The road to having my life back

Thanks for sharing this. I had to read your text a few times before I started to understand it. I relate well to your super fast brain. I used to be like that once. I can imagine that you go through things pretty quickly because we gamblers do that. Fast jobs fast cash fast life. One thing I missed in all of this. What is it you want? Where will you be in the future? The plans for your concerns are missing. If you can create that in words you have achieved something you can work with. I am here for you if you have any questions. So is admin. Just narrow it down.

How can we help you out?

Thank you for your reply and that makes a lot of sense, and u are right in what u say, I just want me brain back and to stop living this pain and regret, it feels like I can’t till I’m out of the trouble it’s coursed, that’s not a quick fix and it’s just one big vicious circle at the minute, all I want is my normal head back on my shoulders, this site has helped me dearly and to understand a lot of diff things, but in my head for the first time ever I just can’t forgive myself, normally I’d be free an don’t care by now getting on with it. But this time is diff and it’s having an effect I never thought was possible for me, if that makes sense 

Hi Rusty. Welcome to the forum and thank you for the message on my diary.

Like you, Im not someone who has to fight daily urges to gamble. Long ago I would play roulette every day until I realised that I had a problem and needed help. The help helped and daily gambling stopped. By now my main threat would be relapses followed by weeks or months of chasing losses followed by seeking help again then repeat. Then I went to GA for 6 months and stopped going. This led to several years of not gambling. I learned a tremendous amount about gambling addiction in that six months but thought GA had become repetitive and I thought i wasn't learning anything new so decided to pull away. Several years later I relapsed stupidly and gambled for several months then stopped again. By now, I could lose thousands in one relapse whereas at the beginning I could lose a few hundred quid. So, I gambled far less but was capable of far more destruction.

Fast forward to this year, early on I gambled and one day lost the plot and lost big. I had another panicked relapse a few months later and my debt was xxxx. Ive not gambled since.

I don't hate myself. I have many regrets but accept that what is done is done. It took me a few months to get to this stage. Someone wise on here advised me to think of the debt as something in the background and chip away at it. Thats what I'm trying to do now. 

For sure I have a problem. I realise that I have the ability to hurt myself. To prevent this I accept that gambling for me is unacceptable, will always be unacceptable even on the worst days when all around me has turned to s**t.

There are things that I can do to make myself feel better. They require effort and often I cant be bothered. But I must try. Running helps as would eat better, sleep better, relax more, read a book, have a bath etc. Lots and lots of things can make me feel better. It takes effort but if I feel better I won’t feel like gambling. I don't gamble to feel better or for enjoyment I do it as some sort of self destructive, mental punishment. 

I used to gamble to win money now I only stop when Ive lost everything.

I haven’t given up hope. I honestly believe that I wont gamble again, will pay off my debts and will have a super fabulous life - I’m just taking the long way there.

Take it one day at a time. Build the days, open your eyes to the small stuff and things will improve steadily. Build momentum and resilience and you’ll be on the path of recovery.

Take care.

RR

From my point of you regret starts to fade with time.

Your brain is complicated and like an orange, you will need to peel one bit at the time to understand it better.

Our routines define our actions a lot. We like having a lot of balls in the air. We need to solve our debt problems to erase fumes of our gambling but we end up gambling too solve our debt problems. The point is that the routines we do very much intertwine with the triggers that set us off.

The money that we love and will solve all our problems is .. one of the big problems. We are addicted to that to.

So, in short, our paths lead us to being happy without money if that is possible. The whole thing is a long journey of discovery. I keep on saying that we need to understand our own computer (brain)so the computer will be nicer to us in our lives. But I am not judging. We all have our separate journeys and we are all different.

So my hopes are that my story may have something you can use in your story. 

So let us keep on talking here in this forum and get wiser from it.

Good luck in your recovery!

I also had a pattern of spending big leave it two months then repeat the pattern again in between I had awful guilt hated myself and what I was doing well done for joining the group and good luck 

Rouletteregret thank you because u seem in the position I’m in and it’s nice to hear someone positive to escape it all, I am trying to recover but before when I done this it didn’t effect my brain or emotions, this time it has and I’m normally a good controller of my mind and how it works but at the moment I’m not and questioning why I can’t see life how I used to, c43h cheers for your advice and yes your story helps as does everyone else’s mate, I appreciate all the feedback that’s why I’m here, I felt alone in this but now I don’t so that’s one step, i have things that are easing all this pain and regret and I am trying to get out of my head dilemmas, it’s a deep situation and a first real bad trouble for me in life, I always thought I could cope with anything but I don’t know if I can this time, it’s something I’m trying to change because it could make things harder but it’s hard, very hard and I’m new to this mental torture in my brain, thank you all for commenting I do take it all in