When the nightmares gonna stop?

Hi all,

I follow gamcare for a while now and decided that I just have to post at least once and say my story. I don’t know if I should call this an addiction anymore. This became now more like a battle: to be or not to be. I started playing when I was 17 (36 now) and was fun at the begging but from 2010 not anymore. I start a battle with quitting in 2015 and now just realised that there is no quitting. You just have to do 360 degrees turn and rethink everything. Since 2015 I am single. They are saying that before getting in a relationship you have to fix yourself first in order to don’t break others. Wasted my money and time (I don’t remember the figures anymore on both cases). Lost so many “friends” and disappointed my family. I am thankful that my family is still with me. Lost jobs and got homeless. Used drugs and quitted on 2018. Got back on track. Had where to live again. Had a job again. Ended. Got a job again. Ended. Got another job. Ended. All these ends because I could not think straight and could not perform at work. I had jobs just to keep on playing. Had debts. Payed them. Made another. Payed them. Some I am still paying them. Self excluded myself with Gamstop and Moses. Went to a priest - I got told that there is no miracle, I have to do it by myself. I got into it, I need to get out of it. Realised that this is like a game I can’t play it anymore because everything I do I always lose. Is like when you were kid - just need to take your ball with you and go home. Went to GA meetings - took their advices. Nothing worked. I gave my control over finances to my brother. It’s not working. It’s not working because your mind is settled like this: to live on with money. Everywhere you go - there is money. Every thing you do - there is money. Money, money, money. You will need money in the end. This is the world we live in. I realised that the only way to come up with it is to really understand that playing you will really hurt yourself. And I mean it. I said to myself so many times I am hurting myself but all the time you could see no signs on me of being hurt. All the time I hurt myself I managed to handle it somehow and to get out of the mud I put myself into. We are fighters in the end. Last time out (3 weeks ago) I hurt myself by not sleeping 2 nights in a row - I had in the past also 3 nights in a row - but this time something different happened: because of all worries and stress I got dizzy and I had a heavy nose bleeding. Plus, I felt lost like no other day and I was asking myself who I became. This scared me so much and now every time I think about gambling, playing etc. I remember of what happened and every thought gets killed in seconds. In the end you can say that there are sunny days after cloudy ones. I decided I have to be thankful that I am still alive and healthy. Other things can get fixed on the way. Like I mentioned before I always thought we are fighters - but you can’t fight if you are not in it. No need to be worried about money. No need to be worried about life. This is your life, it comes thrown at you: good and/or bad. It is good, be happy. It is bad, make it better. Don’t try to take the fire exit and face every day with courage. Don’t look for excuses and run back to gambling. Now it is your chance to make things happen. Enjoy life and let this bad habit go. You have only one life in the end. You choose how you live it - every thing you do is based on decisions. Just choose right - you are free when you realise you have the power of choice. Make at least one good decision regarding gambling. Make this good decision every day. This will make you happy. Be happy.

The most ever I counted staying away from gambling was 30 days. Now I just remember last time I played and I just count the day of today. I count on me - it is my choice, it is my life.

The bad side of things is that I have at least 2-3 nights a week this nightmares about gambling where I dream I play and at the end of them I realise what I did was wrong and I am shocked of what happened - that I played again. Then I wake up and I am thankful it was just a nightmare. When these nightmares are gonna end? 

Thanks all for reading.