Hey Craig. Hearing your story reminds me of a guy from my GA meetings. He was scared to death at his first meeting but he stayed strong and hasn’t gambled in years. He talked about the challenges he faced like football games, horse races and the NCAA tournament. The funny thing was as these events approached they seemed to give him more strength because he knew how good he felt after not betting on the previous one.
I also love that you’ve compared this addiction to your tobacco addiction, we need to realize that addiction is addiction. Once we distance ourselves from our destructive behavior we realize that we never really liked it anyway and that the addiction made us think we did. After you power through the first few weeks and see the money you’ve saved you’ll start to see that gambling really isn’t even fun. For me the biggest day in my recovery was the first paycheck I got after having not gambled the previous one. It felt so good to still have some money in the bank when I got paid.
A couple things I’d recommend for you is not to dwell on the past. It’s counterproductive because it makes us hate ourselves. We can’t recoup the money or the time that we lost, we can only make sure that we never lose any more to gambling. I’d also recommend treating yourself because you’re doing a great job! You don’t have to go nuts but if you could go out for a nice dinner or go to a movie with some of the money you’ve saved it will make you feel good. If recovery seems like a punishment we’re more likely to relapse so I like to treat recovery as a joyous thing.