Dear diary
Since I started counting “continuous clean days” and not the number of clean days I had on the 17th August 2016, I must be 1 week old now.
The change was drastic for me, I had more freedom, I can feel the peace and calm almost immediately after I change.
It was very clear and obvious. Now I no longer have to spend time and effort to check what soccer matches is on, where and when, I don’t have to study the odds, their past performance and make a prediction, finally deciding how much confident I have on the match and whether I would like to go ahead to gamble on the outcome of the result and how much to gamble.
I no longer have anxiety and worry from missing the deadline and gamble, no fear that I may miss a good opportunity if I did not follow up closely, there is no more pressure and stress to made important gambling decision all the times before each match start. No more fear, tense and anxious feeling when the match is in play.
Weekend is the busiest, during the peak period of the year, there are soccer matches going on every day. Once I admit defeat to soccer punting, spending long hours monitoring, analyzing, making predictions, and having emotional roller coaster ride is no more a part of my daily routine. Now I have more time to rest properly and relax mentally.
What happen in the past?
This was one of the hardest obstacle for me staying stop for many years. In the past, I have been living with this reservation to gamble deep down inside my heart, I strongly believe that I may not be able to beat the bookies or casino all the times, but I am fully convince from my past winning experiences that I can beat them some times if I could just wait patiently for my chance and stop after I win.
Where am I now?
I look at the periodic gambling I do in the last 11 years in recovery, it has always been “a period of compulsive gambling in the end” and not about winning a single soccer match. Every period end up in losses.
This is the confident that the bookie and casino has, if I continue gambling, they are very sure I will lose in the end. This is what exactly happen to me. I can be an opportunist waiting for the chance to made a winning gamble, but each opportunity return me to compulsive gambling for a period and losing whatever I have all the times in the end.
I had an awakening recently, I am not only stopping gambling, I admit defeat. In the past for me, stop gambling means I stop not only the losing opportunities but also the winning in gambling. I admit defeat means I stop all the losing in gambling, there is no winning in gambling for me, there is only losing. Any false hope in me that I can win sometimes was one of the biggest reservation and biggest problem I had for many years which was address now. It is all over, it is finish, it was remove after 10 years in recovery.
What is my action?
No one want to give away their hard earn money to the casino or bookies. I don’t want to lose a single dollar to them.
What about taking money from the casino or bookies. Everyone likes to believe that but in reality, it is a con job, a deception, an illusion, this is what those businessman want us to believe but it is a lie and a trap for compulsive gamblers. I have stop believing in this lie, I have stop lying to myself.
