Hope

Good luck for 2011 SA hope all goes well for as you diary is so helpful too many on here i am sure, thx for posting on my diary and again stay strong for 2011.

Hi all,

Didn't expect to wake up this morning and find my diary sitting on top of the pile... but it feels nice... thanks everyone. Ive been reading and re-reading your comments. It feels good that you all have belief in me but as Tik-tak says its the belief in myself that I struggle with. But as far as my gambling goes that is history, done and dusted, finito. Ive hurt myself enough with that. Don't want to punish myself anymore. It has only ever brought me misery and despair.

Having finally knocked gambling on the head its on to the greater challenge of trying to find some joy and happiness and contentment in life. At the moment I swing my legs out of bed in the morning and think.. "what now?"... it scares me. Everything I do or don't do just feels like marking time.

I know am not alone in these sort of feelings but its hard to find that shift in thinking that positive can do go out and ***** life with both hands kind of attitude. Its as if I am waiting for some kind of "eureka" moment where things begin to make sense and i can see my way forward but it doesn't come. I know that I have to make my own eureka moments but I just don't know how...

Whoever said life was easy?

Thanks for listening.. S.A

Nobody said that life was easy--you are quite right but it has taken me almost 54 years to work out in my thick head that it does not have to be as hard as we make it for ourselves either.

Everybody has good and bad times in their lives but we seemed to have used gambling as something to run to when times are bad hoping that gambling will make them better and when times are good we thought that we had to win win win so we ran to gambling again. In reality when we were low it made us lower and when we were up it brought us back down.

2011-has to be a good or at worse better year for us without gambling dominating our lives.

All the best

Stumper

thanks for the post s.a.....i dont want all this turning into an us and them forum though....freedom of speech and all that,each to their own....to be honest ive been having thoughts like yourself about my times on the diaries....anyways i should be posting this on my own diary....good to see youve carried your momentum over into 2011...stay strong my friend,theres no turning back now 🙂

Hiya SA,

You still here!! 🙂 (you know I jest)

Thanks for popping into my diary...another new one...yikes. Glad to see your on the straight, I've read a few times in your diary about not buying lottery tickets etc and your reasons why. Your right.

At least I'm not in any major diffs.. but why gamble with gambling if that makes sense. I remember when I first came here that I adamantly said I did not want to gamble in any shape or form. So thats the way its going to be.

Bye for now 🙂

Del x

Hi SA,i think i must have been editing my post whilst you and one or two others were writing messages of farewell lol,....i get frustrated from time to time having been to hell and back more than once because of my addiction, when i read some things that people write that are so polarised from my own understanding of what this addiction can really do to a person.Like you, i know you just can't switch it off!!!.

Seano.

Thanks guys and gals.

I feel like a moan. I do find myself disagreeing strongly when i hear people say they are "recovered" and "cured". By implication this would then mean that the said cured person could then choose, should they so wish to, to return to gambling without all the "consequnces" that they experinced when they gambled before. This is absolute nonsense! The whole thought, feeling and action would be exactly the same as it was before.

And to go around suggesting to others (even by implication) that they can cure themselves is at best irresponsible and at worst demonstrates an over-infated sense of self-importance and ego-centric personality. For me i prefer to acccept the collective wisdom of the Ga principles developed over time rather than the opinion of a person or persons. Moan over.

Must admit am having a moderately s**t day. Ran for a bus and had much pain in leg.. thought it was nearly better.. sadly i was wrong. Am also feeling fairly disillusioned on the job front. Good job i'm not cured on the gambling front cos other wise I could go and have a gamble without the consequnces. happy days.. S.A

P.s Am not actually that bothered about the debate but its a good excuse to have a moan just for the sake of having a moan. I feel better now... sort of.

Hi SA

I feel like a moan as well as I'm tired of people mi-reading, mis interpreting or just plain making up stuff that I have written. I have said I (just me) consider myself recovered. You said below:

"By implication this would then mean that the said cured person could then choose, should they so wish to, to return to gambling without all the "consequnces" that they experinced when they gambled before".

I (in my humble opinion) think that, at the very least, is bizarre logic. I have (as has Rusty)continually (to the point of boring myself let alone everyone else) stated that i consider myself recovered BECAUSE I have removed totally my desire to gamble, so I totally disagree with your implication.

I don't "go around" I simply post on here (as does everyone else) their suggestions as to what has worked/is working for them, in the hope that it helps others. My understanding was that is what an open help forum is all about. IF GA is really the ONLY way why don't we shut Gamcare down and just put a single post saying "Contact GA". Why is someone who has successfully developed his own techniques, and wishes to pass those on to someone else/others considered by you as demonstrating "an over inflated sense of self importance and ego-centric personality"?

If a 60 a day smoker wants to give up smoking is the only way to do that to go a weekly meeting and say "Hi I'm Phil I'm and addicted smoker" and is AA really the only way you can cure an addiction to alcohol?

We alone got ourselves into gambling and not one single person/institute/doctor/counsellor/society has ever produced a piece of evidence that can convince me that I need 10 or 10,000 other people to get me out of gambling. The fact that you feel you need those people does NOT reflect negatively or positively on you but equally the fact that I don't need them shouldn't reflect negatively or positively on me either.

You "prefer to accept the collective wisdom of GA" but how many people have posted on here saying GA doesn't work for them and how many people go to GA but still continue gambling? The only figure I could find in my research was a 3% success rate for GA for keeping people off gambling.

If other people on here have said they feel they have recovered and can gamble again (although I can't find anyone who has said or implied that) then they can speak for themselves.

Moan over

I'm sorry to hear you are having a s**t day and hope things improve for you regarding your job in 2011

Good luck Deeds

Hi Deeds..

"Removed totally your desire to gamble".. until the day you desire to gamble of course! What would you do then?

For me I don't think its possible to forcast into the future whether I will or will not experincce a desire to gamble. Self-awareness can help to not to act on a desire to gamble.. but the belief that one can remove the desire to gamble completely and on a permanent basis is mis-placed I think.

In the right circumstance and in lets say a difficult emotional head space self-awreness and understanding of ones own gambling addiction can go out the window to be replaced by a tunnel vision and an overwhelming desire to gamble. At that point its about making a determined choice and using ones support and coping mechanisms. But not having the desire in the first place.. unavoidable i think.. more like allowing it to pass rather than denying that its there. Just my opinion of course.

For me their is nothing rational or logical about gambling addiction. I cannot analyse or intellectualise my way to a point where i can say with any certainty that i am cured.

I respect the fact that we disgree and of course you have the right to your opinion just as i have the right to mine.

I apologise for some of my other comments about Ego and so on.. they were just born of me having a bad day and being in a bad mood. I don't know you. My apologies. Regards.. S.A

Many thanks SA

Apologies accepted and many thanks.

Believing I'm cured/recovered and Being cured/recovered for sure are 2 different things. I certainly can't predict if I'll get run down crossing the road (least of all here in Algeria where the odds of it happening are considerably higher LOL !!) but it doesn't stop me crossing the road.

If believing I'm cured works for me, just as being in recovery works for you, then ultimately that is all that matters to both of us.

Thanks again and all the best

Deeds

Yes indeed .. have a good day.. S.A 🙂

Bless you both, S.A. and deeds for a healthy discussions about things as it is always that - healthy - it give food for thought - as you both quite rightly deducted - everyone is different and approaches this horrible gambling - addiction/habit/drug..whatever you wanna call it - in their own way and in a way their own brain can deal with it, which is great. If that wasn't the case, we would all be clones and how boring would this world of ours be then...

Thank you for sharing both of your thoughts as it gives me, as I'm sure it will give others, something more to contemplate and to maybe apply to one self... from one recovering addict to another, I wish you well in your quest.

God Bless

Sabine x

Hi S.A, thanks very much for posting on my diary. You are right, i know what i have to do and this is the time i have got to do it. Your diary shows that giving up gambling isnt easy but you have to keep on trying. You have done really well. You seem to be able to offer great support to others even when you are having a hard time of things yourself. You should be proud. I feel weak for giving in so easily but will try my very best not to gamble in 2011. Thanksagain bex

Thanks both 🙂

Another day dawns gambling free. Had a good Ga meeting last night, took my medicine. I feel strong as an ox as far as the not gambling goes. I feel worried and dejected as far as the job situation goes but am coping. Day at a time as always... S.A

Glad to read the meeting went well. Sorry to hear that you are still anxious about work. I know myself that if there is no money coming in things can quickly get you down but then again in the past after such times when I have had money I have stupidly and recklessly wasted it by gambling so perhaps I need not have bothered working in the first place!!!!

I started up a small business last year and although my wife and I only take £250 a week between us-when we can-at least I am my own boss and am not lining the pockets of some fat cats. Things are far from easy but realistically things are almost certainly a lot easier as a non-gambler than they ever were as a cg with money.

All the best mate

Stumper