Life With Sports Bets Only

Thanks for the reply Dan, not very helpful or constructive but respect your opinion.

So what would you wish to hear? Would that change anything? I have enjoyed your diary youre clearly a smart cookie. If your way worked surely the relapse/remission nature of your diary wouldnt occur? Perhaps its time to consider you dont know best when it comes to your addiction & try another avenue.

I could have said you did it before you can do it again. Just do what works for you. Keep trying the same things that have never worked before. But i think youre a little smarter than smoke blowing. So why not commit to it properly. Stop your desire to control the uncontrollable. Draw a line. You cant gamble on your terms. Fact

Thanks Dan and Half life. Yes there is a big part of me saying I was fine for 3 years so I can be fine again. Anyone can relapse regardless of how long they have been fine and which approach they have taken. I am still shocked that the relapse came so quickly and was so severe though. In terms of the advice on here being the same I'm not too surprised, I just naturally came back on after the relapse and am open to anyone providing their thoughts and opinions just not sure at the moment whether I can learn anything new having done over 4 years on here previously and gone through a complete recovery.

Captain.

Fella I am glad you are back posting all be it in unfavourable circumstances.

The reason I am glad is simply because I owe you an apology for the way I responded to your thread on many occasions, because I was wrong to do so, I challenged your methods because I believed that they belittled mine,a result of ignorance upon my behalf.

Today I understand that you gifted me the opportunity to find acceptance, that every single person is entitled to an opinion and the opportunity to voice it.

I hope you find inner peace again in whichever path you tred, because you're correct that you have previously.

I hope you will accept my apologies, I fully respect the input you unconditionally gave.

I have learnt myself that some of my most valuable understandings have been found where I have least expected.

I sincerely wish you well.

Duncan.

Very good info:

https://healdove.com/mental-health/Gambling-Disorder-and-the-7-Deadly-Sins

https://healdove.com/mental-health/The-10-Commandments-of-Gambling-Addiction

Great post the 8th deadly sin

Trying my best to re-engage with the Forum over last couple of weeks following a 2 year absence. Since my relapse I have experienced shame, guilt, regret, shock, disillusionment, anger. I know why it happened, I know how to prevent it happening again but I still can't accept that it happened and at the moment I can't get back to any sort of normality and real life, I'm stuck in ' relapse recovery and acceptance land' and don't have a route out of there at the moment. Will maybe give the Forum another couple of weeks.

Hi Captain,

It's always difficult to see someone back here after a relapse, just know there are plenty of others who come back after a relapse, me included. For me, I know that sports betting is my gateway...the thing that almost inevitably leads on to video poker, which is eventually the downfall, regardless of whether or not I win to start off with.

Best of luck with your recovery, hope that you can stick permanently to a way that works for you. For me I can't let sports betting be a part of my recovery, but we are all individuals, and our problems are best known by ourselves.

Ryan

Stick with it Captain - it would have been easier to not come back here and slip further back into the old routine (many others wouldn't have come back). So hat's off to you coming back into gamcare forum. It has worked for you before and it will work again.

As you say you are feeling mixed emotions - all still raw from recent events. Give it time for your head to clear.

Hoping you turn a corner soon - I really think you will if you continue to stay gamble free.

Wish you all the best...

Thanks Ryan and Tommy - nice posts.

I guess anyone feels many of the emotions that I am feeling after a relapse but if I had been fine for less time and the relapse had only been a one off bet of a small amount of money I'd be coping better.

But I've been fine for 3 years and thought I was fixed and then from nowhere I've gone on a 10 day binge and lost thousands.

I didn't even think I was capable of going off the rails for one day far less 10. 5 years of hard work in recovery was then followed by 3 years of living a life in control to the point where I had only 6 years to go to pay off debts. In 10 days the 6 years has become 7 possibly more. It is such a large step back for me in terms of confidence, finances and just ability to move forward with life.

I random gambled again yesterday but I then got a message from God to tell me that is my last, its over, I need to go back to doing what i know best. I am a sad, penitent man.
Just for today no random gamble.
I need to make my family proud of me, not ashamed.

Promotions and earning more money are no good for problem and compulsive gamblers. I wish I was still in the same job I had at 19 and didnt change jobs or get any promotions. Then I would still be betting £5 and £10 for fun. When you earn more you gamble higher amounts. Life would have been so much better if I had never been able to increase amounts.
I am a sad, penitent man.
Just for today no random gamble.
I need to make my family proud of me, not ashamed.

Not sure i agree with you here Captain, i to started off with the small fun bets but over the years that changed and progressively increased my bet year on year. I have not had promotions at work. Whilst my wage gas increased with the cost of living I'm 42 and earn roughly the same as 29 year olds I work with but by the time I stopped gambling I wasn't betting the same as I was as a 20 year old.

I believe we stake what we have available the figure is irrelevant. I'm aware you have your theory on controlled gambling but as a compulsive gambler I don't have the control to self police myself anymore I have progressed beyond the £5 and £10 bets satisfying my needs and I personally feel if he had a higher income the amounts would of increased inline with what I had available.

KTF

Yeah me too Captain, the control went out of my gambling years ago & many years of thinking that I could just stop @ x amount found me in a never ending downwards spiral. People abstain for years too but the minute they think they have it licked, back they head to oblivion. Thinking we are fixed & being fixed are not the same, you've been around long enough to know that. Being 'fixed' for us in about living in harmony with addiction, accepting it is in us & knowing that we can never turn to it again. Recovery is more than abstaining, it's about addressing our problems, retraining our brain & making peace with ourselves, including our past.

I haven't read your diary, only seen a few posts pop up from time to time & from what Duncs wrote, it's been said before, but maybe it's time to reconsider your stance on recovery now.

You can make your family proud but first you need to make yourself that - ODAAT