Heropanda conquers the world... well one step at a time

For the purpose of completeness i just wanted to say that i did visit the casino on friday night with a friend. I'm not in the right place to put my feelings down more as i've just had a pretty disturbing night out but i'm ok and the things that have saddened me this weekend aren't related to gambling. Better updates to follow but i'm not trying to deny by ommission anything.

Hi HP

I've noticed your diary before with a degree of alarm. What is stopping you from knocking it on the head? It seems to me that you are making excuses by opting for a control strategy.

You are a gambling addict.

You use gambling to escape from your problems: an avoidance strategy. Avoidance strategies are very unhealthy as the problems inflate the more you hide from them.

A drug addict seeks avoidance through getting high. Say a drug addict who has been getting very high, regularly, for a very long time, was suggesting a strategy of going to, say, Portugal for a controlled (free) heroin binge, and was also planning various weekend sesh's in the UK, what would your take be? This person tried to justify it by saying that actually it can be fun if I just moderate my intake.

It seems to me that you're being led by your addiction: by trying to lead a 'normal gambling life' like someone's who's not an addict. Unfortunately that's not who you are. The CG voice in your head is winning.

Once you make a commitment to actually stop gambling permanently, you will reaslie that gambling is a trivial and insignificant dot in your life. I gambled for 16 years but now see it as enturely pointless. Before I gave up, I wondered if it was possible to a kind of life line to gambling in place. It seemed hard to completely stop (I even used the 'fun' argument!). But that was my mind being reluctant to give up a control strategy as it meant I would have to face up to my pain and emotions. It's like before I stopped smoking, I remember thinking 'I don't really, truly, believe I can ever be fully relaxed and myself if I'm not smoking' - obviously that was b0ll0x too. Gambling/smoking/drug addiction - these are all control strategies which we use to avoid us feeling difficult emotions.

I see you started a thread looking for advice for your potential girlfriend, on entering a relationship with you, a CG. If you care so much, would you not do the most obvious thing in your power, and stop gambling? It's almost like by making that thread, and getting others' views (incuding those of 'other halves'), your telling your GF 'I'm not prepared to change, this is what it's gona be like'. That seems egotistical.

What do you think you are hiding from?

For me, after I stopped gambling I realised I suffered from social anxiety which is linked to worries over rejection/acceptance. I couldn't see this before as I was hiding from it, I was scared. I wish I had faced up to my demons earlier and not tried to run away from them. When you face up to your fears they're nowhere near as scary as you thought and your life can really take off.

I hope you can stop making excuses and benefit from the rich rewards that can be there for you.

Thanks for the message Cardhue, i can tell the passion and the amount that you care about a fellow person to go to that level of detail is really compelling.

To be honest its left me with a crisis of confidence about how i tell my journey. I'm now very worried that my updates could appear like they are trolling for a response and i really don't want to agitate other members of this board. The reason for posting updates, specifically ones around actually gambling is because this is a promise i made to that special someone, that took away the deceptive and secetive power that gambling can foster in people. I don't hide when i do it but out of respect for members here i don't go into a great deal of detail.

This diary shows every instance of where i've gambled since i came clean to those closest to me about my problems, i have no secrets from them in here and i don't want that to change.

I also don't want to argue or come at your words head on so i'll probably explain my feelings on this approach.

Right now i feel less likely that i have ever done in the rest of my life to spend every last available penny gambling. I have been down a route of complete abstinence before and it hasn't worked as long as this approach has. I'm 8 months in and i've had 8 gambling sessions. I can see that the number of occasions has gone up recently but i'm in the best financial shape i have been and i haven't been remotely tempted to gamble online which had been my nemesis previously.

I can genuinely say that i haven't felt this in control of myself in a long time and life is certainly not easy for me at the moment. I feel like i would be more likely to throw it all away by trying to abstain as i know one day i would crack and it would be very painful.

Maybe i'll crack this way too, at least everyone and myself will be able to see my journey and see another perspective or a what not to do. I'm not smart enough to know all the answers and couldn't even start to work on my self in the way you have so for the time being i'm just doing what i can to get by and as i said, its been the most successful (in terms of the soul) 8 months i've had in my adult life.

Hi HP

Thanks for not getting aggro. I actually had one of those moments after posting when I felt I overstepped the mark. It wasn't meant to P**s you off but you could've taken it so.

I don't think you should worry about your posting. I think it's evident that you are trying and your not just boasting about gambling.

Be careful with this controlled gambling thing. Are you sure it's not your mind feeding you a story to keep you gambling? I've been on this board for a few years and I haven't seen a controlled approach to work yet. Anyway, I've gone on long enough before so will stop.

Wish you well