karabas

Day 64/90 | Productive hours: 6:05 | Work hours: 3:20 (105%) Sleep: 5:00am - 3:30pm I'm basically back, but with a problem: I'm now fully relapsed on videos. Not gaming videos, but I'm watching a lot about football (since the World Cup is coming up) and just random stuff here and there. I'm doing a short 24-hour trip and not taking my laptop, so hopefully that will help get off of this stupid video habit. But it's kicking my butt in terms of productivity, so it needs to stop. Productivity: Very bad. A lot of video watching. The only reason I got more work done than planned is because I stayed up 1.5 hours past my bedtime to finish up some urgent work. Cravings: None for games... too busy watching vids. Feeling: Gah Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 24 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 1 days (missed one yesterday) Extra Qur'an & Study: 25 days Personal to-do list: 20 days Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Day 60/90 | Food poisoning Day 2 | Productive hours: 4:30 | Work hours: 4:15 Day 61/90 | Food poisoning Day 3 | Productive hours: 2:25 | Work hours: 1:55 Still on a mostly soup/cracker/fruit diet, about 75% back to normal. Hoping tomorrow will be a more productive day. I've been pretty good about keeping up some work (because I need the money and because I can just do it on my laptop in bed), but I've fallen behind on most my other habits. I'm not holding myself to it - I've been super unwell - but I hope I can get back into the swing of things. I'm trying to fast today again. Ramadan is coming to an end, kinda sucks not to be fasting and generally being a lazy unproductive bum in these last nights... On the plus side, I'm getting a lot of sleep! Cravings were pretty minimal at first, but once I could go about the house without carrying around a puke bucket just in case, they kicked back in full force. It was one of those "c'mon, you're sick, it's OK to game" feelings. And maybe it is, but it's still going to prevent my brain from re-wiring into a less game-dependent state. So I'm staying away. In other news, I'm 2/3 of the way into this detox. It's crazy! I still remember my 2-week (or was it 3?) gaming binge that led me to come to these forums in the first place. If you were to tell me back then that I'd be able to go cold-turkey on games AND videos (well, OK, the videos things I kinda cheated on sometimes) for 60 days straight, I wouldn't have believed you. I seem to have survived that really hard period that a lot of people get around day 40+. Let's see if the last 30 are easier or there are more obstacles on the way.

Day 59/90 | Food poisoning Sleep: ??? I'm down with really bad food poisoning. Probably the street food I ate yesterday. Would wake up regularly to puke, although I haven't for the past 12 hours or so. Had a massive fever too, but that seems to have gone away. Nauseous to some degree at all times. Had to break my fast and won't be fasting tomorrow either. So aside from like 15 minutes of work that I had to put in, I've been bed-ridden the whole time and sleeping whenever the nausea is tolerable. Anyway, I think I'm feeling slightly better, but if this continues for another 12 hours or so, I might need to hit up the hospital.

Day 58/90 | Productive hours: 7:05 | Work hours: 3:35 (119%) Sleep: 6:00am - 2:30pm After a close call yesterday, today was a lot better. Productivity sucked - the only reason I went over my predicted hours is because I'm up way past my bedtime finishing up urgent work that couldn't wait until tomorrow. Productivity: A lot of distractions and wasting time. May be due to the fatigue. Couldn't sleep for several hours because neighbor was doing some loud construction. Cravings: Not as bad as yesterday. Still pretty strong, but it was a like a dull faraway type of craving that I could just block out. Not nearly as bad as yesterday. I think cutting out videos and the news (which is where I saw updates about games) is helping. Feeling: Very happy that today's a lot easier. I honestly don't know how I managed to stay away from games. I prayed for it the day it got really bad, so looks like it worked :) Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 22 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 22 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 22 days Personal to-do list: 19 days. (did a lot of it today, will take tomorrow off) Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan Thanks. It's easier today. Might be able to just get through it.

Day 57/90 | Productive hours: 5:00 | Work hours: 2:40 (?%) Sleep: 6:00am - 1:30pm I was *this* close to relapsing today. Didn't do it mostly because of my Mac. The thing is, you CAN play PC games on a Mac. It just takes a bit more research and effort. So I put in that research and effort. I did get some work done in the middle, so it wasn't so bad and it was pretty hard to figure it out. But it's right before my bedtime and I finally got it. And I was literally in the process of installing Fallout 1, but I was also going on these forums to post today's journal. And the first post that I saw was by a member who relapsed 15 days before the end. And God, that must feel like crap. And I realized that's what I'm doing to myself and I just said "no, not today" and I went and deleted all the apps I had to get to get PC games working on a Mac. Doesn't mean I won't repeat tomorrow. I hope not. The problem is, I know what to do now, so it's a lot easier to do. But at least in the meantime I'm not gaming and that's a win. And it's all because of these forums! Productivity: I got some stuff done. Not as much as I wanted. But hey, tomorrow's a new day... Cravings: A lot. As you can see, I almost caved in today. Feeling: Relieved that I didn't game. Super tired. Need to get sleep and finally crush it again, because I've been having very lackluster days productivity-wise. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 21 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 21 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 21 days Personal to-do list: 18 days... ish. Didn't do it today, but I'm gonna spend 60 minutes tomorrow on something I have planned, so should be OK. Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan Yeah, the problem is that you CAN plan PC games on a Mac, you just to put in more work, hence today. By the way, if you end up getting a new mouse, get a trackball. Better for you anyway (I was starting to get carpal tunnel until I got myself a trackball) and you can't play any fast-paced game with it.

Believe it or not, this post made me NOT relapse today. I'm 57 days in and I was in the process of installing a game and I saw this and I was like "man, it sucks to be so close to the goal and not make it to the end" and then it hit me that I'm doing the same. Not sure if this means I won't relapse again, but I won't do it today. So, thanks for sharing this. But on a positive note, while the 90 day thing is important, just think of the fact that you went for 75 days without gaming. Those are 75 days that your life was way better than it would've been if you didn't stop gaming. Just try to get back into the detox and play the "game" that Cam recommends: get the lowest number of relapse days and the longest number of detox days :)

Hey guys, I'm 56 days into my detox. Everything was fine up until day 40 or so. Then a new game announcement triggered me into wanting to play its predecessors form the 90s. I grew up with those games, consider them works of art as much as entertainment, and it's really occupying my mind. I've generally been avoiding videos, but I'm now watching lets plays. But because it's such an old game, nobody knows how to play it well and it's just making me want to play myself even more and do it right. The only reason I haven't relapsed yet is that these games are easy to play on PC only... and I have a Mac. But there's a way around it for Macs, so so far it's just been the hassle of doing + not wanting to lose out on 56 days of progress that's held me back. I'm feeling like that's not going to last very long. So... what do I do?

Yeah the videos are bad :( I'm really hoping the inconvenience of owning a Mac will help me hold out until day 90 at least. But it's not looking likely.

Day 56/90 | Productive hours: 3:45 | Work hours: 1:30 (41%) Sleep: 5:00am - 2:30pm Ugh. This was a crapshoot of a day. Started with me watching a soccer game (world cup is coming up and all)... had to leave the second half for a work meeting, but that was an hour down the drain. Then some stuff came up with the wife, then I got stuck in the washroom because of my health issue, and so I finally sat down to be productive past 11pm with no motivation to do so. So I just watched a bunch of videos, including lets plays... sigh. I finally forced myself to keep up my habits, but essentially this has been a relapse day. Still game-free and I intend to do get rid of the vids again (plan for that: no more phone in my office or in the bathroom), but this is pretty bad. Productivity: Pretty much none. At least I forced myself to get my habits to continue Cravings: Still watching Fallout vids. I feel like a relapse is imminent, it's just a matter of when. So far inconvenience (I need to set up a Wineskin to play it) + not wanting to lose the 56 days of progress is keeping me from doing it, but it's a close call. Definitely would've relapsed by now if I owned a PC. This is typical for me too - I start out strong and then slowly I start making small inroads (like allowing this or that) and then it grows until I get closer and closer to gaming and then I just end up gaming. *Sigh* Feeling: Disappointed and feeling like I'm going to relapse and there isn't much I can do about it. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 20 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 20 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 20 days Personal to-do list: 17 days Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Hey @JoshD, welcome back! Really glad to see you here again :) That's OK on the relapse. You'll do better next time. Even if you relapse, just aim for shorter relapses and longer periods of time without games. Also look up the 5-second rule, that might help with some things. And yeah, I know how you feel. Every single time I relapsed in the past, I'd feel like an absolute loser. I've learned to put that feeling away and just focus on getting back on track. I think the more we allow that feeling to stay, the longer the recovery is. So yeah, "I get knocked down, but I get up again, ain't nothin gonna keep me down"... Smash Mouth had it right :)

I did skip the electronics bit, but this is pretty much on point :) Been trying to quit for 10+ years, but it's been a problem for a lot longer. Enough is enough.

Welcome! Do head on over to the journals section and start one. It really helps :)

I hear you about not enjoying it. I've had this relationship with several games, but especially with Civ 6. I would play for hours and be thinking the whole time "man I don't even like this game, why am I playing?" And that's the height of idiocy because you're wasting your time and you're not even enjoying the process. So yeah. Glad you guys are doing this together, that should definitely help. Welcome to the forums. And do start your journal! It really helps in so many ways.

Day 55/90 | Productive hours: 7:15 | Work hours: 4:50 (107%) Sleep: 5:45am - 1:30pm It's a been a mixed bag. My wife was busy today so I ended up just sitting in my room and working away. I think I could've beat my work-hours prediction by an hour+ if not for my other big time waster: health. Depending on diet and/or randomness, it can take me an hour+ to use the washroom (for #1). On most days it's totally normal or within bounds (5-10 minutes). Today it was more than an hour. On the positive side, I found a fiction book I enjoy! Productivity: Fairly productive, but really need to get the phone out of my office... Cravings: Still watching Fallout let's plays. Man these guys suck at this game. So the craving to play is for real (just this one game, nothing else for the most part). Having a Mac is the only thing that's keeping away from it. Feeling: Still tired, want to keep going with the productivity and not fall into the games again. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 19 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 19 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 19 days Personal to-do list: 16 days (I'm 30 minutes over, need to take tomorrow off) Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Thanks man, useful videos. Going off of the second one, what I'm missing is a restive activity. I have a LOT of intellectually stimulating activity (I study, I'm working on my own business, I'm a freelancer so my work is in itself very stimulating and full of learning, etc). I don't have the social problem because games were never social for me (I avoided online games like the plague). My natural go to for restive (something I do when I'm feeling lazy and tired) would be reading. But the thing is, I don't like fiction that much. I like intellectually stimulating fiction that's well written (usually the classics), but once again that's not "restive". I like podcasts about skills I'm trying to learn like new languages and career-related stuff. But that's again intellectually stimulating. I tried reading a modern fiction book that everyone was hyping up and couldn't last more than a few chapters. Partially because the writing sucked. The last modern fiction I read that I enjoyed was ASOIAF series, but God knows when GRRM will come up with Winds of Winter... sigh. THAT would be a book I'd totally dig reading for fun/relaxation. Maybe that's what it is - maybe I just need to find similar books and get into them. Another thing that you might be onto is physical. I have a very sedentary life right now. My plan was to start working out after my 90 detox (and do a 90-day weight loss journal while maintaining the computer game detox), but maybe I need to expedite this. It's Ramadan now, which adds too much challenge for starting a workout regime. But there are about 10 days left and I could start something after that... Thanks for the reply. It really helped me go from "I'm doomed to relapse" to "Let's look at some solutions".

Day 54/90 | Productive hours: 5:55 | Work hours: 3:10 (79%) Sleep: 4:30am - 1:30pm Spent a lot of time with the wife today - had some family stuff come up and we were just discussing our lives and the challenges we're facing right now. It was good, therapeutic. But it also took up a bunch of time and put me in a pessimistic mood for the rest of the day. I feel like once I know I'm not going to be as productive in a particular day, I don't try as hard to stay productive and waste even more time. I worked 25 hours so far this week, and I want to be at 35, so still have more productivity efforts to go. Productivity: It was OK when I was actually doing productive stuff. Cravings: Watched some let's play vids of Fallout 1. They're all crap, nobody knows how to play this game or does something stupid like "I won't pay attention to the dialogue too much" or "let me play with an intelligence = 3 character". Destroys the whole thing and really makes me want to do it myself instead. It's a bit of a problem: I've used let's plays in the past to avoid actual gaming, but so far the thing that's preventing me from relapsing is the fact that I have a Mac. Well, thank God for that. Need to figure out a long-term solution for these cravings though. Gotta do the whole "be aware of the craving and just roll with it" thing. Feeling: Tired and want to be productive tomorrow. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 18 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 18 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 18 days Personal to-do list: 15 days (I'm 60 minutes over, need to take a few days off) Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Better on the street than on the computer :) Keep going man!

Hey man! It's been several weeks. Everything OK?

Day 53/90 | Productive hours: 9:20 | Work hours: 5:40 (119%) Sleep: 4:30 - 1:30 So I kinda relapsed today. I watched a few vids, including a game "lets play". It sucked (the lets play). I'm not going to count it because I stopped doing it pretty fast and I don't really feel like going back to it. And no games, which is the main point. I also realized that I can now recognize by feeling when I'm watching videos on purpose and when it's to waste time the way I used to before starting the detox. Overall I found that I dislike this feeling and it's a lot easier to just say no to this stuff. So that's good I guess? Otherwise today was a weird day in that my wife was busy the entire time and I ate alone. Which meant that I did some productive stuff while eating, hence the huge boost in productive hours and more work hours than predicted. Productivity: Distraction was less of a problem. I like having the phone in another room. Cravings: Semi-relapse, but I'm feeling good overall. I realized that I actually really don't like watching videos to waste time. It gives me a bad feeling now. Feeling: Want to do tomorrow well and stay away from vids and games. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 17 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 17 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 17 days Personal to-do list: 14 days (I'm 60 minutes over, need to take a few days off) Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Yeah, so I'm the super-addict who probably shouldn't be exposed to games, even in moderation. It's never worked out for me before, not in the long term. So my point is that in theory I think all games are bad for me in any amount. I know they're noy evil in and of themselves. But I don't think I should use them. And I have 10 years of a wasted life to know just how bad they are for me. But that's not how I feel about them. The way I feel about them is that they're a favorite pastime of mine. That's problem #1. Problem #2 is that I don't want to play games because I'm bored. My days are packed to the brim, I have more than enough things that I'm doing or want to do. The problem is almost all of those things are intellectually rigorous and so I need to "turn off my brain" to relax and gaming is the only satisfying thing I do that with. Not sure if this makes sense...

Day 52/90 | Productive hours: 8:35 | Work hours: 4:50 (88%) Sleep: 5:15am - 12:00pm Today was a bit of an experiment. I noticed that I don't actually track my whole day. Like I'd be up at 2, but only start tracking time at 5pm. And then I wonder, why do I only have enough time for like 6-7 hours of productive activity despite being pretty good about not wasting time. So I started tracking my time from the beginning of my day. And I realized where a lot of my time goes: random unscheduled breaks. I get "tired" of working whatever it is I'm working on and take 5 minutes off to go do something else. Sometimes it takes 5 minutes, sometimes it ends up lasting longer. I'm also realizing I'm pushing myself pretty hard. Like those 8.5 hours of productive work isn't the same as spending 8 hours at the office where you can go chat with coworkers, half-attend meetings, go get coffee, etc. Those are 8.5 hours of productive activity. When I'm studying, I don't even count bathroom breaks. So that's actually quite a lot of focus and energy output and I'm not doing much to recharge. Back when I first joined these forums, the advice I got was to spend 2 hours working on the laptop and then an hour off. I think I need to go back to that. I also need to go back to the pomodorro technique and breaking big tasks down into small ones to make them more manageable. This should help eliminate all those mini-breaks that turn into hours of wasted time. But I also need to give myself more time to relax and do stuff I enjoy. Gardening is one of those things and I've been neglecting it in Ramadan. But I feel like I need another hobby that will allow me to just turn my brain off. Something that's not physically or mentally intensive or require learning. A lot of things I enjoy doing involve some kind of intellectual stimulation, but I need something where I can just focus on doing. Maybe I just need to go to the gym, I don't know. I have that planned for once I hit 90 days of this detox. But that's once again working on myself and involves effort. I need to do something that's effortless. Kinda the way gaming is. Something to think about... Productivity: Very distracted. Got a lot done simply by having a lot of time available, but could've probably done a lot more. Cravings: Minor. This damn new Fallout game is popping up in my feeds and making them worse. Feeling: Pretty focused on solving this recent challenge. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 16 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 16 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 16 days Personal to-do list: 13 days (went 20 mins over today) Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Hey guys, I'm about 50 days into my detox and for the last 10 I've been on-and-off cravings to go back to playing games. I think the main reason I still haven't caved in is that the game I want to play is PC only and I have a Mac... so I'm holding out by luck more so than self-control. But in analyzing my feelings, I've realized my main problem: I don't actually think gaming is bad. I know a LOT of gaming is bad. And - in theory - I know that a little gaming can lead to a lot of gaming, as it has for me in the past. So while I know that it's a slippery slope and that this is how I relapse (I've been trying to quit for 10 years now), I don't actually have negative feelings against playing in moderation as a way to relax. I have very negative feelings about playing a lot, because it derails my life. And, in theory, I know that even a little bit of gaming can derail my schedule because I'm barely doing the things I want to do as it is. And because I will inevitably get sucked into games and spend more time than I want to. But I can't shake the feeling of wanting to relax from the hard work I do on myself every day with a little bit of gaming. So the question is: does this go away after the detox? And if not, any advice on fighting this?

YES! I love the attitude, I love the fact that you re-aligned your life goals, and I love the fact that you're trying something new again to deal with your issue. This is huge progress. I think you're far more aware of what the issue is now than you were when you started. So stay strong! And if you do relapse, remember that all these mistakes are just investments into an eventual success. You're clearly moving along!

Day 51/90 | Productive hours: 4:25 | Work hours: 1:40 (44%) Sleep: 5:30am - 2:00pm Seems like my fatigue is back on track. Today ended up being a crapshoot of productivity because I went to see a friend all the way across town. Spent a lot of time talking with him and then telling my wife about my conversation with him lol. Overall it's nice to have some company (I rarely hang out with people), but I just gotta be better at estimating how much time this is going to eat up. Productivity: Once I got to work, it was good. Cravings: I did some gardening today and I think it helped overall. Still have the urge to play Fallout. The main problem is that because I like the game so much (and I consider it an actual masterpiece, not just a fun game), I don't find a negative feeling associated with it in my head. Like if I had cravings to play Civ or some other strategy game, I'd say "man, what a stupid waste of time". But Fallout is special. *sigh* Good thing I can't play any of it on a Mac. I think I would've relapsed by now otherwise. Feeling: Need to catch up on work. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 15 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 15 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 15 days Personal to-do list: 12 days Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan

Day 50/90 | Productive hours: 6:55 | Work hours: 4:10 (96%) Sleep: 5:30am - 2:30pm Still paying for that early wake-up day. Tired, groggy, and lazy overall. Somehow I managed to put in the hours I aimed for, which I think is mostly due to giving myself enough slack in estimate how much work I could do. I also am starting to spend the first couple of hours of being on awake on just mindless browsing. Not a good habit. On the plus side, 50 days! Exciting to be this far into the detox. Productivity: Ok. Wasted a lot of time browsing and reading articles online. Cravings: I had some strong gaming cravings today again. Might be the fatigue. Might be the new Fallout game that Bethesda teased. I watched like 10 minutes of a Fallout 1 Let's Play, but that just got me wanting to go do it myself since these people don't know what the heck they're doing and I grew up with that game. Another thing is that I feel like I need some "mindless entertainment". I hate the word, but I do want to just tune out. Since I'm not doing games and I'm not doing movies and I'm not doing videos, I have little left. I wonder if this is because I haven't been gardening as much upstairs. Since I only have a few hours of daylight, I often times don't catch enough free time to go up to the roof to do it. That was a good activity to get my mind off of stuff. Need to bring it back. I really don't want to relapse because my schedule is super tight as it is. I'm doing just enough to get by in terms of work and just enough of studies that I really want to do. Anything less and one of them would suffer and I'd hate for that to happen. Feeling: Pretty happy with how much I got done despite the laziness. Minor habits: Morning/evening spiritual routine: check Religious study (jurisprudence): 14 days Religious study (purification of the heart): 14 days Extra Qur'an & Study: 14 days Personal to-do list: 11 days Career-related study routine (on hold) 15 minutes of working on my business idea (on hold) Major Habit: on hold for Ramadan