TheWilliamJacob

Third day into this now and I feel the change already. Honestly it feels like I am lying to say that, but at the same time it's my life changing. I mean I am not gaming, so I have to be doing something different, and I am. Today, I took my dog for a walk, kinda messy and muddy since the snow is just now melting. My dog got dirty so I gave him a bath. Really proud of that for some reason. I worked on modules and actually talked to my father for quite some time. I watched some NetFlix and made it out to dinner with a friend. I met his child and his girlfriend, ate dinner at a restaurant and actually hung out with him at his house. It was a good day, very productive. I got out, drove and had some social interaction, it was really good.

Forewarning: this will ramble and it will help me. Today was productive but also one of the hardest days of my life. Let's start with the morning, I woke up on time but didn't go to my first class, I watched Twitch instead. I ate breakfast, not a very healthy one but I ate nonetheless. I went to my second class of the day and sat through the whole class. I went to my third but it was canceled so I skipped the final (fourth) class of the day. So, all in all, I only went to one class for the whole day. I am a commuter so I felt like it was kinda worthless to go for one class but I went. I had my consoles in my car and I went to PawnAmerica to try and get rid of them. The place would only take the PS4 and due to my social anxiety, I was okay with just getting out of there as soon as possible. I still had an Xbox 360 and a PS3 to get rid of, I took it home and patiently waited for my friend to come over later today. He came over and he took all my monitors, every computer part and the final consoles. So now I have done what module 2 has said and get rid of the ability to play. I moved forward in the modules and I broke down when it asked me to find other things to do. I couldn't answer the questions. Luckily, my stepfather was able to sit down with me and talk with me. We talked about a lot of things but one of the biggest takeaways was me deciding to distance myself from Twitch. I have watched Twitch never endlessly for the past 6 years now and I disabled my account, set up an extension to block the website and plan to give my iPad to my younger sister to eradicate the possibility to watch it. I want to thank James Good for the recommendation of the StayFocusd extension. It really helped in this process, thank you. I got to the point in the discussion with him where I was able to write down activity possibilities and I feel like today was really a success. I am moving forward in the modules and I really hope that I can get my life back to a point where I am happy and living it to the fullest.

Yesterday, I took down my set up, I put my monitors in the closet, and I put the PC there too. I put the laptop on the table and used it only for school stuff. I found myself laying in bed for 6 hours watching Twitch. I slept until 3 PM. That day, today, I took my monitors and PC upstairs and scheduled for a friend to take them away, I cleared out all my consoles, and I will give them away tomorrow. Today, now, 8:32 PM, I have begun the transition away from video games. I will likely lose friends, I hopefully get closer to family and get into a better place in life physically, mentally and emotionally. I am thrilled I found this community and I hope to change my life for the better.

Hello, I am William. I am from St. Paul Park, Minnesota. I want to quit games because I am losing opportunities in life, it is amplifying the depressive symptoms I am feeling and I don't know how to live life without it. My main goal is to get my life back on track to a "normal" life, to be able to go outside and not feel a draw to go back inside and play video games. I want to be able to talk to people and not feel pressure to run away. I want to have passions in real life attainable things. I want to break free of the grip virtual reality is holding on to me with.