Avnat Netzer

2020-01-22: day 83 90 day detox: | ####################~ | 92.22% Complete Today: went to sleep ~12.15am woke up ~10.00am brush teeth, tea, make bed Worked from home today Activities: pray brush teeth tea make the bed compared prices on wedding bands / DJ worked a little on video game clean up Yesterday I binged on a youtube let's play. I had such an urge to get on my laptop and start playing a game. I'm not sure where this urge comes from. It started on Monday. I had the day off and thought about what it might be like to spin up a short game of something. Just a couple of hours and then I might do some work. I'm not over my 90 days so I don't want to spoil all of my effort. I have been contemplating possibly picking up gaming after 90 days but I'm hesitant because I don't know if I'm really able to game healthily yet. This week has kind of shown me that I'm not. I still managed not to pick up a game and instead satisfy myself by watching someone else on youtube but it felt a lot like a real gaming binge. Every part of me just wanted to stay glued to the screen and ignore everything else. There are a bunch of stuff that weigh on me and they're probably the main contributors to me wanting to go back to gaming so badly. I have expenses to take care of. We need to finish planning parts of this wedding which is becoming more and more difficult as the day approaches and we're trying to make a few parties happy at once. We need to find a new place to live. Work has been getting harder with a number of projects I'm juggling at once. I'm under pressure and I want to escape. But also I want to feel like I'm reaching my fullest potential and I really don't see myself that way. My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 7.30am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala go to sleep by 12.30am clean up, pajamas, tea, read Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up scala game wedding stuff

2019-12-29: day 59 90 day detox: | ##############~~~~~ | 65.56% Complete Today: went to sleep ~12.20am ? woke up ~8.45am brush teeth, breakfast + tea, make bed Sunday, lot's of stuff to do Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up Hung out with my fiance's family and, later on, our friends I have a cold and feel awful. Last night I hardly slept. Woke up at 3 all stuffed up and tried to read to help shut down my brain. My fiance is also sick and I think I picked it up from her but it's hard to tell since a lot people seem to be suffering from some kind of cold. Today was full of planned activities and all I wanted to do was stay at home and relax and hope to wait out this cold. Our friends had a baby recently and were having a party for them this morning. We had to miss it though since we're both not feeling well. But we did end up going to see her family and later go to another friend's memorial service for their child who passed away. Last night had such an urge to start up a campaign on Attila total war. A new mod came out that I was waiting for a while for and is the reason I even got the game, on sale of course. Started to watch a video on youtube about it and imagined myself picking up the game again. Even only playing it for an hour or so at night if there wasn't much else going on. I know that this is not how it's actually going to go down. I want to be able to play games one day without them taking over my life. It's hard to say if I really have changed much since quitting games almost two months ago. This is definitely the longest I've gone without playing anything. In that time I've increased my reliance on youtube for numbing distractions. I generally stay away from netflix because that has quickly turned into entire season binge sessions. But I've also spent more time with friends. I've been reading more and getting invested in side projects. My days feel longer and fuller. My sleep has improved slightly but not dramatically like I had hoped. Even so games have been the best way for me to escape the daily stresses and anxieties and they are still my favorite way to gain a sense of accomplishment. I just also know that these are just illusions and have been the source of some of the biggest struggles I have today. My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 7.30am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala go to sleep by 12.30am clean up, pajamas, tea Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up scala game wedding stuff

2019-12-12: day 42 90 day detox: | #########~~~~~~~~~~ | 46.7% Complete Today: went to sleep ~1.45am ? woke up ~7.45am brush teeth, breakfast + tea, make bed worked from home Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up completed coding assessment! I completed that coding assessment from yesterday that I bombed. It was bothering me all last night and I so badly wanted to go back and do it again. I had three tries in total and I only consumed one. But I stopped myself because I knew I was getting obsessive about it and that my second try wouldn't be much better than my first. This morning when I woke up I did my daily routine and then rushed to my computer. Sat down and took the test. I've always been bad at timed tests because I get so nervous and sometimes my mind get's tied around the question. This time however I completed them within the time. One of them was super easy and the other one slightly harder and I was really close to missing the trick to solving it. I hit submit and was glowing with triumph afterwards when I saw the 100% score! I need this kind of reassurance because I'm still not sure whether or not I have progressed as far as I could have as a programmer. I'm worried I might be much slower than my peers. The test itself said that the average time is 40minutes... and it took me an hour to complete 2 questions. Tonight my fiance came home from work and we walked to pick up groceries. I made smoky black bean soup for dinner and she made a few phone calls. It's a new recipe and wanted to try it out. Had to substitute a couple of ingredients because I forgot to get them at the super market but it came out almost the way I wanted it. My fiance said she loved it which makes me happy. My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 7.30am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala go to sleep by 12.30am clean up, pajamas, tea Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up scala

2019-12-11: day 41 90 day detox: | #########~~~~~~~~~~ | 45.6% Complete Today: went to sleep ~2.45am ? ? read lord of the rings woke up ~8.10am brush teeth, breakfast + tea, make bed had a phone interview around 10am worked from home Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up phone interview Went to sleep late and woke up at the usual time. My fitbit recorded less than 5 hours of sleep... yikes. And I felt it when I tried waking up this morning but the day isn't going to wait for me just because I can't keep a healthy sleep schedule. Had a phone interview with a company that might be looking to hire me as a mid level engineer. More pay more responsibility and power over the software. It's exciting stuff. The interview went really well and I was patting myself on the back for how much experience I've gained to reach this point where I'm interviewing for higher positions. But then I tried to take a kind of coding assessment to get a small badge as part of the job searching platform I'm using but I absolutely bombed it. I felt so frustrated after because it was just 2 questions and I had over an hour to complete them. The questions themselves were pretty typical programming problems. One had to do with substring lengths and the other was about matching braces in a sentence. I knew I could have completed both of them eventually but this test was timed and I can't believe for routine problems like these I had so much trouble with them. I only got around to writing code for one of the problems also. It's frustrating because I've been programming for a while and now I want to transition into a mid level position and I feel like my proficiency in coding should already be at this point where simple problems are solvable and I'm scared I haven't attained the expertise that my resume suggests I have. I can take the test a couple more times and even thought about doing it again tonight but I was afraid I would start to over obsess about it and then not get any sleep. As it is my mind is already racing and thinking about why it was so difficult. I will try again but now I'm uncertain. My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 7.30am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala go to sleep by 12.30am read Lord of the Rings before bed Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up scala wedding stuff

@BooksandTrees whoa that's fantastic Yeah I've tracked 2 nights of sleep and they're not good. I've been going to seep a lot later since I've been doing tasks pretty much up until the point where I want to start sleeping but then I take even longer until I'm actually going to sleep which is, exactly like you said, to my point of exhaustion. Are you sleeping in a cool enough environment? yes ✔️ Are you staying up to the point of exhaustion? yes ❌ I notice that if I fall asleep softly to that first wave of tiredness I sleep better. (great suggestion!) If I stay up late to the point of exhaustion I feel battered in the morning. (yeuuuuup) Staying hydrated before bed is good (no alcohol or caffeine), but also don't drink water 1 hour before bed. yeah I try to avoid caffeine after 1pm-ish and alcohol I try to avoid before bed I turn off all of the lights and try not to use my phone. nope ❌ I'm really bad at this I stopped watching porn before bed also. Yup! ✔️ pretty much the worst thing for me to do before bed I brush my teeth an hour before bed instead of 5 minutes before bed because it feels like a task and I can't unwind after it. no ❌ yeah brushing is such a chore, great suggestion. I try not to read anymore before bed because it keeps me thinking. I now just try to take deep breaths, relax, maybe meditate or just watch TV far away from my screen. for me reading is great and TV activates my brain too much. I think all the pictures and when I close my eyes my mind starts replaying everything. Same thing but worse if I was playing video games. Exercise also helps. no ❌ I don't exercise and I really should I really really really want to try and fix my sleep so all of this is invaluable!

Thanks man! yeah it's the format that works for me. It took a little time and me looking around at other formats before deciding it's the one that fits me... for now. Everyone seems to do it differently and the one thing I like about mine is it highlights pretty clearly my day to day And one thing it lacks probably is it's sparse and doesn't track my long term goals

2019-12-10: day 40 90 day detox: | #########~~~~~~~~~~ | 44.4% Complete Today: went to sleep ~1.45am ? read lord of the rings woke up ~8.10am brush teeth, make bed went to doctor around ~8.45am got to work ~12.00pm Activities: pray brush teeth practice typing made the bed went over wedding details updated my resume My fitbit said I only got a little less than 6 hours. My light sleep, time awake, rem sleep were normal last night but my deep sleep was well below. This is something I've been interested in learning about for a while since I have trouble falling asleep and wake up tired most days even if I got around 8 to 9 hours. Probably should ask a specialist instead of relying on a little device on my wrist to tell me what I already know. I'm not getting enough sleep. The graphs are pretty and colorful though. Looks like tonight is going to be another late one. We got back too late from shopping and was super hungry. Luckily friends of ours brought leftovers over and we all ate together. It really saved us the tremendous trial of having to first decide and then make dinner. Unfortunately we didn't really eat till late and I was planning tonight to update my resume. Really sat down with my fiance to discuss the cost of individual vendors and where our priorities are based on our budget. A lot of the money for this is coming from her parents and the rest from my mom and tomorrow we're meeting with her parents to try and get them to finalize their decisions on which vendors they think are best. We have to know what we're talking about otherwise it will be harder for us to push for some of the pricier options. Sometimes the numbers kind of blur together for my fiance and she gets nervous because she really wants the best our money can get us but to her parents it's sounds like we're getting caught up in the extravagance of it. But we're not. We're just trying to make this one night of our lives together the most meaningful. Omg it's late I need to go to sleep. Goodnight fellow game quitters! My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 8.00am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala go to sleep by 12.00am read Lord of the Rings before bed Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast + tea make the bed clean up scala wedding stuff

Yeah me too I remember college being a pretty discouraging experience. I've been through it recently enough to remember enjoying some parts but really hating a lot of it. It's different for everyone but I think one common theme is the amount of risk and pressure there is to succeed during our time in college. Universities like to talk about how much learning and growing they provide for young adults which I guess is true but I also remember developing some of my most unhealthy habits during that time too. Hang in there @WhatAboutToday?! I know how tough this stuff can be. Definitely seek help early and often where you can and know you're not alone! Good luck on your presentation! If the material is boring try and investigate the root causes for those feelings. Could be for a lot of different reasons like the difficulty, vagueness of the material is a demotivator, could be the classes are for a major that doesn't really match your interests, etc... whatever they are I'm sure you may already know the answers

2019-12-09: day 39 90 day detox: | #########~~~~~~~~~~ | 43.3% Complete Today: went to sleep ~1.15am read lord of the rings woke up ~8.30am brush teeth, shower, make bed went to meet with vendors Activities: pray brush teeth shower cleaned room a little wedding planning met with printing company for invitations spoke with another photographer My room is an absolute mess right now. I haven't folded my laundry, my bags are still unpacked from my business trip, and I have amazon prime boxes everywhere. The gift I ordered for my fiance came in today and I couldn't wait to give it to her. I really should have waited for actual holidays time but I just couldn't hold it in. I justify it because it's something she needed to try on and I wasn't sure I got the right size. We were in the sort weeks ago and she saw something she loved but they didn't have the size. So I looked online and found it around black Friday. Had my friend wrap it up for me because whenever I do it it just comes out looking like a sock. The smile on her face was totally worth it. For myself I got a new drawing tablet. I want to get back into digital painting. It's something I worked on a lot years ago and actually got pretty good at it. Drawing and painting has always been a childhood passion of mine and at one point I wanted to try and do it professionally. My dad kind of scared me away from it saying I wouldn't make money that. For better or for worse I listened to him and followed a career in technology. I'll probably never really know where I would be if I had pursued a career in digital art. I also got a fitbit. I want to get better at tracking some basic healthy stuff like sleep, steps, and weight. I'm actually below my bmi and need to gain a few pounds. For some it might sound like a funny problem to have in a country where food is everywhere but for me it's actually embarrassing to be as skinny as I am. I can't fit into normal men's clothe's most of the time and I'm not really happy with how lanky I am. Today was damp and rainy but we managed to get a few things done for the wedding. I met with someone to do invitations. I saw about a dozen different cards and they more or less looked the same. My fiance is the one who is more particular so I was trying to pick out something that matched what she was looking for. For me, I really couldn't care less. It's just a piece of paper that's supposed to tell people where and when a particular party is supposed to happen. My fiance and I spoke to another photographer but this guy was absolutely nuts. We would ask him a question and he would just all over the place going off on tangents. It was hard to really get a sense of what he was offering. Still so much to do and we can't make any final decisions on things without both sides (parents) approving. My mom is easy going but unfortunately my fiance's parents are a little more particular about the cost of the wedding. It's been stressing us out for last couple of weeks now because we're at this point where we want to start signing contracts and moving on to the next steps of planning our wedding. My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 8.00am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala go to appointment 9.00am be at work by 11.00am go to sleep by 12.00am read Lord of the Rings before bed Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast, tea clean up scala wedding stuff

2019-12-08: day 38 90 day detox: | #########~~~~~~~~~~ | 42.2% Complete Today: went to sleep ~12.00am read lord of the rings woke up ~9.00am brush teeth, make bed went to meet with vendors Activities: brush teeth wedding planning met with florist spoke with photographer I was worried about today because I had just come back from my business trip and knew that we had set the day for dealing with vendors for the wedding. This whole week is going to be like this with each day other than Thursday set for a certain "goal". But today was actually nice. We managed to accomplish a bunch of stuff and the wedding day feels like it's more within our reach than I have thought the past few weeks. We've gone through a lot of drama with this stuff even while I was away (maybe especially because I wasn't around last week). It's been tough keeping sight of what's really important to us. The rest of our lives together is going to be set by this one day and we keep getting stuck on details like what kind of music we want, what color the flowers are. The whole process is hollow to me. I just want to be married already. After wedding planning we spent part of the day with my fiance's family. I'm usually a little on edge around them since I'm still not used to them and it takes me a while to entirely trust people. This is kind of a sensitive topic between the two of use because she gets along so well with my family and I'm still kind of quiet around hers. She has a hard time understanding why I would be nervous around perfectly normal friendly strangers but for me it's tough. Today it was better though. I felt comfortable around them and was even able to smoothly initiate small talk with them. I think and hope it's a sign I'm warming up to them. We finished off the night with dinner and went home where my fiance surprised me with a gift she purchased during black Friday. I smiled because I told her I wasn't getting her anything this year until her birthday due to all of our recent expenses but I also ordered something that should be arriving tomorrow. Hope she likes it. Tomorrow? Work from home and meet with someone who might do our invitations: Tomorrow: wake up 8.00am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala Start work 9.30am go to sleep by 12.00am read Lord of the Rings before bed Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast, tea clean up scala wedding invitations

@ismailkanaan feel better!

Hey @Deku welcome back!!! It took me 8 years for me to fail before I got my act together enough to complete my degree and actually start working. So much I wish I had learned sooner including asking for help right away instead of leaning on games as my escape route. You probably needed this time to grieve and try and process the loss so I wouldn't feel to bad about relapsing. It's all part of the process of becoming better.

2019-12-04: day 34 90 day detox: | ########~~~~~~~~~~~ | 37.8% Complete Today: went to sleep ~2.00am ? read lord of the rings woke up ~7.40am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed went to lecture ~1.45pm Activities: prayed brush teeth breakfast + tea clean up attended lecture Tomorrow is my last day at this conference. It's tough getting into any of the sessions since there are so many people and not enough seats. It then becomes a scramble to try and make it to an alternate one if I miss my "ideal" talk. I walked around the expo room and built up the courage to talk to vendors. The experience was uncomfortable for me since the vendors are trying to sell me something and ask questions that kind of hint in that direction if I'm actually interested in buying. My agreeableness kind of kicks and I feel so guilty saying no as if I was tricking them in the first place. I did manage to talk to a couple other engineers at the conference. One who was a engineering manager. I could kind of sense the difference in confidence even before he told me his job title. It made me wonder if I'm ever going to get "there". Last night I went to sleep late watching netflix. I read lord of the rings to try and help me fall asleep. I'm in the last book now. The whole trilogy combined is even smaller than a single harry potter book. It's amazing Tolkein could fit so much of his world into these books. Tonight again I watched more stuff on netflix. It continue to be my replacement for gaming along with surfing the web. For now I'm ok with that. My goal is to make it to past the 90 day mark without gaming. Tonight is another kind of late night because I watched a movie with my teammates and am now working my way down from that energy level to be ready to sleep. I took a shower, put on ambient music, and cleaned my room a bit. Want to leave everything nice before I check out tomorrow. Tomorrow is the last day at this conference, let's make it count! Tomorrow: wake up 8.00am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala Go to first lecture ~10.30am go to sleep by 1.45am read Lord of the Rings before bed Activities: pray brush teeth breakfast, tea clean up scala conference stuff

2019-12-03: day 33 90 day detox: | ########~~~~~~~~~~~ | 36.7% Complete Today: went to sleep ~12.30am read lord of the rings woke up ~8.05am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed went to lecture ~10.00am Activities: prayed brush teeth attended lecture Ok so a lot of days have passed but nothing major has happened. We just made it through thanksgiving weekend where I spent basically the entire time with my fiance's family. Usually that's pretty rough for me. I'm an introvert and they're all still essentially strangers for me. I get uncomfortable and it's hard for me to carry a conversation. In the past I've tried talking about some of my struggles with spending time with her family but my fiance has gotten defensive about it I think because of the way the conversation gets framed for her it probably sounds like I don't like her family. Which is not the case. They're nice and I do have a nice time with them. It's just exhausting for me to try and be up beat and friendly all the time and I still feel like I'm at this stage with them where I need to make a good impression with her family in order for them to be happy with us getting married. For her it's easy because she gets along so well so quickly with people and my family loved her almost immediately. But this time I was actually able to enjoy myself and felt relaxed most of the time. I'm getting used to them and I think my animal brain is slowly learning that none of them are out to kill me. Kind of absurd but I'm pretty sure my subconscious is convinced all new people I meet are homicidal maniacs. After we got back I prepared for my business trip. I left on Monday morning and am spending the week at a tech conference. It's big, expensive, and overwhelming but I'm really here to spend time with my teammates and get to know them. Past couple of night we hung out over drinks and chatted. It was nice and a good change of pace to be able to relax with them outside of work. They pretty much work in an entirely different state then me so we don't get to talk other than short conversations through instant messaging and conference calls. The conference is hectic but I'm having fun ? I wanted to work on more Scala or side project (game) this week but there's been no time and whenever I've gotten back to my hotel room I've just watched netflix before falling asleep. Netflix and youtube continue to be my gaming substitutes. My plan for tomorrow: Tomorrow: wake up 8.00am breakfast + tea, brush teeth, make bed Scala Go to first lecture ~10.30am go to sleep by 12.30am read Lord of the Rings before bed Activities: pray breakfast, tea scala conference stuff

What you say is so true. I'm safe for the time being. Yeah I get that. For several reasons it's hard for me to be open about it with her: I feel guilty for being this way I'm afraid of raising her alarm bells I still hope to play games again one day regarding #2: we're getting married and I'm just trying to make it to that finish line in one piece. We're both stressed out about it and I'm afraid if I tell her about my struggle with gaming she'll start to freak out. She'll start wondering if and when I might have a relapse and she'll start thinking of the future and how we're going to manage. regarding #3: she might never want me to play games again out of fear that it might cause a relapse and I kind of still want that option. It might be that I decide I should never touch a video game ever again but I'm not sure yet. I still feel bound enough to my steam account that I can hardly think of deleting it.