Back to day one

Yep, as the title says, I have spectacularly failed. After 30 days of staying strong, being gamble free and feeling good, I've been sucked in once again. The blocks I thought I had in place didn't work and that feeling of hopelessness has once again reared its ugly head.

So I've done what I need to. The missus is away tonight, gonna have to tell her tomorrow and hope that we're able to stick together. I really think she'd be better off without me at this point, but I'm gonna do everything I can do to make it better again.

I feel I have learnt something about my triggers though. As I mentioned in my previous post, I had an argument with my girlfriend at the weekend. We have a great relationship and have only ever argued about the fact I'm pretty crappy at helping out around the house (hands up I don't do enough) and that's what this argument was basically about. But it was different this time. She was angrier, more aggressive than she has been with me before. I picked up on the resentment she has towards me because of the secrecy and the debt I have gotten myself into, and to be honest I don't blame her at all. But it reminded me of my previous relationship, which was a bad time in my life and was around the time I started gambling and first experienced gambling at levels I knew I was uncomfortable with. She would scream at me, call me every name you can imagine.  And I'm starting to think that this was why I started to gamble the way I have been. To be clear this isn't what my current relationship is like now. My girlfriend is caring, supportive and genuinely the best friend I've ever had. But when she screamed at me the way she did, I was taken back to the way I used to be made to feel on a regular basis. And from the next day, my urges to gamble had come back and I foolishly gave in to it.

This isn't a boo hoo story, far from it. One of the things I've always said is that I'm responsible for the actions I've taken. It isn't her fault at all that I've done what I've done, but I think now I understand why I've done it. I hope that will help in the future in recognising when I'm at risk of relapsing again and to be more proactive about it.

But now, it's back to day one. I'll tell her what happened tomorrow, hopefully she'll be able to forgive me. I've had so many times where I've said "never again" but my most recent abstinence had felt different and I don't think I've ever been so disappointed in myself for what I've done. This is a lesson I really need to learn from.