fawn_xoxo

Day 166. I made the right choice to detach myself from negative triggers and I'm now around two months in after that decision (not accurately documented online). The journey of self discovery and acceptance isn't by any means finished, it's still going on, and that's fine. Things I'm slightly better at accepting about myself these days? I've got a lot of feelings, I can get easily affected by a negative thought.. unless I work up the mental strength to deal with it later. This has worked for me, telling myself that I don't need to answer to anxiety in the same moment but rather allow myself a day or two before revisiting the thing in my brain, which is usually much less emotional and much more rational an approach to my thoughts. I am pretty sure, by the results of it, that the last five or seven years of my life I've been experiencing a loss or confusion of personal identity, which is why I get so anxious in this moment. Gaming blocked out every other aspect of my life and I didn't see other sides of myself for years, to the point I didn't know who I really was beyond it. I'm keeping this short, as I don't want to linger too much and ruminate, it's a hard habit to drop and so anything that takes me closer to it is bad for me. I do gratitude journaling and got a night routine of relaxation nowadays, in general I have dropped the tension levels in my life significantly for the evening. Tl;dr: My mood is gradually getting better and more stable. I won't be active here since I get triggered by the struggles of other people into thinking negatively about myself because of "addict" identity.

Day 126. Tony Robbins' speech notes: Awareness is one thing, but I need to take action else nothing will change. Do I want to continue living in regret for my past, reliving memories of my failures and fearing I'll only ever be a loser? No. So I have to take different actions. I will do a cold turkey detox of negative thinking. The anxious, negative thoughts have been with me for a long while and I think, just like gaming, they have their own established neural pathways in my brain. How do I fix it? Firstly, I need to ignore any negative thought and doubt that comes in my mind with the same intolerance as the gaming ban. No allowing myself to explore negative scenarios, no trying to think of ways to fight potential negative scenarios, not giving food and more time to judgmental thoughts (if they come I will accept them and then move on like I have done with gaming urges). Secondly I will avoid contact with any online material that reminds me of my past mistakes and might trigger those negative feelings. This includes this forum, for clarity. My goal is the same as gaming detox was, 90 days. So tomorrow will be day 1. Let's do this. Might come back later to redefine things if I feel like it.

I'm in a very similar place right now Catherine. I am thinking of looking at these thoughts in the same way as gaming and making a plan on replacing them with either meaningful activities or other thoughts, in a detox way. Basically I'm thinking of following a Recognize, Let live, Move on and do something sort of approach to the negative thinking, because I feel it's been repeated so much that it's created really strong neural pathways in my brain, just like gaming, and so there's nothing else to do other than approach it in the same way. I feel like worrying has become a new "activity" of its own, and it needs to stop, but it can't stop just by saying no I don't want to think of negative things. Instead I need to just recognize when it happens and distance myself from it and move on. Maybe it will be a 90 days thing for me. I might journal about it.

Day 125. Processing my thoughts even more, I think that I'm one of those people who just aren't satisfied with what they have. Some people call it chronic dissatisfaction, others call it hedonistic adaptation, the name doesn't matter, the thing is that I am constantly looking for the negative in my life and never stopping to enjoy all the positives. I have not celebrated my weight loss so far in any way, I have not congratulated myself, I spend my free time thinking about all the things that are wrong with me, and this thinking alone only reinforces that I'm a problematic person. I've always been chasing after highs of adrenaline and the gaming addiction definitely got rooted in me because of this trait, but this is something I seriously need to work on, because in a couple of years I will need to make decisions on what I'll do after college and feeling like nothing is satisfactory enough is so misleading. Is a gratitude journal the answer? I think it needs work either way. Work, to consciously replace the thoughts about all the things I can find in me that are wrong with thoughts about the things that are right with me. The negative type of thinking has stayed with me for a long enough time that it feels like it's me, but truth is what we think about is a choice, and like everything else we can change it. Taking some notes here for future reference from resources I found about gratitude: Savor the moment - Reduces stress and negative thoughts Thank those who matter - Feel better about your life Aspire to meaningful goals - Eliminate dead-end thinking Give of yourself - Boost self-esteem Empathize with others - Improve your relationships

Day 124. I have been doing my work, attending college and everything. Had to deal with some things in my life, which are now settled and good. Have I said I got a lot of feelings? I really have a lot of feelings and a lot of thoughts that cause me feelings, and I get in my head a lot about them. Ever since I started becoming more responsible and adult, I have been plagued by overthinking. I used to just do whatever and not think of the consequences at all, then I shifted to the exact opposite and thought everything over too much. I have wondered if I can ever be happy and carefree again, without being an inconsiderate/naive/careless person. Balance, it's something that I need to aim for, neither overthinking nor not thinking at all. At this point in my life I feel like I recognize how things work in my head. I might get a thought, then if it's a negative thought, I can't let it go and I feel bad about being this negative person, about having been this person for a while, about having been through and having caused some situations in my life. This only reinforces the negative self image and I think the solution to this is to stop judging myself for my negative thoughts, ignore them when they come to me, and like with everything else, if you don't feed a certain mindset, it will die on its own. I am only a problematic person if I allow myself to give in and believe my negative thoughts. The gaming addiction and its side effects played a big role in this, making me feel bad about myself and beating myself up mentally. But if I continue this, then it is a self fulfilled prophecy as some say. When you think something, or fear something, and your mood and actions get affected by it to the degree that you end up behaving differently, making your fears a reality. If every time I think of something negative, I also judge myself for it, I achieve nothing. Sure, I can't close my eyes to the truth, I can't lie to myself and say that my thoughts aren't negative maybe half the time. But accepting that this is the way it's been so far doesn't equal agreeing that it will continue being this way in the future. I have power in the here and now, I have a choice, I choose whether to accept the identity of a loser, or ignore the negative voice in my head and do actions that match a winner. It's hard to visualize a better life when you have been thinking badly of yourself for a long time, but I also need to do this. So to summarize, I need to accept my negative thoughts when they pop up, accept that they are part of who I've been so far and they come to me naturally, but also remind myself that they don't define my present and future because the choices are up to me and the actions are mine to take. If I catch myself thinking about negative future scenarios, I need to stop that and ask myself what scenario would actually be pleasant for me and get my mind to think about the things I desire. They say you can't reach a goal you can't see, which means I need to know what satisfaction, happiness and fulfillment look like to me, in order to know what to visualize. Here comes the part where I define what I want, let's see. I want to be healthy and I want to be fit. Small pause here, cause I want to remind myself that I should not try to set goals that represent happiness, I shouldn't connect happiness with achieving a specific goal, because that's not how it works. I need to define happiness first. I know nobody can be happy every moment they are awake and I know that I am a person whose mood can vary a lot throughout the day, which is something I don't know if I have accepted yet or not, probably not. Here is when I wonder if I would still have big ups and downs in my mood if negative thinking was removed from the equation, food for thought. Anyway, happiness for me is.. feeling content with the activities I do during the day, experiencing positive emotions be they small or large scale, being somewhat creative/artsy in a practical way, being near my loved ones. With that said, my hobbies area is currently mostly empty but then again, do I need to do something under the hobbies category when I have free time to be considered normal? If I have free time, I like to watch some specific shows, but primarily I feel like spending that time with my loved ones whenever possible. I am somewhat lazy but I can also be very focused in my work, depending on whether I get in the zone or not. Sometimes I have free time but I feel like doing some work and sometimes I know I should work but I don't feel like it. It's that 'work in bursts' type of productivity, so I milk that I guess. To get back to the hobbies thing, I'm thinking of trying out a drop-in style of dance school but I haven't decided it yet. On one hand I don't like spending time alone, on the other hand I don't know enough interesting people or to the degree that is required for me to start doing activities with them. I'm very slowly building up some friendships, have met one new friend that I get along with rather well, but I'm not rushing. My social recovery is going slowly, but I don't feel like doing anything more than that right now. I guess I used to be really into groups of friends when I was younger, but right now I'm more like searching for deep and meaningful connections? I'm eccentric in a lot of things, I question a lot of things in our society and I am honest when I share my views with people. I've also been through quite a few things and people who haven't won't really fit me as friends cause they live in lalaland in a way, and I don't see the world through a pink lens, at all. All in all, I'm quite picky to be honest, and I'm fine with that, even if it really clashes with who I was when I was a teen. I guess back then I did it just to fit in, I know I wanted to fit in, and before that I only had a few friends that I valued, like 2-3 people. Maybe re-finding myself just requires me to look even farther back, to how I was before I tried to fit in. And at that point, I didn't care to be popular or anything like that, I was satisfied with my specific group of friends and that was enough for me. Didn't think I'd write so much but here it is. If you've been reading the thread, yeah, it's one of those entries. Next day: I think I'm addicted / fixated/ obsessed with trying to fix myself. Maybe it's because I've been thinking something is wrong with me for far too long, and I'm in this mindset that I never rest, I'm not satisfied with what I have achieved so far and always looking to what I haven't yet reached. I think I definitely have this thing and it holds me back from enjoying life. Is there any specific way to stop it other than just.. looking at it like a bad habit and quitting it cold turkey? I spend so much energy on the daily thinking of all the things that aren't ideal in my life, all my traits that aren't ideal.

Day 122. Gaming helped me mess some things up in my life. In AAs they ask you to go to the people you have hurt with your addiction and admit your mistakes, offer to make amends. I hurt myself during those times but I also hurt other people. Here's where I own up to that and set the goal for myself to be the strong person I should be in order to make those amends to myself and others. When it comes to others, I need humility, patience and altruism. When it comes to me, I need self love and forgiveness. My strength is coming back, slowly, gradually. It flickers at times, I lose hope for a few, but it returns again after. Today I'm grateful for the problems that I've been having to deal with, because they're teaching me ways to deal with the next ones easier and faster. I'm grateful for the people who love me despite my weaknesses. I'm grateful for awareness and mindfulness, and I'm grateful for having chances in life, still.

Bad? No. But combined with boredom from free time not spent on doing anything, you're maybe walking on the line of relapse? Change things up!

Great quote that sums up what real self esteem is. Is it from a book?

Well done so far Assellus, I just want to bring something to your attention. You are at the start of your detox, when you are supposed to have the most will power to do changes and replace your time with new activities and hobbies, but you played games for five hours. You can't expect yourself to keep track of your gaming for more than a few days. Habit will kick in, you will postpone/forget about tracking and soon enough you'll be back at square 1. Don't allow yourself so much leeway, it hasn't worked for anyone here except for relapse. Sorry not sorry to be a downer, this is what happens though.

Welcome back and good job on not giving up. Remember that nothing changes if nothing changes, meaning you have to actively seek other things, time consuming things, with goals attached to them, to take the place of gaming in your heart and mind. All the times I relapsed, and they were multiple, were because I wasn't willing to go the extra mile, get out of the house and force myself to try other activities. Doing something, anything, is better than spending your time on games. I had to start by doing things on autopilot, not caring if I enjoyed them like I enjoyed games. I'm on day 117 or so now. Boredom is always a trigger, don't allow yourself a lot of chances for it.

Day 118. I'm grateful for the quality of my relationships with loved ones. I can count on them, they can recalibrate me and tell me when I'm exaggerating in my worries or such. I'm grateful for the love and understanding I receive from them, the tolerance for my mistakes in the past, how they stuck with me even through those times. I'm grateful for having the luxury and comfort to both study and work at the same time. I'm grateful that I have the opportunity to continue something from where I left it, even if I don't have any one direction I want to follow when it's over. I'm grateful for God's impact in my life. Seek and you shall find. I'm grateful for finding ways to make dieting easier, walking has helped a lot on top of not being at home for the majority of time. I'm grateful for the weight I've reached so far and how it looks on me. I'm grateful for the nice views in my walk yesterday, the good weather and circumstances too. I'm grateful for a good night's sleep after a long walk. I'm grateful for having my whole body, all my senses and my health, to experience the world potentially fully. I'm grateful for my strengths and for my weaknesses, which make me me and have given me both advantages in life and lessons and things to work on.

Is it possible for you to work from a public place? It's helped me a lot, used to work from home only.

Day 117. I used to be a careless, carefree happy go lucky person when I was a teen. I want to be like that again, I want to be me. Happy. Energetic. Upbeat. I'm now an adult and reality, my past mistakes and everything in between has grounded me significantly. As I write this, I realize a big factor is a situation out of my control, changes that are happening in my life that trigger my fears. Situations filter through our belief system and out come emotions. I know this. These emotions are a result of me perceiving the situations I'm experiencing as something bad, and I perceive them as such because my belief system is distorted right now. At the same time I know that if I don't fix these beliefs, I will probably affect the situation towards a worse turn. Maybe the solution right now is to accept that I am fearful, and not fight my emotions or try to fix them. It's okay to fear. It's okay for things to be uncertain around me. I am not supposed to feel a certain way. I need to come up with more things in my life, even beyond college and work, so that my time isn't spent ruminating like this. It makes me more stressed and what I need is to self care and develop, not have even more expectations of myself. All in all, I get in this place of luxury of time in which I waste my time being concerned. There's no point in this, getting in my feelings just.. to be in my feelings? I need more purpose and more things that matter in my life, because just lingering on things that I have no control over doesn't do anything good in my life. Later on the same day: I think there is no way to bypass negative feelings. The only way to get over them is to experience them, accept everything, go through them. I am stressing over things that aren't universally negative, yet trying to walk away from the fears doesn't work. They need to have their time in the spotlight, to be tended to, then I can continue with my day. I'm pretty sure even if I'm in a better place self confidence wise than I was before this forum, I still have a long way to go, cause my stress is an indicator of thinking I'll not be able to deal if things get negative. The fears themselves are an indicator of my low self esteem, which also shows in my insecure attachment towards my loved ones through the years. There are so many things I can do better now that I'm games free, and it needs even more effort than I thought, but I'll do it. I don't want to need people's approval to feel like I'm good enough, I don't want to worry all the time. When I was a kid I thought I was so self confident, but really I was just feeding off the good words from loved ones and teachers. Raising my self esteem isn't an one week quick change and it needs me to change the way I see things and people around me, but only by doing things differently will I be happier. Just writing things down today helped me process everything and find the root of the issue. It's not a solution, but at least I know that I need to work on X thing now. Even later on: Saying everything out loud and getting a different perspective on things really helps. Crying it out also seems like a necessity for me when my emotions have already piled up, it takes all the negativity and pushes it out of me, until there's nothing more to cry about. I really have a lot of feelings, God damn. Everything is going to be okay.

This is your journey. I tried moderation BEFORE I committed to 90 days, thought I could make changes happen without abstinence. I couldn't, but nobody came to judge me for thinking else and nobody will judge you for trying it out even if it doesn't work out how you hope. My suggestion? Sit down and write down your newly emerged concerns since day 91 and then the benefits of 2 hours of gaming. Is it worth it for you? Can you make it so it has no negative effect on you? People who play games some times don't need timers, don't feel concerned, just like you probably don't need those things about your food portions or glasses of drinks. I experienced these concerns myself, and that's how I knew I was still an addict and it was hurting me mentally to play.

Welcome to the forums Sheldon. A tip from personal experience, after countless attempts at quitting: it only worked when I worked hard to replace the newly found free time AND committed to never playing again. It's going to be hard, changing habits and replacing them with new ones, but it's most likely you'll end up not believing how great life can be at some moments. First you have to go through the sucky parts, after you get to reap the results. Prepare for hardship and embrace it, you'll be good.

You have all the proof and facts supporting that you weren't bitten. I know that it might not be enough to put your mind at ease when the thought gets bigger and bigger inside your mind, but you have to draw a line where it's reasonable to stop worrying about things and not put more time to the thought, else it will torture you far more. It's how OCDs develop and grow, you don't want that. Good job on your progress!

Or you might just be in a loop of cognitive distortions, one of which is black and white thinking. https://psych2go.net/cognitive-distortions-how-to-challenge-it/

I'm late to the party but.. my two cents: Don't play games again. 90 days is too early. I'm only speaking from personal experience, mine and other people's here on the forums. Those 14 hours per week, those 56 hours per month, you don't need to waste them doing things that will undo the progress you've done so far. You don't need to give your brain these chemicals again, these highs, you don't need to make the routines you have established so far harder. Would you accept an alcoholic spouse going back to two drinks a day after 3 months of abstinence? Isn't your brain still addicted, when it asks you to play 2 hours per day? Isn't there more life to live for 2 hours per day? You don't need to answer any of these, but maybe consider if you have good enough answers. I played for 4, then 2 hours per day for a while. Nothing changed for the better while I was getting at least some of the surreal adrenaline hit from gaming. Things only changed when it was removed completely. Check this out?

The whole socializing thing will come back to you gradually the more you put yourself in social situations. It depends on your desires, how often you want to be in social circumstances, but that's what will define the pace of your recovery. If you got the self esteem book, you're good to go regarding confidence books, though the point is to put what you read into practice and not just read it and nod so to speak. It requires effort and actions, confidence is basically your own, fact based impression of yourself. You can correct it if it's not that good, by taking different actions. Try to look for more hobbies, or a job if you don't have one, cause the addiction will come back if boredom reigns.

You might be experiencing agoraphobia because of your gaming habits in the past, but that's nothing you can't overcome by exposing yourself to the public, one step at a time.

Day 113. Had a few tough days during the week, but the sun is up now. I am feeling positive, and it's not the first day of course, so I thought why not write down some positive things? If I hadn't given up on gaming I wouldn't have known so many things about myself. I would not be in reality, I would still be in a limbo, life passing me by. I hadn't addressed some personal issues all these years because I pushed them under the rug as I gamed. I didn't know that I was under stress, but I was, I was afraid of things and games helped me hide in my house away from phobias. This only made the phobias stronger, as the more you don't face your fears the more you're telling yourself they are a real threat. I'm not going into detail about these things, they're personal to me and vulnerable. I'm actively working on this, trying to see things objectively, trying to accept and love myself. For the most part I've forgiven? myself? I am not sure if I've forgiven myself, but there's no active guilt and regret in my mind any longer. Compared to other people my age, I'm behind professionally, I see the people in college who are younger than me and I know that when I was their age I couldn't focus on studying. But there are at least positives in being older than others in class, I'm not hesitant like I used to be, I care less about fitting in and I can pay attention to the material rather than chit chat with friends like I used to. I also am looking at college like a resource and I see the professors for what they are, people with years of experience that I can benefit from. I wasn't mature or grounded enough to see them like this when I was younger. I'm also now capable of telling whether something is in my interests or not, some classes do interest me, others not so much. I am finding a new social self. People appreciating my efforts really motivates me to work more, that's the reason I was doing so well in school before college. The professors were mostly approachable and appreciative of my efforts, whereas in college I got a metaphorical slap on the face by how little most professors cared about us students and how they disrespected us. I wasn't ready for that experience and it surely contributed to my repulsion and avoidance of college. Things have changed now, and I'm also more thick skinned myself, but I've found some good people in the professors. To go back to the social thing, I'm finding it gradually easier to talk to other students- I know these are things natural to people, talking and such, but for me it's like I need to relearn some of it. I walk a lot nowadays, I get out of the house a lot and I prefer it this way. Home is bound to awake bad eating habits in me, so being in college and working not at home has helped me greatly with the weight loss. I'm lighter than I've been in the last three to four years, and I'm continuing, I've completed 40% of my weight loss journey so far. Rediscovering the self and keeping my ears open to my inner voice is an interesting process. It's like trial and error, if it works I'm already one step further than yesterday and if it doesn't I'm just in the same point in my path. I'm trying new approaches, reconsidering everyday choices and just evaluating mostly everything that I don't feel certain is done in a me way. I don't want to rely on my loved ones for solutions, for decisions, etc, I want to stand on my own two feet and I want to stand by my beliefs. What are these? Not all are clear to me, not all my desires are known to me yet, but I'm doing my best to be open to myself and not constrain myself to a gamer identity any longer. Just cause I haven't gone exploring new locations all these years doesn't mean I'd not enjoy it in example. I'm in this process of discovery and recalibration, sometimes it's scary and some other times it's exciting. Suits my near-cyclothymic self fine. I'm also revisiting my strengths and flaws, trying to lessen my prejudices, my oversensitive nature and other weak points.

I used to work from home for years, from the same computer I gamed. Taking my work outside of the house helped me tremendously with focus, focus impossible to achieve when comfortable.

Well said. I wish I understood taking action is the only thing that can change feelings when I was sorta depressed, waiting for it to somehow reverse itself. Try to remember it and DO IT next time too!

It really depends on the person. You might be able to progress within your existing environment or you might need a total break. I personally think that taking a break from everything only looks ideal in our heads. If you're alone you will have no mom to talk to, to be hugged by if you need a hug. It might be confusing yeah, but I'd take your therapist's word and do the program for ten days. Use the afternoon and evening to process what happens 8am-3pm. Intense mental workshop style, I guess. Don't go at it alone, you're not a friend to yourself yet, my 2 cents. Your mother isn't training you to treat her badly, she's just tolerating your anger issues cause she loves you. And as far as those ideas you have that people hate you are concerned, do some cognitive distortions worksheets to realign your thoughts with reality. You need to put in the work, nobody else can fix these thinking patterns but yourself.

How will being away from everyone help? Even if you do do it, you need a plan, right? Trying to help you sort things out.