Hey ho.
Mr Exon, I must be very honest with you. I am jealous and wish I had your head on my shoulders when I was your age.
You are an addict, you accept that, and you know to prosper in life you’ve got to get to grips with your addiction.
Every addict trying to kick their addiction will suffer withdrawal symptoms, 100%, if we didn’t then we wouldn’t be addicts would we.
How you are feeling at the minute, is all caused by the withdrawal symptoms. The feelings themselves are symptoms of your withdrawal from addiction. You’ve said it yourself “gambling would fill the hole”. Indeed it would mister, but guess what you’d then have to endure a little bit more of life as an addict before enduring more withdrawal symptoms, probably more severe.
Despite how you’re feeling at the minute you are persevering with recovery, and I admire you a great deal for that, and whether you disagree with me or not, I reckon your parents will be immensely proud of you.
You don’t feel better after 9 weeks, why should this change after 9 months?
I’ll tell you. In 9 months you will have been and gone from GMA, and if you absorb everything you learn there you will leave with your head held high, your withdrawal symptoms won’t even be noticeable to you. I’m sure you said you already had a job lined up, I hope they’ll keep it that long for you. But even if not you will leave there knowing what you’re going to do, you will, towards the end of the GMA programme, start laying foundations for your new life.
I know you do understand that gambling is a very serious addiction. When you say no one understands the gambling, or how you’re feeling, of course you are absolutely right. But I can tell you the feelings you’ve described over the last few weeks sound identical to feelings I’ve had many times in my life, So I think I know where you’re coming from. As to understanding gambling…Mr Exon, I’ve done it most of my life, as you know, and I’ll never understand it. Of course I have my theories like everybody else. It is what it is. It’s a crippling addiction.
I used to think it was so important to find out why I started, thinking if I could just find that out and deal with it, everything would be ok. It doesn’t really matter though. At the end of the day what matters is making sure you end up in the position where you never ever want to gamble again. Where, when you feel shit, depressed and empty, the first thing you think of to fill the hole isn’t gambling. Until you get to that stage what matters is protecting yourself, from your addiction.
I admire you for posting so honestly, and with such clarity.
Many many people rather than post how they’re feeling, would rather fill the hole with gambling, I hope just by writing your words down you can see how pathetically stupid it would be to fill the hole with gambling today, or any day. Because once that hole’s plugged there’ll be an even bigger one, which would probably require a bit more gambling to fill it. Or a lot more misery.
4 weeks mate. 4 weeks, you’ve already been stopped gambling for more than twice as long as that, it will pass before you know it.
You say, “I used to be the happiest, smileiest, funniest person ever. Now what am I? A disgrace to myself, to my family, to my friends… I’ve turned into a greedy depressed piece of shit, who doesn’t even want to be alive. How the **** did I get myself into this mess?”
You know the answer to that.
I could have copied that quotation from one of many of my posts on here. So I know when I say to you, “You’re not a disgrace to yourself or anyone else. You’ve got a problem, you’re standing up to it, you’re getting it sorted, and that, Mr Exon, especially for one so young, takes immense courage, and huge doses of maturity” Well I reckon you’ll be thinking along the lines of “F*** off I am a disgrace, I shouldn’t have ever gambled, I should have stopped years ago, I’m a w@**er”
You know what you need to cut out of your life to get back to how you were, and you will, if you don’t let your current feelings get on top of you.
I can’t really fill you in too much about what the programme’s like, when I did it it was for 9 months, so a lot has changed. GMA wont “fix” you, but it will give you everything you need to fix yourself.
You might ask, “if its that good, how come you’ve gambled so much since?” Quite simple really, I didn’t have my head screwed on like you do. Thats why I’m jealous. Old age you see, missed opportunities.
You’ll always be welcome on GT whatever the future has in store for you. But mate you are so lucky to get into GMA, I hope you make it work for yourself.
I’m pleased you started using GT, you’ve actually helped me a great deal. I would say thanks, but as you’re in Spain suppose I best say, “Grassy arse”.
Keep posting mate, even if replies aren’t forthcoming, it’s the best thing you can do.
If you’re really dead bored, two films I think might appeal to you, Analyse this, and the sequel Analyse that. Robert De Nero and Billy Crystal. Nowt to do with gambling, It’s about a mob boss who turns neurotic and goes to counselling. As you can imagine they’re both comedies.
And a book. No Big Deal by John Coates, it’s written by an addict 15 years clean, I found it very inspirational. Maybe you’re not in right frame of mind for books but just a thought.
Take Care, be bloody careful, and once again, keep posting.
Geordie