Gamblers Anonymous Forum
rock bottom - Printable Version

+- Gamblers Anonymous Forum (https://forum.gamblersanonymous.org.uk)
+-- Forum: Main Forum (https://forum.gamblersanonymous.org.uk/forumdisplay.php?fid=23)
+--- Forum: Share Section (https://forum.gamblersanonymous.org.uk/forumdisplay.php?fid=7)
+--- Thread: rock bottom (/showthread.php?tid=3209)



rock bottom - aj31 - 06-09-2011

were to start .been gaMBLING HEAVY FOR 5 YEARS but deep down no ive had a problem but recently ive lost it all ,control,family,nearly my sanity,for me its football accas and roulette lost thousands cnt or dnt even wana wk out how much i lost,but on saturday it all came to head and i cudnt handle it no more .sunday was meant to be a nice week away ,family holiday but dad of the year ME DECIDED to blow my money and had to turn round and admit we cnt go having to tell my 6 yr old daughter that we cnt go holiday was the worst moment in my life .spent the rest of the afternoon walkin around in the pouring rain thinkin this is the end .living with mum now and life a mess hopefully i can dig deep now and win my family bk gonna b very hard ut gotta try .5 days no bets now so things can only get better i HOPE


Re: rock bottom - jmgstamps - 18-09-2011

Hi Maverick ,
I have been reading your story about gambling not stop so I was my life has been a misery for many years, my life is all about gambling for 40 years.the lies that I have told, it is incredible and at one stage I belive myself what I was telling my wife, she is saint after all the things I have done and still gives me the opportunity to reform myself. I left her many times and I come back and take me back
I have been gambling free now for about 5 and a half months and still go strong,I do attend meetings at my local place where I live and I am going in to line chat where I notice your name, I do support you for your effort and to me that will help me to keep going and not gamble any more. I do know that I have been doing wrong to many people I could never be able to put it wright, but I do pray for no falling again to gamble, well done Maverick . please stay off and life will be better for all of us


Re: rock bottom - barrieexgambler - 25-09-2011

Hey Maverick,
I read your post with interest, I like the point you made about I may not be the best guy in the world but I am not the worst. That kind of suits me to many degrees.

The stories you hear are not unfamiliar when it comes to us compulsive gamblers and wow I could tell numerous stories of "being in the proverbial" thanks to gambling.

At 21 walking into a Church and sobbing my heart out with a fob story so a "good samaritan" would lend me the money to travel home at Christmas, only to blow the money instantly, jump one train then an intercity, hitch 40miles and arrive home to sponge my way through the next month.

For me it was failure after failure to recognise how deep my addiction was. Attending a funeral one time and "killing time" waiting for the bus to arrive home broke.

Or the time I said "willpower" will stop me in a new job. Only to go and take hundreds from the safe and "borrow" in a blind panick to put it back.

My gambling increased at times to some very desperate acts such as selling the High quality TV I had got on HP for a fraction of its worth to try to win back the money I had lost.

I wasnt just a gambler I was a fool.

Sometimes however things in life come back and bite you so bad that afterwards you take a deep soul searching evaluation of yourself, its one word for me "enough".

That happened to me very deeply and now I am clawing my way back, using the forum to advise others on pitfalls, call it giving back to society what "me in action" took.

Because me in action was someone I would not have wished to be unfortunate enough to meet.

I sometimes feel I could make amends to those I hurt, but some I cannot, all I can do is say "that was me then" and "just for today this is me now"

I remember vividly one day in my local when on a day I entered with a pocket full of crisp 20s and going through, impatiently asking 20ones...a guy looked at me noticing the stress in my voice and calmly said "I used to play them things a lot, but dont anymore" i noticed him as then he turned to his wife and daughter smiling happy as they proceeded to go and enjoy a nice dinner and this was what went through my mind:

"must be just lucky, not like me because thats what I dream off, normality" to go to the bar with family and do "normal" things...it was however not my mind.

Five years ago I hit rock bottom, having a car previous to this and ability to travel only increased my gambling, making more money had only increased the level to which I gambled and things were heading towards the end.

I found myself with nothing, absolutely nothing but my body, all women had left me, the family had pretty much disowned me, no car, nothing.

That was the time I did the one amazing thing that I had never in my hurried life done before, I sat down and asked the most important questions. Who am I? What do I want from life? where do I go from here.

In that there was only one answer to what made me bad and that was gambling.

So I started my new life.

it was tough at first, going to work 7am finishing late, trying to catch a chance, money was sparce but after a year I bought a car, quite a nice car, nothing flash but it matched the new me.

I continued to work hard and who knows what will happen next week, I do not really care about next week, the view I have taken for the past 4yrs+ is "today" im living for "today".

Well I have not finished my path yet as something in that few hours of contemplation told me that I needed to accept what i could not change and change what I could.

I have changed a lot, but it was always me and that is what I have back "me" the nice guy I actually am (no one will believe that) actually the nice guy I have always been, its just before gambling took that nice guy away and controlled everything.

I will continue my fight and anyone who listens to me or I can advise is a plus in my mind, GA is a good place full of good men and women, the reason they are good men and women is because they are trying to do something about an illness that I for one will never ever be able to hand on heart understand why it grips so deeply and is unrellentless in its destruction.

Maverick keep up the fight its worth it..there will be dark days.

But god has given me the serenity...I hope tommorow is a good day as today I did not gamble.

TC all...

B