Days Since Last Betting: 110
Attended a SMART meeting last week and found it useful. The main topic discussed was managing urges with a tool called the ABC’s mostly focused on. The idea behind this tool is to 1) Identify potentially activating events for urges e.g. Getting paid, boredom, an argument etc , Next jump to C and look at the consequences of the event, how do you feel, (anger, self-pity etc), and then finally look at B the beliefs – what do you believe about the activating event, and are theses beliefs 1) real and 2) helpful.
For a gambling perspective, an example would be
Activating Event: Getting paid
Consequences: Initial thinking along the lines of, I could just place one bet with the funds, win and then have some extra cash for the month
Beliefs: I have gambled many times before when I got paid, so it is inevitable I will gamble this time. My urges will not go away unless I place a bet, and so I may as well go ahead and do that
When looking at these beliefs, the first one has some positives in identifying that payday is a potential trigger, and we have fallen at this hurdle before, saying however that it is inevitable it will happen this time is not, we have successfully navigated previous paydays without betting before + there are steps that we can take to limit the chances of falling at this hurdle.
The 2nd belief is not true and is not helpful at all. We have had strong urges in the past that have gone away without gambling, and there is no reason the same would not be the case here if we resist the urge.