why,why,why!!!!!!!

Dear Cheryl, here I am. It has been a week since I wrecked havoc and chaos in my life. I put myself in an emotional concentration camp, burnt my fingers on the electric fence of the online roulette wheel. Twirled money..won back losses...didn't bank and lost and then lost so hard I even managed to extend my overdraft (instant decision allowed) just so that I could get my addictive fingers on another 3k and that overdraft lasted all of ten minutes. This white fire of addiction...addiction increases, gets worse, never diminishes and yet at the same time some inner worm, some diamond in the darkness was inching its way to break free with a message somewhere. Why is it taking me to this dark place in order to reproduce the pain, the exact helplessness of childhood trauma??? After twelve cans of cider (never my drink of choice!) and a bottle red wine and 5.5k down I almost ended things on Saturday....8.8.14 was a very grim day for me. I guess I have been in a gambling hangover ever since last Friday. I am sick and tired of feeling sick anmd tired but I haven't gambled..haven't drunk and tried to terminate a very needy co-dependent relationship which fuels all this. STOP STOP STOP. Okay then, how do I access normal? Content? Peace? When will the urge to f*** things up manifest again? In my parallel world I am doing callentics every day...happy in my own skin, calm balanced and having the wonderful life I deserve. I feel like I am in the T.S. Eliot place... "Rat's alley where the dead men lost their bones." WHY??????????????????????????????????? Help needed. Getting counselling but this emotional suicide has to stop. I need a route out of rat's alley back to a safe place where addiction doesn't live and I am happy to be safe not ready to wire it all up with landmines. I never realised how similar online roulette is to Russian roulette. I am haunted by the image in "The Deer Hunter" where they have been betting on him shooting himself....I never realised gambling obliterates peace of mind. I don't want to die. I wonder how long it shall be before gambling strips me of my creativity, my love of books, films, music and scabs me into a worm life. The co-dependent is a loser no hoper who has fed off my goodwill for 18 months now..he moonwalks through life and I have tried to shower him with goodwill...my light...my joy but he sucks it out of me....I try and put up my polite Jane Eyre/Austin type of defences. I live in a nice house on my own but he has pushed and pushed and pushed his clumsy thick way in. At least I managed to say to him yesterday "I can't do this ! " How can I have a relationship with a man who doesn't even own a fridge ???!!!!!! He lives in a horrible area and it must be a nice jolly coming out to my lovely home in a lovely place. Yes I still have my home but I know he was whooping with delight when I lost big because he thought (actually admitted this) that he hoped it would mean I would have to go and live in his horrible little place with the bars across the door...the no hopers..the boozers..the losers...theose who don't even try to better themselves...where the shop lifters sell their wares in the local pubs and to be honest people aren't stressed because they can drug their way out of it....self medicate on booze and loose. Help. After writing this I suddenly have gratitude. I have to cut the chord with this man. He stalks me...I've barred my phone from him and he goes through cycles of ringing me, badgering me...the ne the fall out...then the making up...not been physical for months now. This is a man who is actually jealous when I stoke a MALE cat..he makes crazy loopy connections and is so jealous and paranoid that he even thought I was havbing an affair with my plumber just because I had left some underwear in the spare room and the plumber had left his toolbox there. This man comes from a desperate violent world and I was at school with him...I hooked up with him a year and a half ago because he was the c**k of the school....the toughest guy..the one I had been most terrified of and HOW POWERFUL I HAVE FELT when drunk and disorderly I have B***ocked him and made him scared and timid...back to roulette. I see more links now. The desperate, helpless child who was denied control and treats and lived in fear (back to worms again but my esteem was at worm level) at school and at home finds a means of control..it costs mind but I get to play roulette and my mother and brother are the blacks and reds on the wheel. My father is the zero, that's why I put 5 on him every spin just in case he comes up trumps for me...sometimes I win (e.g. sometimes Mummy is nice to me) and sometimes I lose (mummy is nasty to me). This all mimics my early life. My father put me on a pedestal...my brother psan me around on it and my mother pushed me off it. I guess I AM THE METAL BALL of the roulette wheel being tossed and turned...but I pay for this...I didn't have money as a hcild so I paid with my self worth...sometimes high and sometimes low but all the time I was being controlled. So I play online roulette in an attempt to redress the balance. This time self worth equates to money. My money my earned income. I am so uncomfortable with money. I am frightened of it..always have been...scared of my own success (following on from the idea that money represent self worth). Spend it on others...give it away....and all this creates sticky emotional glue..glumping me down in my own battlefield. Again, back to the war analogy. I am in the mid flats of some emotional vietnam (back to The deerhunter) as a girl born in 1968 after the summer of love but hang on...that makes me 46??? I can't be...I have so many arrests in my devleopment that I write this now feeling 15..always arounf 15 stuck in teenage hurt pain and rejection. I wasn't a bad teenager really but once one's self worth is at worm level from years of family violence (when we sold the house every door had been slammed so many times they hung off their hinges) HOW CAN I ACCESS CALM???? I have spun the wheel again...emotionally only there are no bets this isn't real play anymore..or is it? I am so confused. The roulette wheel of addiction mimics so closely the wheel of family life. I hope these hastily rattled out words offer some help. I've spent up now Jane xxxx

Hi jane, your cries for help and happiness (maybe forgiveness) are plain to see in this thread. I am replying because your heart-renching pain is so evident. Will it suffice to say I am in pain with you as well, (will that really help you - I don't know) . I think for both of us, (from this thread) have re-alised the roulette wheel is not the answer to lack of whatever in one's life (money, love, contentment, peace) it hasn't solved the demons we both have. For me I don't think I will ever be truly happy again, losing so much money (which is irretrievable) has cost me so much, the future, confidence, independence, happiness, and as you seek calm. Where do we go from here ? Is there a way back to happiness, I like you keep looking on here for answers, (gambling quitting answers are plentiful) but the peace we had before the losses, I don't know really don't know if I can get back there. Keep posting its better than gambling, thinking of you.

Day 17

No money, no gambling and no inclination.

Jane, your post brought me to tears, i truly think counselling is your best avenue and you have already seen the connections between life/ gambling and self esteem. You are doing well at 1 week gamble free and you seem to have a resolve to break the cycle of all your triggers. Bad relationship, destructive childhoos and self worth. It was almost that you were saying you deserved the pain, like the roulette was your torture chamber.

Please try counselling, everyone deserves to feel worthy.

Get your workplace/Gp or even self refer, break the wheel into a thousand pieces by proving you are better than those who tried to keep you down.

Hope you continue to post

Cheryl xxx

I WILL NOT STOP TRYING

Hi Cheryl

17 days of winning soo much better than 17 days of losing and then losing more think positive and keep going

Stay strong and safe

Suzanne xx

My trigger has just walked through the door. I so want to feel that I can do this but unfortunately now, at this precise time I just want to hide and for a small time get some small feeling of how it must feel to be happy. That's how I feel when I gamble in the moment the expectation that the next spin will be the one to change my life. Only I can do that but I am weak, ground down and useless.

These feelings will go as have to put my smiling face on for work soon walking around as though I am invincible and can cure everyone else's problems.

He just sits on the sofa saying how bad it all is with life, I have to accept my share of that but how long can 1 person absorb someone else's pain be the cog of destruction to that person.

I used to sort it so as said I have to shoulder some of this, I am all out of strength but am determined that despite these feelings at this time I will not gamble even when I have money.

I can draw out any small amount of positivity from the darkness to do this for me. To once put myself at the top of the pile and make things better FOR ME. That will then help all the other c**P

Gambling will only make you more miserable and sink you deeper into the dark hole

Time to think of you now time to be honest and true to yourself gambling is not or never will be the answer

Abstaining and maintaining is the answer and it will make you stronger to deal with other issues keep going keep focused and stay strong it is the only way to go in the end

Take care

Suzanne xx

Ty Suzanne

I am more determined than ever not to gamble.

Cheryl xxx

Good

Am right on your side

Suzanne xx

Day 19

No gambling but no money, also no desire to gamble at present. Life gets put on hold when I work nights and I lose 2 days just work and sleep.

On a different note car is dead and because of my actions we can't put it right so I feel very down about that, but again no inclination to spend money on slots to try and get more money.

This just has to stop.

I WILL NOT STOP TRYING

Cheryl xxxxx

Hi Cheryl.

Glad you're still here! Sorry I've been quiet - I wrote in my diary this evening explaining why. Am still here, but feeling very very wobbly. Money in my purse but not in my account so no worries that I'll act on the urges, but I do wish they'd bu**** off and leave me alone 🙂

Chin up - keep strong - keep Christmas in mind 🙂 xx

Day 20

Still no gambling, but still no money

I WILL NOT STOP TRYING

Cheryl xxx

Hi Cheryl

Very well done on 20 days

3 weeks tomorrow

Keep going clocking those days up

Suzanne xx

Day 21

No gambling, lots of desire but kept busy

I WILL NOT STOP TRYING

Cheryl xxx

Hey Cheryl

3whole weeks that must feel good

Keep going stay strong and don't look back

You are doing great

Suzanne xx