Crashing from the gambling high

A whiff of memory is all it takes or a passing gust of anticipation to invoke an appetite for gambling — in as little as 48 hours after a (destructive) bender.

Is there any other kind?

Amnesia is a marvelous phenomenon. It helps us forget temporarily horrible actions we inflict upon ourselves as gamblers.

It enables us to way way overspend, to forgo families, friends, sleep, nutrition, jobs, responsibilities, creative time, rest and more for another shot at playing.

Amnesia? Or denial? One in the same for gamblers.

Two days ago I went on a binge. What made this one destructive wasn’t the amount of my withdrawals, comparatively, rather the tidy sums in jackpots that I gave back to the casino: Because I wanted to keep playing rather than listen to the voice of reason that told me to leave while I was really ahead and think of all the good that money could do, like pay for imminent car repairs or rent.

Gambling is eviscerating to the self.

Then, the bloody sliced-up flesh sloooooowly starts sealing, scabbing and scarring itself with time.

Even the briefest passage of time is all it sometimes take for the demented gambler to return to the scene of the crime.

Earlier today I was tidying up my studio, doing laundry — task-y stuff that I really love.

Out of nowhere blasted this rush of desire to be at the slots anticipating … optimistic … the old crap from just 2 days ago behind me and “forgotten” … spinning wheels and betting big because the bigger the bet, the greater the rush.

That blast of desire didn’t include Big Winnings or dollar amounts, be they in wins or losses.

Rather, there was this rush of anticipation like a kid feels around Christmas. Completely outta nowhere, while doing housework!

A whiff of memory — of the casino environment, favorite slots, perpetual night, a womb of sensual pleasures, decadence and excitements … a gust of anticipation can be all it takes to compel me back to the casino … in as little as 48 hours after a bender that wrought self-punishment, loathing, hatred, frustrations, almighty unforgivenesses.

Any reasoning person would ask: Why do I do it?

There IS no reason to addiction and compulsion and relentless adherence to that which destroys. Addiction is immune to reason. That’s part of what gives addiction its unrelenting hold. Like the jaws of death, rather than Jaws of Life.

I felt that blast of desire to be at the slots, anticipation, optimism, “forgetting” the wreckage of merely 48 hours ago.

The power of denial … the power of self-induced amnesia … the power of compartmentalizing do me no good with gambling.

I didn’t act on that blast. This time. I noted it and continued with my tasks — which are inherently far more productive and positive than a 15-minute drive to a casino would be!

Dealing with urges is part of recovery. “Recovery.”

Does a gambler ever truly recover? I suspect not. One can’t remove the compulsion/addiction, only arrest it.

Shit. The price we — I — pay for being unable (or unwilling) to gamble within reason and temperance. “Recovery” truly is an All or Nothing endeavor.

Ticks me off that I pushed my passion for slots so far that I can only deprive myself entirely if I’m to live a “normal and healthy life” (ha! was never the case regardless of gambling!).

The early weaning away from slots / gambling is often the hardest part initially of “going clean.”

Anybody who thinks gambling’s not a drug is ignorant, uninformed, sadly and profoundly unaware, blind. For me, for gamblers, it’s as much a drug as cocaine snorted or meth shot into a vein.  Different effects, obviously, but as real a high — and crash.

Crawling through the crash is part of recovering sanity, restoring balance, ultimately honoring and respecting the self enough to NOT engage in destructive actions.

I’m nowhere near there. Baby steps precede adult steps. Feeling that sudden urge earlier and not acting on it is baby step sufficient for now.

From Road Sign to Slots in Mere Seconds

I gambled again.

Yesterday, after four days of seeking to stop. Talk about a short-lived recovery.

The gambling, it wasn’t even planned or on the mind particularly. No urges — or fighting them — or need to escape reality that so often demands a trip to the casino, come hell or high water.

It’s that I simply drove past a casino.

Repeat: I. Simply. Drove. Past. A. Casino.

That’s all it took. That and feeling chipper after an afternoon playing fun Bunco and a little wine.

Was driving along the interstate in an unfamiliar part of the city. Didn’t even know there was a casino nearby. Then I saw the exit sign. Wild Horse. “Hey, isn’t that that casino?” The tall structure off to my right confirmed.

I took the exit. Casino right off the freeway — how convenient. Found a parking spot. Entered the casino. Just like that. So simple. So quickly. So easily. So deadly.

One small withdrawal and one large cash advance and I was good to go for a while. Won three small jackpots, boom boom boom. By small, I mean for high-roller bets but still happily received to keep me in the game.

Because as winnings that are returned to the slots remind me every time, I’m not there to WIN. I’m there to PLAY. To GAMBLE. To take the risk of a big one. Come hell or high water. Come wins come losses.

And hour or so later, all my money — mine and the house’s — was gone. Three $1 bills remained in my wallet. Well, that was SOMETHING.

Even those disappeared as I walked toward the exit. A machine catches my eye then boom, bye-bye anything left in the wallet. Playing lowly 25-cent bets, no less! Terribly unexciting. Especially after betting at the Big Slots in amounts I cannot bring myself to write.

Good wins, big losses. All because I DROVE PAST A CASINO. And had nothing better or else to do, aka the Boredom Factor that’s immensely fed my gambling.

I intended to write about self-esteem in relation to gambling (addictions generally) but will back-burner that as suddenly am not so inclined for that contemplative post.

For now, just want to say that stopping gambling is one of the hardest things in my lifetime. I try. I fail. I try. I fail. I try and try. And fail and fail.

I’m also stunned at how LITTLE it takes to poke that bear who escorts me into the casino, to the ATM, to the cashier, into the high-roller slots (much preferred over the general slots floor).

Even when I’m not upset or feeling an urge or compulsion to gamble. I can feel as cool as a cucumber, calm, rested, happy even and BOOM! Without contemplation or planning, I’m walking through those doors in the cool dark womb of bright lights and chiming bells and colorful screens in a sea across the floors.

Ohhh the sensualities of a casino, I do love those!

Back to square 1 of trying to stop. For the umpteenth time.

I wonder how many of us gamblers get so fucking damn sick of trying and failing that we quit trying at all, go hog wild, destroy our lives irrevocably and die, if not physically, then in all other ways across life’s categories.

Will I ever really stop doing something I really love that’s also terribly self-destructive?

Such a disappointment to my self am I. A failure. A loser, in the true sense of the gambling word. Fuck me, man, fuck me.

Rampaging through slots & sums

I’m the biggest piece of sh*t alive.

On second thought, O.J. Simpson’s bigger. And any person who’s done bad things to children and animals.

So I’m the biggest POS who’s basically a good decent person.

Last night I went on a bender. The biggest and most expensive bender ever in years of gambling. I dare not write the figure even in my journal. I’m that disgusted with myself and sickened.

Thing is, there was no fire in my belly, no particular compulsion, emotion or state of mind that took me to the slots.

Only two light beers. Then I detachedly observed my THINKING process morph from sane and rational to gambling.

Even after deciding the night prior — a night of pricey losses — to quit and restart recovery.

My recovery in the past months resembles a revolving door! In out in out. Sometimes 1-3 days clean at a time. Once recently I went a week. Then I blew it — plus a LOT of money.

But last night … the worst ever. I kept playing one particularly favorite machine (“The Bees”) despite that it wasn’t paying off. It was cold, man.

Yet I kept hitting Max Bet over and over and over and over, waiting for the tide to turn, convinced that it would. It had to.

Bye-bye big bills. Then back to the cashier for another big withdrawal. Over and over, 5 times, ’til I could take out no more.

I was destroying my finances. Destroying my foundation. Ruining my security and my self.

And I DID NOT CARE. That’s one scary place to be.

“This is my last night. I’m ALL IN. The last big hurrah,” I told the friendly floor attendant.

I might as well’ve looped an iron block around my ankle and jumped into the sea — an old method favored by gangsters to “disappear” someone.

Why live only to destroy my self?

I felt sick, sick as a poisoned dog, when I left the casino around 1 a.m.

I’d NEVER gambled that much in my lifetime … AND I couldn’t stop. I recognized the damage I was inflicting; thankfully my mind wasn’t clouded by alcohol.

But I didn’t fucking care. And to pour all that money into the slots, particularly one THAT WASN’T EVEN PAYING OFF! …. a machine that any rational or reasoning person would’ve walked away from after several spins!

But ohhhhh, no, not I!!!

I was like the jilted lover, clenched, clinging to that lover ferociously, my attention relentless, unyielding, high-intensity focused.

That intense laser focus is my nature; it is gift and curse.

So yesterday I rampaged through the slots, figuratively. I destroyed my finances IN A VERY BIG WAY. A Very Real Way. A Most Intimate Way.

And while I recognized it at the time, I had NO intention of stopping. The rampage continued until some outer circumstance (i.e., withdrawal limit) put the brakes on. I couldn’t save myself from myself. It took an outside force. How pathetic is that?

I wouldn’t … couldn’t stop despite some rational awareness of JUST HOW MUCH DAMAGE I WAS DOING. No fucking way. I’d rather destroy myself — let myself be destroyed from within — than face the destroyer within.

I don’t have the “courage” to die over it.

However, every cell is REEKING of punishment. Hatred. Unforgiveness. Beatings bloodier than any mafia don could inflict.

I am that good, that desiring and that deserving of harm. Brutal self-inflicted harm. I deserve nothing but pain. I deserve only pain and punishment. Huge piece of sh*t that I am.

For gambling when I promised myself I wouldn’t — a mere 24 hours prior.

For destroying finances and foundation. For throwing away sooooo much money that could’ve — SHOULD’VE — gone to much better use than slots! Like rent!

I am a POS because in this dark dark place, no light can enter. Just the suffocating stench of pooh. That is me, the gambler, the person, the punisher of self and source of my destruction.

I don’t deserve life. That is all I’ve to say and is left to say for now.

 

Gambling is my love, do or die.

Breaking up is hard to do. Even when that which you love is destroying you.

My love affair with gambling — the slots, solely — is one of the most intense of my lifetime.

In one way, it is a simple passionate love affair. No human being on the other end to muck up matters. No human emotions of the other to have to deal with, fight off or survive. No complications of another human and his/her baggage.

It is simply me and the machines and the act of gambling itself.

It doesn’t get any better than that!

Being a loner and more powerfully inherently verrrrry different from most people to begin with are perfect fodder for the sport of gambling. Being with slot machines for hours is WAY WAY WAY easier than being around people for the same amount of time!

Long as there’s money, I can gamble for 5, 10, 15 hours at a time. When I was younger, I could gamble 24 hours straight “no problem-o.” Lack of sleep – pffffshaw! No food – big fucking deal.

Having to break for peeing — you can’t fight Mother Nature — that’d piss me off, no pun intended. Everything else in basic body needs didn’t matter, were quickly cast aside while I was submerged in the sea of slots.

I am still like that though at age 60, those all-nighters are harder to pull off and the recovery time, 3-4 days, is much harder than in my younger days.

Still. With slots and gambling, I jump in full on with both feet. If the water’s frigid, doesn’t matter. Still or stormy, doesn’t matter. Only thing that keeps me outta that sea of slots is not having money.

Were that I felt this boundless all-in passion for something else in my life! Or, even better, something POSITIVE in my life!

I don’t know what that would be at this age! With eras of “youthful indiscretions” and abundant wild ways behind me, at 60, I ask: What excites me now.

I’m tired. I’m old (or certainly no spring chicken at the very least!).

Gambling rocks my world — like past lovers but different, obviously. A love affair with machines, rather than individuals, is a whole other universe.  It is so much simpler. Until I run out of money.

I had a lover once. He was violent. I got hit. That wasn’t unfamiliar. Love and physical abuses went hand in hand since my childhood.

It was a very passionate relationship and NOT A HEALTHY ONE. I learned and grew my way out of it in time.

My love of gambling is a lot like that. Destructive, ultimately, but oh so pleasurable.

I can’t help wondering what role my relationship with my father (bless him), the underlying violence and destructiveness and such, have in my gambling. My attraction to it and ability to “withstand” its terrible destructiveness. I’m certain my childhood primed me for it. Not fated me unto gambling. Primed me.

Ultimately, it was my head and feet that led me through the casino doors. Free will.

Even though as any addict will tell you, there is no feeling of free. Our poison controls us, not the other way around! — when the addiction is active.

There’s a saying in gambling recovery groups when you’re clean — or trying to be. “My addiction’s in the parking lot doing push-ups.”

It is always there. Waiting to take you into the casino and take you down.

So true it is. So very true.

Stopping gambling is losing something I love. I have to be willing to process that, endure that, willfully remove myself from the act of gambling that is my passion for … something else, a life that doesn’t include it.

How willing am I? Not in head but in heart.

This is the question into day 2 — approaching 48 hours without gambling. Gambling is my love, through thick or thin, do or die, heaven or hell.

That is one ferocious bone that dog’s holding onto! Can I coax that bone from his mouth? This is the mission, should I really choose to accept it. Bidding goodbye to my love … not gambling is grief.

 

 

 

 

When (metaphorical) bulletproof vests are required in GA

It happened.

For the first time in nearly 4-1/2 years of recovery, in sum. {That is, 3 years clean, went back out, came back into GA, now approaching 1-1/2 years clean.}

A group member crossed the line. During a meeting. In front of some 15 recovering addicts.

Whether 15 or 1, the number doesn’t matter.

Nancy (not her real name) crossed a line.

Under the guise of “offering a comment” to a share, she verbally attacked another member.

That member was me.

I won’t repeat what she said. Neither will I write the content of my share. I shall write only that it was deeply personal, intimate and of the heart share. It was a share about turmoil, uncertainties and losses in my present life.

After getting approval from the meeting’s facilitator to comment (since it was a share/no-comments meeting), she turned to me from her seat some distance away in the semi-circle and, aiming straight for the jugular, launched a cruel verbal missile.

I was stunned. Shocked. Taken aback. Everyone in the room, I reckon, was taken aback.

And no one said a thing.

As it happened (and conveniently for Nancy), the meeting was closing anyhow.

I left the room with a hole made by a verbal mortar through my belly.

It wasn’t what she said — though of course it was that too. It wasn’t that what she said is untrue.

It’s the way she said it. Vicious. Attacking.

It’s that she said it at all.

I pressed my metaphorical palms against my belly to halt the bleeding and keep the guts she’d eviscerated from pouring onto the floor.

No one said a damn thing. To her. Not even the facilitator, who immediately recognized her act as wrong.

Fortunately, a couple GA members were available to go out for a bite (as we sometimes do after a meeting, just the 3 of us). We spoke privately about what had transpired.  They shared that their jaws dropped at Nancy’s comment. They agreed it was an attack and that she was out of line.

Yet no one said a thing when it happened.

If I’d witnessed her attacking another member, I would’ve been tempted to sail across the room and pound her some! I’m protective that way.

I feel that the GA rooms are sacred spaces. Anyone who violates the sanctity of the meetings and sacred spaces would be banned from attending any meeting.

Nancy did more than violate the code about selfish commentary; earlier in the same meeting, she’d given her personal advice to another member, a big no-no.

She did more than violate the sacredness of the circle.

She made the meetings unsafe.

It’s taken me more than a month to process what happened. During that time, I’ve learned that she was talked to by two “leaders.”

I found it disturbing — but not surprising — that upon being spoken to by one of those leaders, Nancy said she was “proud” of that comment.

One: Ouuuuuchhhh!

Two: What the fuck?!?!

Three: That speaks volumes about her.

I’ve seen Nancy since — once, at a meeting. I actually rose and changed chairs to put as much distance between her and me as seating permitted.

It appears she’s since left the recovery house and returned to her home state. Good riddance.

Yet the damage was done and it remains.

 

I no longer feel safe in the GA rooms. That’s not directed toward any one particular member (now that Nancy is gone).

She brought harm to the room. She brought danger. She brought risk. She brought cruelty.

Without safety  — the safety to express what is in our hearts, to share our successes, insights, troubles and struggles — there is no purpose to GA.

GA is supposed to be about recovery. And recovery requires first and foremost two things. Safety. And sanctity of space.

Nancy violated both.

And I am struggling. Struggling to continue going to the meetings.

I’ve been to some meetings (free of Nancy) since. I very rarely share. And when I do, it’s more from the head than the heart. The experience of being vulnerable and attacked is raw; the risk of self-exposure dangerous.

That’s all I have to say today.

 

When GA meetings make you want to gamble …

It happens. It’s happened before. It’s happening today. And it will happen again.

It is when a GA meeting makes me want to gamble. And/or when the (so-called) fellowship dinner at the treatment house makes me want to gamble.

Today, it is both. Rather, would have been both had I gone to the dinner following the meeting.

It was not a good meeting. Not for me. It was for others. The main reason is that a good deal of the shares, input, comments were directed to one person. I am not minimizing her current trouble and story. Rather, I cringe at the enormous amount of time devoted to her. The heapings of support from her friends within the group

They consume precious time. And they remind me that I’m an outsider. Even within my family of GA.

My group is an odd mix of tight cliques and transients by virtue of the treatment house in the area. I am not a member of the cliques, neither am I a transient. I live here, work here (for what that’s worth) and am basically trying to have a life here that is better than the lives of my past.

Many is the occasion, sometimes within meetings but more often at the “fellowship” dinners that follow, where I’m the lone wolf, excluded from conversations, even though I am present and attentively listening. The women are the worst at excluding; however, some men do it too.

Either one of two scenarios occur, depending on the composition. One, I’m sitting there, very present, very attentive and very listening to the others as they talk and none includes me in the conversation. Hell, most of the time, they hardly even make eye contact, they’re so wrapped up with one another!

Again, primarily — but not exclusively — this scenario occurs with the women.

I’m invisible.

The second common scenario is when I’m lucky enough to engage one person, two at most, in a one-in-one conversation and that person talks my ear off. Yak yak yak yak yak. I’m a Giant Walking Ear. A verrry good listener. I don’t just nod and say “yes.” I listen actively. Ask questions. Show interest. Probe. I’m psychologist – therapist – writer – reporter – caring and curious human being all wrapped up in one.

Unfortunately, for me, the same interest is not returned. I can listen for an hour and when the person finishes or the conversation comes to an end for one reason or another, h/she knows little to nothing about me. It’s not a dialogue we’ve had but a monologue … with one speaker and one listener. I could set a mannequin in my seat for as much as the other party knows — or doesn’t know — about me!

I’m invisible.

Invisible and isolated.

These are huge huge huge triggers for me. They are huge huge huge reasons that I gambled and sometimes still want to gamble.

Particular social configurations are worse than others. But “when the gang’s all here” is when I am at my worst. Feeling my worst. I know no one will listen to me or show interest. They show interest only in one another. Their bonds and friendships remind me that I’m on the outside. Looking in.

I’ve never been invited to their parties, lunches, get-togethers and whatever else they do. I’ve never even been asked.

I’ve never been a “joiner.” But I am a person and as a person on the outside, it’d be nice … just to be asked. Even if I can’t attend. Just to be asked.

The stressors in my life are swallowing me up. I do not need the added stress of sitting at a dinner (or in a meeting like tonight’s) with glaring reminders that I don’t matter. That I’m invisible. That people aren’t interested in knowing me, only talking about themselves.

I don’t need the reminder that all the great stuff that I have to offer and am goes for naught. Goes undiscovered. Because no one’s taken the time to get to know me.

I barely got out of the meeting without crying. As they drove to the house for “fellowship” — put in quotes because fellowship by its meaning is inclusive and I am definitely not included, not truly — I had a very strong urge to go to the casino. Not to gamble but rather simply sit there and be entertained by the machines played by others and to drink beer.

But I feared where that might lead … not tonight, but someday. So instead, I went over to Panera for a bite and coffee and company. With my laptop.

It makes for better company than the cliques in GA.

That’s all I’ve got stomach to say tonight.

Even mock gambling is its madness for the addict

I didn’t gamble — but, rather, feel like I did.

I have a job that doesn’t ask a whole lot — or enough — of me. I love my work; if and when opportunity to take on more  learning, skills and knowledge presents itself, I’ll grab the bull by the horns!

In the meantime, I have a lot of downtime as I work (akin to being a nighttime security guard, which I’m not). Since I work in the presence of no one except a cat, the quiet alone time is significant.

How does this relate to gambling– or mock gambling, in this case? Oh, it very much does.

To pass the time, I browse the Net and play the occasional game (free apps). Along that course I discovered free gambling apps.

I must preface by saying that I am a casinos gambler. Online gambling has never interested me. In fact, the idea bores me silly.

I’m all about the casinos and their slots. The lights, the smells, the sounds. The womb-like environment where it’s perpetually night. (As a deep nocturnal creature, I especially love that.) The pulse of a casino cannot be replicated on a computer at home.

For the record, any forms of gambling other than slots, for example sports betting, horse races, tables, lotto tickets, again, no appeal. I’m fortunate in the sense that it’s casinos and slots or nothing. In a weird twisted way, that somehow mitigated the damage — even if only by a yardstick.

It’s important that that be said. Online gambling with real money holds no lure.

As I mentioned, the long alone quiet hours and boredom “inspired” me to try out gambling apps. I’ve never paid for any app, neither have I succumbed to invitations to pay for more game time, extra moves, candy-crush blasters or — in this case — slots coinage.

Once the freebies run out, I’m out. Done. Sometimes I delete the app. Sometimes I return the next day for a refreshed batch of freebie coins, usually after four hours.

I made a poignant and pointed discovery last night in the throes of sampling various gaming apps. They give you a mountain of free credits (and they really are free) and usually big winnings. At the beginning. Whopper wins even!

And even though there’s no actual money involved (for me), I’m right back at it. Pushing the max bet on the mock slots button like I used to. There is no small potatoes for me in gambling. Not any more.

Worse than that, my mindset slid right back into the old and (all too familiar) ways. EVEN THOUGH NO ACTUAL MONEY WAS AT STAKE!

The same anxiety. The same “points getting low. need a bonus round! need a bonus round!” The same thrill and pleasure on a win or free spins. The same desperation. The same inability to stop. Or rather, not WANTING to stop.

Again, NO ACTUAL MONEY INVOLVED! No risk whatsoever to my wallet or bank account. And yet, I found myself right back where I used to be when I was gambling for real.

I found myself riding the highs and suffering through the lows. Equally badly, I also found myself staying up into the wee hours just to keep playing. I was up ’til 5:30 in the freakin’ morning! For me, about 2 to 2-1/2 hours past my bedtime so not as late as it’d be for most people. Still. Not good for me.

When I exhausted one app, I’d find another. For hours that went on! I dared not look out the window to see whether dawn was breaking yet!

It is, I discovered, the true meaning and nature of compulsion and obsession —–> addiction, ultimately. You want to stop. But you can’t. You lose sleep. So what.

I didn’t lose a single cent last night — rather, this morning. Neither did my hours of “entertainment” trigger an urge to go to a casino and gamble for real. I’m sure there are reasons for that that will come clearer once I’ve regained sleep.

What last night did do was reveal things about myself — and within a safe and sane environment, my residence, free of all the enticements and enchantments of casinos. I have the mind of a gambler. I cannot gamble small potatoes just for fun and entertainment even when those potatoes are freebie credits in an app.

I have to risk big. I have to play big. I have to gamble big. I have to go for the gold. And if I fail, I’ll keep wanting, keep trying, keep pushing in this case a mock spin button in the hope that fortunes will turn my direction.

And if I do win big — in one case, my freebie bonus credits tapped a million or more! — I’ll STILL play! And I’ll keep playing, going for more and more.

But there is no more that is enough.

Whether they be pretend or real wins, the winnings are NEVER enough!. Any gambling addict will tell you so. When I was gambling for real, if I’d won a mega-jackpot, do you think that would’ve stopped me from playing again? No.

I might’ve TOLD myself that. I might’ve thought: “Great! My money worries are over for the rest of my life. I never again have to do a job I detest for slave labor wages (father-childhood issues). I can give to causes I care about. I can give good to people I love and people in need.” And I would have — some portion of the winnings.

All that said, I guarantee that eventually, one way or another, one day or another, those jackpot millions would’ve found their way back into the casinos. I’d be playing in the big boys’ club and max bets — all the time.

Am I proud of what I did last night? Well, I don’t know that proud is relevant. It isn’t. It was a profoundly illuminating experience. I have a gambler’s mindset and response even when it’s all pretend!

In the light of my newfound understanding and self-recognition, I’ve deleted all those apps on my iPad and iPhone. Not because I feel at risk of heading to a casino. I don’t. I simply don’t need to spend hours and hours in gambling apps. I don’t need to nurture, stimulate or entice my gambler’s mind and responses. Even if it’s for free and “just for fun” and brings zero harm to my wallet.

I needed to be reminded that gambling is my addiction. My intense addiction. And it DOESN’T go away just because I’m not gambling at the casino. It’s something I have to live with — and really LEARN to live with — for the rest of my years.

It was an illuminating night, all right. And tonight, when I go to work, I make this commitment to myself: I will not download any free gambling-type app. I will do ANYTHING else — read, color, stare at the sleeping cat or the wall if I have to! The same stuff I’d do and do do in my life/world outside the workplace in recovery. One moment at a time. One day at a time.

 

My inner gambler is the Loch Ness monster

I wish I could become an alcoholic. I just don’t have it in me. Not in my wiring.

I’ve said that many times tongue-in-cheek. And out of the misery of a gambling addiction that has defeated me and will always defeat me if I allow it back into my life.

I do not make light of the disease of alcoholism. I’ve seen it with my own eyes, heard with with my own ears what it is. He gave me a great great gift, sharing the horrors and the truths, intimately and unabashedly. I am forever deeply and truly grateful to him. He’s been sober for some 22 years. AA saved his life just as GA saved mine.

No one outside the GA rooms knows of my gambling addiction except him. I shared it with him because we were two peas in a pod in our separate addictions. Alcohol will always be his demon and certain death just as gambling is mine.

We won’t “switch sides.” He won’t become a compulsive deranged gambler any more than I will become a compulsive deranged drinker.

When I say that I wish I could develop a drinking problem, tongue in cheek, it’s only because there is NO addiction more painful and severe for me than gambling. It is my demon and certain death. Any other addiction seems easier in comparison.

Gambling is the beast from the dark waters. The Loch Ness monster unseen but lurking deep in the psyche’s waters. It moves silently, casting no shadow because light does not reach those depths. It glides like a submarine. Sometimes it tracks me with its sonic sensors honed to precision because at those inky depths, eyesight is not useful. It tracks me like an ankle bracelet tracks a criminal for law enforcement.

Sometimes the Loch Ness seems uninterested in me. Is it because he’s not hungry? Sleeping? Resting? Hibernating? Bored and tracking others? I’ve no clue. I don’t really care to know of the habits of that creature lurking. Not yet. Not now.

I need only be aware of his presence and mindful of his expert ways of sneaking up on me. Without warning. Without precedent except in his unpredictability. Without signals or hints of any sort.

Sometimes I feel his motion. The water slightly shifting around my legs. Is it the natural flow of water in the lake? The current? Or is it the Loch Ness monster on the move? Am I on his radar screen again? Or is he simply stirring and surfing the lake’s black bottom for plants or fish or whatever else comprises his diet that isn’t me.

He’s a beastly creature, the Loch Ness monster, that gambler. He is bigger than in size, weight and volume. I am puny to him. A petite fish vs. a creature the size of 15 whales! Or more!

I feel defeated in his presence. I feel tiny. Powerless. Unable to swim fast enough to escape him or outrace him. And I’m a good swimmer! Yet no human can outrace the Loch Ness! Not even a speedboater! The Loch Ness monster’s power lies not in his SPEED but his size and weight. His girth. And for a monster, he moves very fast because he has so much girth at his disposal.

Defeated and depressed and hopeless. That’s how my gambling Loch Ness monster makes me feel. What he makes me become.

Through the power of group and fellowship in GA, I’m learning and teaching myself new skills. New skills on how to live life and experience life without going to a casino. Those skills include coping skills. Skills just to survive life when it gets me down and beats me to a pulp. I don’t wanna be mincemeat to the Loch Ness monster any longer.

I wanna be a beautiful tropical fish. With gorgeous rainbow colors and joyful and safe and swimming in turquoise island waters where there is no Loch Ness monster at all.

Recovery is work. A learning process. Sometimes hard. Sometimes smooth. Whatever the water’s current, however rough or quiet those waters, they’re best experienced without placing a bet. Without inserting a bill into the slots. The Loch Ness monster can smell that bill! And just like that make toast of me!

I mut remind myself of that when the urges strike. When I feel the water shifting ever so slightly around my legs. The Loch Ness monster is no friend of mine (or any gambler). He is trouble with a capital T. Cold. Careless. Self-preserving at any cost, including the cost of others’ lives.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.

This day. One day at a time.

high questions on a higher power

I’ve not meant to be negligent with my gambling blog. Writing and sharing in GA meetings are key to my recovery.

As is staying away from casinos and not placing a bet.

Don’t Gamble for Anything. As the book says.

Life has demanded much of me lately. Pushed me into corners where I didn’t and don’t want to be. People around me at “home” have been not nice. Long stories; here’s neither the time nor place to go into any of them.

It is, in part because of the stress, reason to reconnect to this blog by an addicted gambler in recovery.

Higher power. It came up tonight through reading of the literature and personal share(s).

It’s got me thinking.

How do I conceive of a higher power (be it mine, yours or another’s)?

Do I believe in a higher power?

Do I believe in God (whatever it means to me and here’s a hint: I’m brazenly unconventional and unreligious)?

Higher power.

I’m not speaking of those moments, rare and far between, through my life where a divine presence made itself known or interventions occurred — lifesaving interventions — that were irrefutable signatures of our maker / Maker.

Even a doubter, questioner, skeptic, debater and cynic — wow, that’s a load rolled into one person!! — could not debate the way out of spectacular events that defy logic and reason. I didn’t need to be convinced that Someone(s) or Something — a Force Greater than I — was at work in those rare episodes. I lived it. Experienced it. Saw it with my own eyes.

But — ever that “but” reflecting my doubting and debating nature — a belief or awareness or consciousness of a power greater than myself is at work in the comparatively unspectacular, even banal, day-to-day living is a hard pill for me to swallow.

What evidence was there of God when I prayed fervently for a winning slot machine or a jackpot to at the very least recoup my losses and lift me from a suicidal despair and darkness of my gambling?

What evidence was there of God or higher power when I prayed for the strength to walk away, just walk away, with at least $5 in my wallet instead of one emptied entirely?

What evidence was there of God or higher power when I pleaded for the strength to stop gambling? To NOT go to the casino this week, this day, this minute?

Where was God or my higher power when in absolute darkness and broke I could see nothing NOTHING but a yearning for one more bet. Just one more spin.

Just a little more spare change extracted from car and wallet — void of all paper bills —  so that I didn’t have to stop gambling and experience the horrific aftermath: despair, ruination, self-hatred, self-disgust, self-brutality and, ultimately, suicide that I never quite found the courage to commit. But ohhhhh the fantasies of how I’d do it never let me rest!

“I came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to a normal way of thinking and living.”

Disregarding the word “normal” — I’m really not normal in any sense of the word! – it seems that I’ve arrived at Step 2 — without even intending it!

Step 1: We admitted we were powerless over gambling and that our lives had become unmanageable.” No argument there (though I do take issue with the word ‘powerless’ and that’s a whole other topic!).

What would my higher power — if I have one — look like? (Notably in my daily life, not in the thick of a crisis that could cost me my life.)

How would it feel?

What name would it have?

Would it be male or female or androgynous or something else altogether? Like neutral divine?

And if there is a higher power, does this power know me? Personally? Is my higher power for me and here to help me, specifically, through my life?

If there’s a higher power, does it see my woes and suffering? My hopes and broken dreams? Dose my higher power want to restore to me wholeness? Hope? Visions? Dreams renewed?

What is a higher power designed and tasked to do in anyone’s life?

Guide us in becoming our better selves? Our less damaged selves? Our healing and/or healed selves? Just what exactly is the purpose of our higher selves? For if we cannot do it ourselves in this lifetime — and I was taught to do EVERYTHING myself and to need NO ONE, not even the (admittedly fucked-up) mother who gave me life? I hate that I even needed milk or feedings from her.

I have no answers, only questions. A lot of questions about the higher self. My higher self, if indeed she/he/it exists.

I guess, doubting Thomas that I am, there’s really only one way to find out since someone telling me that the higher self exists isn’t convincing. Even if that person’s someone I hold in highest respect and regard.

I’ve got to find out for myself.

The same way that I as a child had to find out for myself that that blue flame on the stovetop really is hot and does burn. No one could tell me or convince me otherwise.

I had to find out for myself and if in the process of placing my hand on that fire 100 times scar tissue formed, well, so be it! In my own way and time, I’d come to know with certainty that the flame burns that I know that I know.

Higher power.

Step 2: Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to a normal way of thinking and living.

Because “normal” is not something to which I aspire plus it means something different to everyone, I tweak that to:

Step 2: Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to a healthy way of thinking and living.

One more tweak:

Step 2: Came to trust that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to a healthy way of thinking and living.

(It’s not the first time that this writer-and-editor has tweaked, corrected, edited and improved upon parts of the GA book that are poorly or incorrectly written.)

Step 2: Came to trust that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to a healthy way of thinking and living.

Yes, I quite like that version.

I want to come to know that power. Not intellectually (though that too) but in inner knowingness. I want to come to know that there is a power greater than I — a higher power that is mine and for me, specifically, uniquely and particular to my life self and cause — in that way that I came to know that a blue flame on a stovetop really does hurt and sear the skin!!

My doubting Thomas nature will never recede; I want only for a trust in life to develop. And a relationship with my higher power is I think a key to that growth.

Wow. For someone who’s not blogged here nearly enough, guess I kinda sorta made up for it tonight! ‘Night now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

daily living

A half year of no slots! A half year of learning to live … differently.

Six months and some change, no pun intended, of no gambling.

A real achievement considering that at one time I could go no more than a week or two without gambling.

Or a day when in the peak of my gambling.

Not gambling isn’t as simple or easy as it sounds. Whether it be one day, one month, six months, six years or 60 years, recovery remains what it was that first day every gambling addict walks into Gamblers Anonymous or treatment program or any avenue of recovery:

One day at a time.

I know I speak for addicts of all kinds, be it to drugs, alcohol, gambling, sex or anything else: The thought of abstinence for the rest of one’s life is an unappealing bitch.

Is one day of not gambling better than none?  Absolutely.

A month? A year? Whatever the passage of time, no gambling is better than gambling. Even if it’s an hour, a minute, a second.

A great challenge for me in GA and indeed life itself is living in the Now.

I dwell on the past and all the CRAP I’ve done to myself. I beat myself to a pulp and punish myself no end for the smallest of blunders to the greatest of life-altering decisions that didn’t turn out well at all.

I hold my feet to the fire until they’re ashes and then still unsatisfied continue up the body to burn ankles, legs, torso and neck. Few people — and there have been some — are crueler to myself than I.

Enter: forgiveness.

I could write volumes on the effects of its lack. Not so much on the effects of its presence. I won’t. Instead, I’ll write simply that the F-word for me isn’t what you think.  It’s forgiveness.

Had I been raised in a family that knew forgiveness — at  all — would I have become a gambling addict?

Probably not.

Were I a self-forgiving person?

Probably not.

Speculate as I may about the “what if’s,” the fact remains: I am a danger to myself inside a casino in front of slot machines. A slot machine is no different to me than a glass of gin to an alcoholic. I may get out “cheaply” the first night.

But the second time … then the third … the fourth … each will be more costly than the one before. Each time at the slots will only fuel my desire to return again. Each loss and each win.

I learned this not only as a gambler but especially as a gambler who remained clean in recovery for three years. When I went back out, I didn’t start as a “newbie.” I picked up where I’d left off and then it got worse than it’d ever been.

There’s truth that any addiction is progressive. I don’t doubt for a minute that I could gamble my way into irrecoverable despair, homelessness and death.

Which makes six months of abstinence and recovery — and the very hard work it entails — very worthy of acknowledgement and celebration.

Yesterday’s meeting was small but good. It’s where I received my 6-months keychain. I accepted it in somewhat different way than I had the ones prior.

With great joy, yes, and gratitude for each and every gambler who has passed through these rooms be it once or consistently for months.

Yet I also want to keep this black 6-months keychain close — in my pocket, in my hand, beside the bed — partly in a clutching manner as if I fear I’ll go back out.

Because it’s always a possibility. ALWAYS.  No amount of recovery changes it. A year or 10 years, we’re all in the same place: today.

The Now.

It’s truly only by allowing ourselves to change that we become free — as free as any addict could be — of the compulsion and urges of addiction.

Therein lies the paradox. A gambler’s never really free. One of the best lines I’ve ever heard in the GA rooms is: While I’m in recovery, my addiction’s out in the parking lot doing pushups.

Acceptance. Coming to accept that one is an addict — that I’m an addict with a tremendous love of gambling that never abates and could be taken to self-destruction — is I think the first rule of recovery.

The GA book states Step 1: “We admitted we were powerless over gambling and that our lives had become unmanageable.”

Personally, I never cared for “powerless” simply because deep down I don’t believe we are. But in addiction, we FEEL that we are and indeed become so.

Learning to accept my unhealthy (to put it mildly!) addiction to gambling IS my first step.

Six months into recovery and I’m seeing that clearly for the first time.

Yey me for staying out of casinos during extraordinary stressful times in the home, around work — rather, lack thereof –around health issues, around specifically a recent assault in the home that evolved into a hasty relocation.

There have been incredibly hard and stressful challenges crammed into the past 1-1/2 months and still I didn’t gamble!

That is testament to the power of GA when it is practiced and to my own willingness to respond to crisis differently than through the slots.

Hasn’t been easy. Not at all! Yet oh so worth it. Six months of no gambling’s a milestone! Most of my gratitude goes to gamblers in GA. On that I’m very clear.

But I also owe myself a (rare) pat on the back. I’ve done well, especially with my feet in all them fires! I chose not to gamble, even when the urges struck. I chose to remember that it leads to the same thing: despair depression and self-destruction. Hatred of self, punishment of self and ruination of self.

Not worth the night of escape and pleasures of gambling. Not worth the return of the agonizing compulsion. Not worth a dime.