Silent John

Hello, on the internet I just like to call myself "John", even though my real name isn't even close to that. It all started almost a year ago. I was very, very deep into PMO. I couldn't make it after only a couple of days, even though once I was around 140 days clean from doing PMO. For the holidays, the whole 3 months I planned to just workout in the gym - work - play - sleep - repeat. But some day I came back from work very frustrated and tired (its not my dream job tbh) and wanted to chill and play my favorite game (ww2 simulator), but I had to go out soulwinning (its just a Christian thing, to tell people The Bible way to heaven). But I didn't go this time. I decided to just stay in home and play. I felt like I betrayed God and the only one thought in my head was "what in the world am I doing? I stayed home to just play some video game???". Then I realized that I have a problem. I thought back then that I may be addicted to video games, so the day after I put my PS5 and XSX on a website like "eBay" to sell it. But I didn't have the guts to actually sell it. Then I thought to myself that "okay, so I will just limit it drastically", so I did. I limited it. A little. A couple of months later I decided to sell my PS5 and XSX to buy a PC to just play my favorite game, ww2 simulator (I won't mention its name, to not trigger anybody) on higher resolution and with better details, better everything. I was super happy for that. And got even more addicted to this game. I spent a couple of months working, pretending to write my engineer thesis, going to church, soulwinning and playing video games. I got so hooked on playing that I totally neglected writing my thesis. And I didn't manage to deliver it in time, so I decided that I will do it later, I just got another year to do that. But it took me a little to realize that I didn't write it in time in order to play on my super computer. But I was like "screw this, I wanted to have a gap year between bachelor and masters degree, so it don't change much". Except I failed my mother and she was super upset about that. After a couple of weeks she calmed down and accepted this fact. My mind has changed a little in the recent months. I couldn't even imagine myself playing some RPGs for over 100 hours. It seems to be lame for me now. I was clean from PMO for like 30 days (as I am writing this, I am clean for 104 days from PMO, my previous streak was 102 days). I still really liked my beloved ww2 simulator, but 3 hours of playing this game in a row was a maximum I wanted to play, afterwards It felt boring. I felt like im not an addict! But some weeks I had to work for around 50 hours, during the workdays I didn't play because of the lack of time, so I was just waiting for the weekend to actually have some time to play and to go out somewhere. It felt amazing. Even when I went somewhere I still had playing in the back of my mind. But I ignored it. Anyway, I started to like my life, despite its not perfect (basically I would just change my job for something I like). The thing was - whenever I was in home, I was playing or when I didn't want to anymore, I couldn't bring myself to do something else, because other things weren't that exciting as playing. So I decided in those situations to play some different game. Or whenever I went out, I didn't want to spend too much time in some places, because I had video games in the back of my head. I wasn't rushing home to just play, but everything except playing video games was more like a chore. I wasn't 100% present while doing other stuff. Only video games were relaxing for me. I started also cold approaching, just for the sake of social confidence. I got some phone numbers, went on some dates. The more I was doing it, the more I improved in real life, the less I wanted to play video games. Really. The maximum amount of hours I could play decreased to like 2/3 hours per day. Some days it even felt like I was doing it only because Im used to. Recently I realized that I have cravings to play this ww2 simulator and I couldn't imagine myself not playing for more than a week. Even though I couldn't bring myself to play more than 3 hours!!! So, finally, I realized that I am a mild addict or call you however you want. And also that video games were holding me back from reaching my 100% potential and I don't see them in my future. I want to have a great wife and kids and earn decent amount of money, so where would be the time for playing? I also would have them in the back of my mind. In the recent days I sent a ticket to Steam support a couple of times to delete my account permanently and every time I cancelled it. I didn't have the guts. And selling my pc? I couldn't do that alone, I had to ask people on discord for support. Thoughts of selling my PC were giving me headaches. Seriously. Since I was I child, I always had a machine I could play on. I wanted to cut this cancer! I wanted to be 100% present wherever I was! So I decided to do that in the easiest way (at least for me) possible. I decided to keep my Steam account, but sell my PC, because I couldn't do the detox for more than 2 days having it on my desk and tempting me to play. After I sold it I felt joy in my mind, but my soul was super sad. It was super weird. On the one hand I finally will do things that I wanted to do, like learn Spanish, read more books, learn about finances etc. But on the other hand... I always had a machine to play on. After one day without it I just feel awkward. It feels more like I had to change my habits than cut my addiction (still I have to do the detox in order to make other things more exciting). I decided to do at least +/- 150 day detox. At the beginning of December I will decide if I still want to buy a PC or not. I probably won't describe my everyday here, because I value my privacy. Maybe I will just describe the symptoms of quitting gaming. We will see.