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      Clarity
      Keymaster

      This was posted on my thread in January, only six months ago! I thought I was doomed to an eternity of misery. This was typical of Colins advice to me at the time. It used to make my blood boil to be honest. I got angry thinking "he just hasn’t got a clue, I’m f****d so I might as well carry on regardless". I even said on one of my posts I could win myself out of the trouble I was in.
      Originally posted by Colin In Brum

      Hi Geordie. As you have said you know WHAT will help, the question is WHEN will you do them? That can only be a question which YOU can answer no matter what support you get here or elsewhere. You are expecting a call from the police? Well that call will likely come and consequences will be faced – what then? The legal stuff will work its way through in due course. Whether that involves a prison sentence, a lesser punishment or an acquittal one thing will still be the same at the end of the proceedings – YOU will STILL be a compulsive gambler. What are you going to do differently then? Make NOW your rock bottom and start taking the ACTIONS that you KNOW will help.
      In answer to Hockeys point – what do we get out of it? Well speaking for myself I’ve got a life now, one that I enjoy. I didnt get it by "just" stopping gambling though, I got it by working recovery. You CAN work yours. Its your CHOICE though.
       
      Colin, celebrated 15 years free of gambling earlier this year.
      I guess I wasn’t really angry at him for giving me "patronising" advice. More likely I was at angry at myself because I knew I did have to change something, and didn’t really want to.
      Of course now I very often dish out similar words to other cgs on here.
      It took me 28 years of half hearted, and serious attempts to quit, to finally understand that no matter how hard I tried I did need to change; Like a lot of others on here I would advise others to give control of finances to others and put a gambling block on pc’s.ect. But didnt follow this advice myself. Having ready access to cash is something we all know is very dangerous. So why is it that more often than not people slip and find themselves losing hundreds, if not thousands before we come back here? Why did we have access to the cash. For me the answer is simple. I thought I was different.I thought I was so special, I really thought I had to beat this on my own because nobody really knew what was going on in my head.
      I feel genuinley sorry for people who are slowly destroying their own lives through gambling. I know how very very tough it can be to break free. But I know it is really possible to do so. I know though that in order to get into recovery for real I had to stop gambling first. And to do this I had to give control of my finances to somebody else, full accountability. I had to exclude from absoloutly everywhere. I had K9 installed by someone else, its not registered to my email so I cant click the "forgot password" button and get an email reminder, I’d suggest other cg’s do this also. Can you really trust yourself with the password?
      I struggled real bad with urges for a while, however I havnt had an urge since March. Recovery is working for me, I just know it can work for us all. But there are no shortcuts. In the 28 years of trying to stop, the most valuable lesson I have learned is therapy has to be ongoing. There most certainley is no cure. Believe me if I can live gambling free anybody can, it is worth fighting for. It might take years to get out of the mess that has been made by gambling, but a line has to be drawn. Gambling created the mess, it’s not going to solve it.
      I was so far gone six months ago, and now I am feeling great about my recovery. I am not walking on eggshells with it anymore although I expect a few of my family and friends are. Its 05.38 I know that I wont be gambling today, and that is the priceless feeling is, KNOWING that I wont be gambling today. Not hoping. I dont know about tomorrow but know I wont today.
      If you are serious about your recovery and finding it hard, then isn’t it time you changed something?
      Take Care.
      Geordie.
      Because recovery is priceless; I dont gamble.– 22/06/2011 05:09:32: post edited by geordie18.

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