NEED PEOPLE... I just need people like you to be there for me right now

hi mate,

everyone has tough days, getting through them makes you stronger and more equipped to beat this. Not a lot you can do about a dodgy carvery so don't worry about it too much. glad your day turned out well though. keep going.

A

initiumnovum wrote: hi mate,

everyone has tough days, getting through them makes you stronger and more equipped to beat this. Not a lot you can do about a dodgy carvery so don't worry about it too much. glad your day turned out well though. keep going.

A

Thanks man. Yeah it came down to a case of pride and stubbornness on my part... I should've reached out to someone much earlier in the day but I've been presenting as positive lately to people and didn't want to come across as a Jekyll and Hyde character... Stupid really because once someone eventually reached out to me I realised that good days and bad days are all part of this process.

I f*****g hate gambling and all that it stands for. I wish I could destroy it somehow. Destroy it in the same ruthless fashion it has destroyed so many others. Any ideas how to go about this? :o)

We need to sign a petition to make gambling completely illegal. Unfortunately, it will never happen because the government gets too much money through taxes. Imagine if it was actually illegal and there would be no such thing called betting. We could watch a football match on telly without constantly being bombarded by betting ads. We could listen to talksport without any of those odds trash and all that lol. The future generation wouldn't have to suffer through what we've been through. Someone needs to do this miracle and make betting illegal for good. Period.

With regret I've had to stop listening to talksport now. Been a fan for over a decade. They just feed off the gambling industry and glamourise betting so much. In the past I've placed so many bets as a result of tips from talksport. They have whole segments of shows dedicated to betting. The hosts all place bets and tell you their accas for the day.

I wish I was normal and could absorb this normally but I identify with the information too much and it either makes me excited or physically sick. So no more talksport. I wish they'd stop their reliance on revenue from betting companies and cease the betting chat. It would be more classy really.

Hi signalman, we can destroy gambling by starving it by not participating. We can all do our bit, so by not gambling we can make ourselves happy and at the same time killing something we despise.

Gambling is just a clever con trick, no more.

Shaun

I am giving someone a lift to GA tonight. I know these 'acts of kindness' i post up may seem trivial to 'normal' people that come across my diary but for me it's a big step forward. I tell you I have been a SICK individual for too long now. Gambling my money away was about 5% of my overall illness... Which I'm starting to realise now. I have so much work to do. Basic forms of compassion are a huge step forward for me.

I would happily see the entire gambling industry made illegal but it's not going to happen. Too many snouts in the trough. The relentless ads are the result of deregulation but they're also milking the market while they can given the government finally seem to be slowly waking up to the social harm completely deregulated gambling has caused.

The best way to destroy the industry is not to participate.

Hi S :)) Thank's for the post it gave me a laugh :)) .

I am around but life now seems to get in the way of posting on a regular basis these day's , which I suppose is a good thing :)) , I've said it before but I really don't know how I used to find that much time to gamble ? ..... Oh yeah , because everything and everyone else was neglected ... that 's it :(( .

Life's sooo different these day's my friend and it's good to see you feeling the same although at an early stage , as for your post " Hating gambling " What's the point ? ............ Don't give it a thought as it's not worth the time of day but if you must well ...... It's given you a new life where you can wipe the slate clean , put right the wrong's and become the person you alway's knew was inside :)) .

Enjoy my friend and have a great day :))

Alan

An early stage... Thanks for the reminder Alan...

I got home today and had a blazing raw with my wife - Loss of control and lack of self-regulation (on my part) was the cause. She was on the cusp of leaving me and taking the boy but I managed to convince her otherwise. I've got so much work to do. There is so much to fix. I know what I need to do but sometimes I just hopelessly watch the grains of my life slip through my fingers instead of clasping my fist tight and holding on to what's left.

I kept her from going today thanks to apologising afterwards and talking through everything and making peace. Thank god I've done a lot of work on myself leading up to this - it helped me to manage the situation in the aftermath and also she has seen how hard I've been working on myself so when I say I am doing everything to change it is justified. I am a sick man, I am still a sick man.

Money and debt is so in the distance now... least of my worries. If I don't regulate my mood, temper, compassion and ego STARTING FROM NOW I will lose my wife and son. Funny because I went on about losing them due to the act of gambling and monetary loss before and that was never going to happen. The inability to stop punishing her mentally will be my ultimate downfall though if I'm not careful... and I will deserve it if I'm not careful.

The program will address these issues I know - and because of that she has given me a stay of execution... that and the work/effort I have already put in.

Am I on borrowed time? NO. Because if I go down that route I've accepted defeat. Am I on my doggy life for now? YES. No more opportunities left to let old habits govern... any more and they will be my downfall. Would have been great to have been further down the program and in this situation but alas it is what it is and I need to be strong. Stronger than I've ever been. It will take x100 strength than it took to tell her I gambled and promise not to gamble again. This problem I have is far more ingrained in my system than gambling ever was. If I f**k up again she and the boy will leave. Wish me luck.

Early days Alan... As always you are on the money once again (I must stop with these terrible gambling puns - this is also something I am working on) :o)

The recovery is not all about the gambling , nor is it all about you S , it's all intertwined in one big web and there's no way you can straighten one strand out without the others following suit .

Your adressing the gambling the debt and have embarked on a programme of self improvement , ie GA but deep down your still angry simply because like myself you effed up and that takes real time to come to terms with , nobody likes top admit we were wrong and made mistakes especially acompulsive gambler who's spent however many years covering their @r*e , so I feel all this inward hate we feel for ourselves has to go somewhere right ? and maybe that's where you having a blazing row with your mrs and probably over something trivial allows you to get rid of this inner feeling ? , just my take on things buddy but maybe you need to look into some sort of behaviour therapy to deal with these feelings of wanting to go into a full blown argument and just like the losses of gambling to move forward we have to let those feelings go ? :)).

Lot's of if's b**t's and maybe's in our travel of recovery/ rediscovery ?

Wishing you well mate :))

Thank you Alan. Behaviour therapy is on my list for sure. Lord knows I need it.

A thought...

Why do some people gamble and others don't. Is the urge inherent in everyone whether they realise it or not. My feeling is that it is.

I was studying my mate today who is the personification of 'clean cut'. Why doesn't he gamble? Conclusion: because gambling is seen by society as dirty, abhorrent, seedy and self-indulgent. He is so worried about what others think of him all the time. His life, his job, his demeanour are all pretty much governed by what others think of him. That's why he wouldn't gamble. The majority of people in society are governed by what others think of them. It harks back to that archaic view that society is regulation and order.

Where do we come into all this? Well... Originally we were those that have broke the mould and didnt give a fig about what other people think of us. Where did we go wrong? We decided that we don't give a fig about what other people think of us and consequently I'm going to do whatever the f**k I want to do in order to protect MY identity which society tries to steal away from me on a daily basis.

Cue gambling addiction and doing your load...

How do we fix this? The answer is serenity. Serenity is not self-indulgent rebellious acting out to fight back at society. That's where we went wrong.

Serenity is - I don't give a s**t what you think of me, I don't give a s**t what I think of me... All I give a s**t about is what I think I can do for YOU. Now and forever. My identity lies inside you. I need you for my serenity and you need me. We both possess keys, we both possess doors. My key doesnt fit my door though and your key doesnt fit your door. Let's help each other.

Serenity is all we were ever looking for in the first place.

There is no inherent urge to gamble in me and there never has been. I can't follow it or see the patterns in it. I never could tell why a fruit machine paid out or didn't and I can't follow a bingo game. Mr L could do both with breathtaking ease pre- giving up. I don't think people are stopped by the social stigma these days either. It's all too easy to gamble in secret with the advent of online opportunities. No need to sidle past the neighbours to visit the back street bookie of the past.

? How do you know for sure your friend has no addiction or is that a side he keeps hidden ?

Was or is he aware that your a Compulsive Gambler ? .

I'm pretty sure my gambling seed was sown at an early age , family members around when I was a kid playing cards for money and me asking to play and allowed to win which was probably the worst thing I could be allowed to do , then onto the arcades with my Nan who was also a huge bingo addict .

My auntie married a bookmaker who had a shop not far from our house and I would watch my nan and my mum back and forth many times a day placing a wager , I'd walk into my nan's and be allowed to draw pictures with the pencil's and betting slips that were strewn all over the table that my grandad was sat at studying the racing page .

Then Saturday nights were spent with the family at our local dog track which was conveniently within walking distance of our home ..................................................." Christ " ........................I had no bleedin chance did I ??? , thank's everyone :(( LOL !!.