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alone is not strong
#1
Hi all.

I want to share with you some things from my last couple of days. I have already shared this on my national GA page, but feel that I want to share it here as well because you all have meant and mean so much to me.

I haven´t been feeling all that great lately, but I haven´t been able to put the finger on why, which has been truly irritating and confusing, because I ought to be feeling good. I don´t even have a mess in my apartment so that I could blame that for me not feeling alright.

It all escalated on friday when I found out that again I had no babysitter and wouldn´t be able to attend my GA meeting on saturday. I began to think things like "I want to gamble, because winning would make me feel good for a moment". Thinking things like "perhaps I am not a cg after all". Or "Perhaps I can just gamble a little bit". These thoughts are so dangerous.

I know on a rational level that gambling isn´t for me: I am a cg. I know that I am so compulsive that if I begin again, I won´t be able to stop until I have lost everything again; including the money for all my bills, rent and so on. And even worse, the game would creep into every minute of my existence, even when I wouldnt be sitting in front of my computer. I wouldn´t be doing any cleaning, not doing any cooking, I wouldnt be singing goodnightsongs or reading goodnightstories for my daughter. I would even stop seeing and hearing my daughter and she would be on her own again, with only the shell of her mother hanging around. I wouldn´t be able to see my friends, and if I saw them, I would be so uneasy and blocked off emotionally, that I would just sit and try to think up excuses, so that I could excuse myself and return back home to my computer. I wouldn´t be able to open any bills, and they would just continue to grow in piles in every draw in my apartment. Finally they would shut down my electricity and I would get evicted.

And then finally I would be forced to stop the chasing, because at that point I would have lost EVERYTHING and there would be no possibility what so ever to keep chasing anything. At that point I don´t think I could find the strength again to meet the shame, yet again, and face reality and try to crawl back up above the surface again. I don´t think I would be able to ever see my friends and my family in their eyes again. And my daughters trust for me would be even more damaged, perhaps irreparable this time around, and how much does a child manage to carry on her shoulders? How much do I manage to carry on mine? Not that much. And this is what I have to keep reminding myself of when those deceiving thoughts appear. Gambling is not for me.

Finally and fortunately paths opened up and I was able to go to my meeting after all. And on the meeting I received my 90 days off gambling medal. There were also two people who came back after relapses. Our subject of the meeting became relapsing. I am so grateful I had the option to go there.

I have flaws and weaknesses, pretty many, besides from gambling not being for me. Some of these I can work with, to become a better person. Some of these I just have to accept that they are always going to be there. HOWEVER I am still a good person. And if I, one day at a time, chose to act, from what I can handle, not trying to be more than I am, if I refuse to fall back into false beliefsystems like alone is strong, or that I have to manage on my own, then I believe this is going work out fine.

I came to realise that to look at myself, to question myself and my acts, doesn´t need to mean feelings of guilt and shame. Guilt and shame have a paralysing effect and closes things in. To see and accept without shame and guilt, somehow means a way of letting go, and there within lies the Power of change. Or like with gambling, the Power to chose not to. Responsibility is not to keep beating on yourself. Responsibility is to have the courage to see, and when is possible, to do differently. Somehow. I don´t know if I find the right words, but this is what it feels like to me.

Through chosing not to be alone I managed to come out on the right side this time around. Thank You for giving me that oppurtunity.

With warmth
Paula
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#2
Thank you for your time and care, and thanks to all who over and over chooses to be a part and makes the existance of GA possible.
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#3
Hi Paula,thank you so much for sharing your story,I am grateful to the most high for discovering the GA rooms which has kept me in remission since FEBRUARY to this day.
I have walked 26 miles round trip to the meeting as I was left broke through gambling.Now can see a lot of people suffering from this illness and I wish I could come out with an invention to make fellow compulsive gamblers aware of their predicament.
I am free of gambling ,but I have to go for my weekly dose and that is the GA meeting.
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