go say bash a cushion,small scream,rip some weeds out.

Stay Strong

E XX

hiya Freda...

Good that your getting it out on here as Libby says...better out than in and those ranty days can sometimes sneak up on us and take on a momentum of their own...

thinking of you and hoping that tomorrow greets you with some sun Freda ...sleep well if you can hun xxxx

Rach and Doo xxx

Freda--bad days are just that and good days are good but overall most days are average.

Try to accept what is thrown at us as some of it is good but some is bad.

I am now working with people who have opened my eyes like nobody has before as they truly have something to worry about but actually do not worry at all.

All the best as always

Stumper x

Thanks E,Dotters, Stumpy

Had a right old meltdown yesterday, and cried most of the day. Got really emotional, and when my friend came round, tried talking to her about why I find it hard to not worry and get upset about her lifestyle. She is the one who is always burning the candle at both ends. I think I explained pretty well actually, that I know that some people do manage to have that kind of high pressure, fast paced life long term without it making them ill, but that it is rare. Having had a breakdown myself and never having been the same since, it is scary to watch someone I care about in my opinion taking that risk.

She is really adamant though, that there is no risk, and there is nothing about her lifestyle that is risking her wellbeing. I said that I can respect that and drop it then, but because of what I have been through, I can't be of support to her when she is feeling overwhelmed anymore. That would make me ill.

It was a really weird thing, because I think I know a hell of a lot about risk factors in breakdowns, and warning signs and stuff. I find it hard at the best of times, to trust my own judgement - and her being so completely baffled as to why I am so worried, again makes me wonder that well worn phrase "maybe it is just me". I still can't shake the feeling that I am right on this one though, but have to accept that she disagrees and I am not going to convince her otherwise.

It is about how do I go forward from here then? Because being around someone so tired, stressed and busy feels stressful in itself. I do think that emotion is contagious to some, and while I can respect her choices, am I going to be able to be around her much as a result? I also would find it heartbreaking if she did have a breakdown.

The real problem emotionally, that I am facing today, is guilt though. That maybe it was wrong to be so candid with her, that I can't shake the feeling that I have done something wrong, and behaved badly. It is giving me this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, and I am tearful.

It was really scary having someone disagree so completely with me, and finding my perspective so completely alien. Not because of control issues, that I have to make everyone think like me - but because for some reason, I find it really scary to not be understood. I end up worrying that I am weird or something. Probably another side effect of low self esteem.

At the end of the day, this is probably just about two people growing apart, and wanting completely different things out of life. It is really sad to accept that I am losing a close friend, but have to stay true to myself. We don't have to fall out, or not see each other any more, but realistically we are not going to want to do the same things very often, and are not going to enjoy each others company if we are so different.

I wish my counselling would hurry up and come around, because I really need to work through this stuff properly.

This inability to trust myself, that I do know what is best for me, and that not pleasing other people to keep myself safe, is not wrong or nasty is crippling me.

I once heard treat your mental health like a business.

It sounds like your a very good friend you have her best interests at heart and deep down she knows that.

Take a we step back if you have to. Try not to worry so much whatever is going to happen will happen so no real point in worrying but i know thatz easier said than done because i am a worrier 2.

I had a break down when i was 22 hit me like a thunder bolt so i understand.

Take care freda

Hiya Freda,

I know exactly were you are coming from and how you feel, I've been in a similiar position with a close friend. I remember the days I would get sooo worked up about what was happening with her that it affected my health ..I had my own troubles on top also.

But to cut a very very long story short.. I eventually took a big step back....I found it very difficult to see my friend living a life that was killing her....I just couldn't hack it. I was ending up getting angry with her...and told her as much, but my friend being as she is..it was like water off a ducks back when I said so.

We've known each other since childhood, and we will always be friends, but we're like chalk and cheese , we think very differently. She doesn't really get me most times lol.

I approach our friendship very differently now, it's not as close as it was, I don't get too involved, and months can pass without any contact but when we meet ..we just pick up were we left off. And she is the one friend I can tell absolutely anything too...and have the best laugh.

We nearly lost her last year, the years of all her troubles have had it's affect, and sadly it comes as no surprise. But none of my advice or worry or anything! would have made any difference. That can be said of her other friends as we all sing from the same page.

Anyway what I want to say Freda, is...take that step back...you have your own health to think about and your hubby to care for too. Your friendship may take a new life that your comfortable with in the future. And new friendships are ahead of you too.

It's not just you...you care, you have a good heart. What I have found in myself that I have worried/ have had guilt etc etc. That in fact has took me away from what is important..and that is what is inside my own four walls. It took me a long time....but one of my other friends kept repeating to me time and time again...Del...you have your own family to concern yourself with.

Hope anything I've said helps in someway luvvy....big hugs..

Love Del x

Freda--if we could alltrust everything that our minds tell us to do we would probably all be living on a desert island drinking pina coladas etc--truth is our minds are not perfect and neither is much of the rest of us either. We exist to make mistakes and although some are better than others at learning from our mistakes, some like me are not very good at it.

Life can be hard some of the time but at least it makes us appreciate the good times more when they finally come around. Remember you can only help people who want to be helped and what we may think is wrong for them and not doing them any good at all, may be perfectly ok for them and they are happy to live there lives that way.

Hope the weekend helps as pick me up for you as you are doing so well with not gambling. Perhaps that is where your main focus should be at this time--on how well you are doing with that.

All the best

Stumper x

Hi Freda... I think Stumper hits the nail on the head.. you can only help people that want to be helped.

In my opinion.. from the outside looking in.. it would be helpful to keep your friend at arms length for the forseeable. Its like if your feeling somewhat fragile yourself... you just don't need the emotional turmoil.

I have friends that i keep at arms length sometimes and people keep me at arms length sometimes especially when I am going through the aftermath of a gambling binge. protect yourself and keep psychologically safe. It doesn't mean that at some point in the future the friendship doesn't get going again. I have a few friends i haven't really had any contact with for months.. like they are in cold storage.. (well sort of lol) but sooner or later we will pick up where we left off.

Anyways.. i hope your having a good weekend.. S.A 🙂