One day at a time

Hi Sonic,

A big well done on 6 months of being gamble free, it's a big achievement because it's not an easy journey.

Keep going and keep paying those debts off and getting your life back.

Happy birthday another Scorpio , lol have a great birthday and enjoy the freedom abstaining brings

Suzanne xx

Thank you for the kind words Suzanne..

Although 6 months free from bookies and FOTB's I have still gambled on what I keep telling myself isnt a problem... fotball on my online account with sky bet... but gambling is still gambling and I need to address this.

Worst case scenario (and if im honest with myself I can see it coming) is when my debts are lower and I have more money in my bank is that im going to let my guard down and be back in a bookies playing on the machines.
After losing 70 pounds since last being paid I can see it in the way i was betting.. chasing my losses, spent 20... lost deposited again... lost, deposited again... won a bit... tried to get fully back to what I had deposited... I withdrew 10.58 from my account today and will be logging back in later to see if theres an option on there to self exclude. I think you may have to phone their customer services team to do so... so i guess today is day 1 (again)

Hi Emily

I cant claim 6 months of non gambling, only 6 months of non gambling on what i openly admit is a problem for me - roulette on the FOTB's. Could easily spend 500 a month on there so had to do something about it.

hopefully can built up 6 months of no gambling at all...

so ive self excluded from my online account so unless i get stupid anf find another bookmakers to sign up to I have no ways to gamble. Well except by taking the effort to visit a bookies im not self excluded from

Hi Em... Well my debts are down to 7,300 so knocking off around 500 a month. Got repayment plans set up with most credirors so i know where i am with everything. Not had any urges today as been at work. Urges usually come around on a weekend and whem im chasing there really bad. Dont dismiss your relatively few days, it is what it is and those days can soon be double figures if you stay focused. The longer you go the easier it will get. sometimes i cant believe its been over 6 months since betting on a roulette machine, i dont even think about roulette anymore. Ive accepted that that type of gambling isnt for me as i cant stop once ive started

Hi sonic.

The only way to starve this addiction as you are realising is to totally not spend even one penny on any form of gambling, and you are realising that so well done, we all do our recoveries in different ways and you have done brill going 6 months without playing those hideous greedy FOTBS but I am really pleased to read that you know now after losing on your footy bets that that can become a problem, especially when you have more spare funds, your addiction is quite happy at the moment because it's still taking some money away from you, even though you are doing great getting those debts down, and well done for that,

Stay strong and starve it totally, it will hate that and make you even stronger, and therefore you will win 100% every day, how good is that, Fantastically good and that's how you will feel

Suzanne xx

Thank you Suzanne... very wise words x
Hope things with yourself are going good?

Hi sonic

Quite right, the FOBT' are pure evil, we must keep away. My friend is a manager at a bookies and says he can't get his head around the fact that someone has a 6-1 winner from £10 on the horses and they are dancing around the shop and will say right I am going now to treat me and the mrs. That same person will put £10 in a FOBT, get it up to £480 but KEEP PLAYING until he has lost the lot!

Keep strong.

Hi Paul, yes crazy isnt it. With winning on a horse race its a one off event, a unique race so picking the winner gives a different kinda buzz, doesnt matter if its only a small win. You get a buzz from choosing that winner. Watching a wheel go round in a pre determined way doesnt give the same kinda buzz. Sure it feels good when your number comes in but walking away is really hard so deep down you know you're prob gonna keep spinning and spinning, lots of losing spins, some winning spins, ghe buzz isnt the same. I knew i had a problem all along as i could never go on, have a spin or two and just come off and watch a greyhound race or horse race. Once i was on an fobt i was there for ghe long haul.

Funny looking back, with there sneaky marketing ploys. Free tournamonts to get people hooked. I remember for days being allowed to play on demo mode. Hell what a scam once i got a free 100 quid demo upto 3 grand! Every spin was coming in. Sure it did it on purpose to make you think you could do the same with your own money... yeah right. Anyway seems so long ago yhat i was hooked on those dvil machines. Dont get me wrong, i dont think im cured or anything. I just knw that i have no desire to be drawn back to where i was earlier this year....

Hi Mark, thanks for the post.

I've got to admit that I'm finding the diary very therapeutic and it's always nice to get that added boost of support from someone going through the same thing.

I've read through your diary and I relate to a lot of what you say. My problem is online slots, the flash graphics, the catchy music, the sight of those coins spilling across the screen when you get a big win. All just a big con really designed to keep me hooked. I am and always will be a compulsive gambler in this respect, I've finally realised it. I can't go back even for one more deposit, or one more spin. It has to be over for me forever and I seem to have made peace with it (for today at least, I'm not daft enough to think I'm anywhere near being fully back in control)

Yet I have no problems with any other form of gambling. I buy the odd lottery ticket or scatchcard (not since joining this site but that hasn't been intentional) I can go to the dogs (I've only been a handful of times in my life) and never found a problem with putting a 50p bet on the dog with the best name (that's my strategy!) and I'll still take part in the £1 sweepstakes for the grand national etc. For some reason my brain isn't addicted to any of those things, I don't know why but I know they'll never be a problem for me.

That said I do know what has the potential to be a problem for me. I've only been in a casino once before when I went to Vegas in 2011 and it was before I was a compulsive gambler. I'd been given the advice before I went 'only take the money you're prepared to lose' and I did. I took $20 each night. I remember laughing with my other half at how stupid I must look to the cashier when I took my ticket to cash out....$26.27, I'd won a whole $6.27!!! Later that night I was waiting outside the toilets for my other half and I got talking to a lad, about my age, from Texas. He'd asked how my night was going, I'd told him how proud I was of my $6:27 and we were off to buy a pizza with it...double bonus! His night hadn't gone so well, he said he was $3000 down. I remember looking at him with my mouth hanging open in horror that he could be so calm. He laughed and said, it's nothing, the nights early and I'll win it back and if not there's always tomorrow' When my other half reappeared I told him the story and my exact words were 'what a complete f*****g idiot, how can anyone be so irresponsible? That money's long gone he'll never get it back' Laughable now really, that I've ended up in exactly the same boat. Although that's the only time I've been in a casino, I know I could never go into one again ever.

I guess we know deep down in the ugly heart of it what we can and can't do again, what we can or can't try. I see a lot written about FOBT in many diaries, your own included, I have no idea what they are and I haven't attempted to find out. I'm pretty sure it's something I could become addicted so I figure it's safer for me not to know about them, then I can't be tempted to have a go.

I've never set foot in a bookies, mainly because I know myself well enough to know that it's something I would do over and over, I'd probably end up betting on snail racing in Outer Mongolia or something equally stupid.

I'm rambling on now, I think what I'm trying to say is you know you better than anyone. If you're honest with yourself, you know what you are in control of and what you're not capable of controlling (I'm big on the word control at the minute as you can probably tell!) All we can do is take each day at a time and try to make the best decisions we can.

Congratulations on day 7
Jess

Hi jess. Thanks for posting on my diary. Slots are awful. A quick way for the gambling sites to take your money off you in a short space of time. Its virually impossible to win and when you are 'up' ithere designed to make you just want one more spin. God, yif there anything like they are on fotb's you can just click the autoplay button and watch your money magically drain away. Yes the sounds and graphics get you addicted. You wouldnt just go in a newsagents (well i guess some people do) and buy 1 lotto ticket at a time, scratch lowe and then just ask for another after another after another. That form og gambling is more of a one off kind, something im not addicted to (or even do). Slots and roulette are designed to get the problem gamblers addicted. Yes, I know myself best and the little voice in my head does try and justify having a bet on the football every week, it trys to persuade me that im a normal gambler now im not playing the fotb's. Im just wary about having that buzz from winning and that not being quite enough for me and then having that voice saying that the fotb's will pay out this time.

Was just thinking of my 'strategy' earlier this year - visit the fotb's every day and just win a fiver and walk away. In my head i thought it was easy to win a fiver ( i still do). But i knew it was impossible to walk away just a fiver up. Even though i knew if i had the disciplin i could win 150 a month rather than losing hundreds every month. That was just the voice telling me it was a good idea to go play every day.

Haha yes, those d**n autoplay buttons. My aim (always my aim - yet never the outcome) was to set it to 100. If my money ran out before then, oh well that's it for another day (reality - deposit again, cycle repeats) If I still had money at the end of the 100 spins, I'd withdraw and leave until another day (reality - I'd set it to another 100 to see if I could win more next time, cycle repeats) the outcome was always the same, I'd leave with nothing but an empty bank account and that feeling of nausea that just won't go away.

By the sounds of it I've done well to steer clear of FOBT (I still haven't googled it to find out what it is or even stands for) all I know is I would have lost even more money and be in an even worse position. Thank heavens for small mercies and all that.

That voice, oh that voice. I've listened to that d**n voice far to many times in the past. I think about 3 weeks is the longest I've ever managed to stop before. I always make the same fatal mistake, I get cocky, tell myself that I must be 'cured' I've proven I can stop therefore one more go won't hurt. Lies, it's all lies. I'll never be cured, the most I can hope for is that I can control any urges that do come my way (there's that word again, told you I loved it)
For the moment at least I'm succeeding, I've just got to try and not let my own arrogance get the better of me - I hate to use that word to describe myself but it sums up the 'gambling me' completely I suppose, convinced I could succeed where so many others have failed.

Jess

Hi Mark,

I assure you they were smoke free kisses being sent out.

I know what you mean about this site, I actually have visited it before but never thought I needed it. Or I did know, and just wouldn't admit it. Either way I didn't join, just read for a bit and came away thinking 'meh, my problems aren't that bad.' Don't get me wrong, there are many people here in a far worse financial position than I am, but given time it's exactly where I would be, I know that now. The money I've lost is gone but the money I save now is mine. And strangely it turns out I like having money far more than I like not having it!!! Why oh why has that never dawned on me before? Crazy.

Congratulations on 20 days, take care and keep it up
Jess x (it's definitely a smoke free one!)

Im starting to realise that the first few days after being paid are more of a struggle than I want to admit. Although not MASSIVE losess yesterday (40 quid down) I fed the gambling addiction when the plan was to be starving it.

I have to admit I want to be a normal gambler who doesnt chase chase chase but thats what I was kinda doing yesterday. Millwall equalised to scupper my acca which had just chelsea left. So then I wanted my lost money back so bet on the chelsea match to try and recoup... That didnt work.

I cant be certain that I wont be betting today im afraid.

Its usually after the first week of being paid that I take stock of where my finances are and stay clean from gambling.

Then payday comes along and this pattern seems to continue