Take 2 this times for real

Thanks Juliette! Appreciate the post!

Well had multiple opportunites to gamble over the past 3 days and pleased to say my willpower was enough to defeat the demons. I feel like I have turned yet another corner in this recovery. In the past it has been a case of ENSURING that I have no means to gamble and the slips that I have had have simply been down to urges and opportunity. However, last weekend I had both and managed to deal with it in my brain for once. The angel won over the devil and I think this may have been the first real time this has happened.

A lot of exciting things going on at the minute. Don't want to say too much incase it doesn't pan out but some opportunities at work that may just work out in my favour and make things a lot easier financially. It's amazing how having something else take over your mind means that you don't think about gambling or debts at all. I wish I had something this exciting going on for the next 3 years til my debt free day lol!!

Anyway, I am a happy camper at the minute both in my recovery and in life 🙂 xx

Things have been AWFUL this week. Unexpected bills etc etc and I'm talking hundreds of pounds 🙁 have obviously thought about making a quick few hundred pound to attempt to cover some of the bills but I haven't done so. Would like to say I'm proud of myself but I think if the opportunity arose I would gamble 🙁 luckily the barriers have been well in place.

There's been a lot of talk about the horse racing in work. There were a few guys yesterday that went into the bookies and placed a few bets and came back in telling each other how they won £60 on the roulette machines. One of them said 'how do the bookies make money on those things, I've only ever heard of people winning from them'. Needless to say I nearly fell off my chair and felt sick to my stomach. Another person getting reeled in? I really hope not 🙁

Anyway got a nice long weekend lined up! Just what the doctor ordered 🙂

Another weekend successfully negotiated.

I don't know what has happened in the past couple of weeks but a switch has definitely been turned on (or off) in my brain. I have had the opportunity to gamble and I have had the urges stronger than ever and normally those two things combined is a dead cert that I will blow a few hundred quid, but I just didn't. The angel on my shoulder is finally winning against the devil, something that i have not really experienced before. Before now I have only managed to not gamble by putting barriers in place but now it appears that I have finally got the inner strength to refuse to deposit the funds.

I think I am slowly realising that money does not make me happy. Yes, it makes life a bit easier and who doesn't like treating themselves to a new pair of shoes etc etc but over the weekend there has been quite a bit of extra cash floating about that was unexpected and am I any happier? Absolutely not.

Anyway, time to get on with some work I suppose! Hope you all had a great non-gambling weekend 🙂 xx

Spending less and less time on this site now. It's not that I don't want to come on here it's that I find that reading about it all the time is a bit depressing. In the beginning this site was the only thing that saved me from going mad but I think the further and further you get away from being an 'active' addict the less you want to continuously read about it. I make sure that I check in on those few diaries that I follow and I find that that is enough to keep me on the straight and narrow for the meantime. Am under no illusion that by not visiting this site at all would have a negative affect on my recovery but I feel its time to think about the future and more positive things and not spend every spare moment reading about gambling.

Am also finding that I am focusing on the debt a lot less. Once again I don't want to spend every waking minute calculating what I can and can't pay off - BORING! There are much more enjoyable things to be doing! There are times when I am at home just chilling out on the sofa watching a film and I am just SO happy and content and I think to myself 'this costs me nothing'. The best things in life are free and I am finally beginning to believe this statement 🙂

Long may this positive and optimistic streak continue!! xx

I thought I was past the gambling dreams phase but last night I had another one. Took £300 out of the bank...it had a really weird set up...the table was there to put your chips on but I was spinning the wheel on my phone. And the first number that came out was 51?! Anyway, lost the £300 and woke up frightened and sick to my stomach thinking 'how could I have been so f*****G stupid???' - then I realised it was a dream and was SO grateful!!!! Clearly my brain is still purging all those bad memories!

Read some shocking news on here this morning, really puts your life in perspective. Poor Mark117 died of a heart attack on Sunday 🙁 he was just getting ready to move back into his family home with his wife and 2 young children, absolutely heart breaking stuff. Makes you really realise how bloody lucky you are even if you are under a cloud of debt.

Have read some shockers on here this week. In particular Busted who lost his 177k inheritance by flying off 1st class to Vegas for a week!! Insane!!!! I thank the lord that I have never been given any substantial amount of money and that when my relatively wealthy parents pass on I will have a much wiser head on my shoulders after this recovery journey. There are very few times that you actually feel lucky in this sort of situation but when you read some of these other stories you really realise that I could be way more serious.

Anyway, didn't have any dreams last night which I am thankful of, although they are a great reminder of the horrific feelings that gambling brings.

Got a nice quiet weekend on the cards 🙂 Will be like that for a few weeks now before I go off on holiday to the sun! Need to save up some Sangria money!!

Have a great weekend everyone xx

This so-called "entertainment" world in which we call gambling really is a horrific place to be isn't it?

Why on earth it is not made public as being a huge problem in our society, I don't know. What with all this 24-7 gambling opportunities available, it really needs to be flagged up.

It goes to show how grateful we are to be able to be in a position where we are trying really hard to set up the rest of our lives.

A much brighter, and more contented life, that is!

All the best,

GT

Thanks for the post GT. In my honest opinion I think that this illness is not flagged up in society because people are so good at covering their tracks! Look at me...I'm 30, have a successful career have a nice house, loving family....no one in their right mind would guess this dark secret that I have kept from everyone around me!

It is pretty obvious when someone is an alcoholic or a drug addict but with this it is much easier to hide and unless you come to the depths of despair and have to admit what you have done it is possible to get in and out of this addiction without anyone having ever have known (thats what I'm hoping anyway!).

Anyway, had another successful weekend. Don't think the debt or gambling played on my mind much at all! Once again it feels like a past life but I know all too well how quickly I can jump back into that hell hole.

I have been absent from the site for a few weeks due to illness however I am in a very dodgy place at the minute. I have gambled 3 times over the past 3 weeks and am currently £1550 up awaiting withdrawals to be processed. I am planning on paying my credit card off with this which will bring it almost below £1000 for the first time ever!

However I have had the most unbelieveable good streak, literally every number i was betting on came in and when i say i have gambled 3 times i am only talking about an actual hour of gambling in total. I know in the back of my head I am thinking I can clear the rest of the credit card. Also however, I am older and wiser thanks to this site and know that this can and will only lead to DISASTER!!!!!!! I only have to get through tomorrow and the largest withdrawal will have been processed, then at the end of next week I am off on hols so I won't have to worry about it then.

I am so thankful for this money I have won it has taken a huge weight off my shoulders even thought I still have a long way to go I really don't want to screw it up!!!!!

God d**n these casinos that make you wait 4 days for withdrawals to be processed grrrrrr

I lost my way a bit over the last few weeks and I knew it would take a loss to make me see sense. Luckily that loss was out of my winnings so I managed to walk away £900 up. I was obviously upset at Losing some of my winnings but if u had have told me before I started this spree that I would win £900 I would have been ecstatic!

Anyway I am officially back on the wagon and today is day 2. I did attempt to gamble yesterday but my blocks worked. I didn't really feel like I wanted to get back on the recovery wagon yesterday but today I know that I need to. I am so much happier and less stresses and irritable when I'm not gambling and I owe it to my amazing family to be as happy n content as possible.

Part of me feels that I will continuously blip until I pay these god d**n debts off 🙁

Day 3...no urges. My withdrawal should hit my bank tomorrow, then I can self exclude. Must be the 30th self exclusion I have done at least!!

Things are pretty S**t at the minute. Don't want to go into too much detail as it will give my identity away (if anyone of my close friends and family were to read this) but basically anything that could go wrong is going wrong.

Glad I have started counting the days again, I think I need to get a good few weeks under my belt before I will get over the regret of the past few weeks.

Anyway, have only negative things to say today and like they say 'if you can't say anything postive then don't say anything at all'!!

Day 4....withdrawal still hasn't hit my account grrrrrr another day I have to wait to get out of my overdraft and to be able to self exclude.

No thoughts or urges. Still a bit gutted that I lost some of my winnings but at the same time extremely relieved that I ended up coming out up rather than down. I deposited £800 to get my £900 winnings so I have to keep reminding myself that if I had lost my initial £800 then I could be sat here £1700 worse off! Why why why does that not make me feel better???? Why why why am I concentrating on the winnings that I lost and not breathing a massive sigh of relief that I actually won???? I have booked 2 weekends away with some of the money, trips to see friends that I hardly ever get to see, trips that I would not have booked had I lost £800. Why does this not make me happy???? I just do not get it. It clearly is not about the money at all. There is a gap in my life where gambling used to be and nothing else gives me that same buzz. Now that I am back on the wagon and am no 'allowed' to have that buzz I am miserable once again. The memories of the terrible days have faded and it is so much harder to quit BUT I know that I can not afford to let myself get back to those desperate times. If I am to get away unscathed and without my family finding out then this has to stop NOW.

Day 5...pfft...day 5. How rubbish. Doesn't even seem worth writing. It is so much harder to keep up this recovery when you have managed a few months clean and then you go back down to day 5.

Anyway...withdrawal finally hit my account so I am out of my overdraft. Have not got round to self excluding yet but will make sure I do. Only a couple more days in work then off to the sun for a couple of weeks where I will be safe and away from all temptation!!!

Just read the post from Mark117's wife. There are times when I let things get me down and then there are stories like that that make me realise how bloody lucky I am.

Onwards and upwards

Well I managed self exclude but not before losing another £300. Luckily for me my debit card got refused otherwise the situation would have been a lot worse. And also luckily for me that after the last few weeks antics I still come out of this £600 up, even though at one point it should have been £1850. Man I could f*****g kick myself sometimes! I was SO angry last night when I lost that money!!!!!!!!!! But yet this morning (before I self excluded) I was already planning on getting another quick session in tonight! Unbelieveable.

Anyway, luckily I saw sense at some point this morning and self excluded and I will not have the opportunity to gamble for a good couple of weeks now so hopefully the next time I speak to you I will be on at least day 14!!!!!!!!!!

Man...it is so much harder to get back on this wagon when you have failed so many times.

Thanks Shorty for your post, the 19th April seemed to be the evening for losing money, I reduced from 300 withdrawal in 24hrs to 200 but then I found that with playing machines in bookies you can just give them your card and keep putting credits on and there I came unstuck.

Hope that you have a great holiday in the sun, and as you say no chance to gamble so you will have a head start on the days when you come back. Have fun, Juliette