Hi Jonny
A quick question, when you first started posting here you said were about 20K in debt and you said it would take you 1-2 years to clear all your debt.
But on day 175 you shared that you were debt free, I know you did get a promotion for 4 months, but even so, considering the time off work you had with the bad back. And then taking into account the money you gambled in January. You’ve done incredibly well to pay that 20K debt off. And now five months further down the line you can spend 2-3K on clothes without it putting a dent in your savings, and money in your brokers account…well it hasn’t turned out to be such a bad year for you after all.
The quick question was how’d you manage to pay 1-2 years debt off in less than six months?
Also Jonny on day 175 when you realised you were out of debt you mentioned that this was the longest spell of gambling free time you’ve had since you were 18. That’s brilliant but you also mentioned that your previous 3 lapses cost you $40,000 of savings and the big one prior to that $60K of savings. How were you able to save such large amounts when prior to this current period of abstinence you’d never managed to stay away from gambling for more than six months, in fact I’m sure you mentioned in a post once that you’d never managed more than 100 days gambling free prior to now.
I only went to check your thread to make sure I wasn’t mistaken about you being debt free on day 175, and read that whole post again. It doesn’t add up to me Jonny.
Every CG I’ve met that has gambled for 10 years plus has never had any savings, or ever been able to save. Not most of them, all of them. Except the one or two wise cookies who have someone else manage their money.
It doesn’t have to add up to me Jonny, but I know a great number of people comment on how they appreciate your posts, (I do too, believe it or not). But to be brutally honest Jonny I don’t think that you’re in recovery, or at the very least not taking it as serious as you should be.
I say this because not only because of re-reading your day 175 post but also because of the comment yesterday that you made on Monkey’s thread. The lady is at her wits end building up the courage to tell her partner, her post was not her musing as to whether she should tell him. She knows she should. Everyone who’s posted on that thread has given their view on the best way to approach it for her. Except you. Your comment… “I think that you probably should tell him that you have this issue for many reasons. But if you can quit and repay all your debt then I’m not sure why you have too”. If you think it’s possible for a CG to quit and pay their debts off in secret I think you’re deluded. And if you’re not sure why she has to I think it even more so.
You seem to have access to lots of cash, when Vera and Charles asked you about this following the two relapses you had early on in this abstinent period/recovery you sort of skipped answering. Why do you think that it’s ok now to have it all at your fingertips now? Isn’t it complacent?
I obviously have read your recent posts and can’t really be bothered to get in to lengthy discussions about the same thing again. You mentioned the stocks thing we’ve discussed it once but at the end of the day stocks and shares are gambling, simple as that.
You say, “Sometimes a glass of wine is a glass of wine and not the beginning of alcoholism”. Indeed it is Jonny. By the same token a bet is just a bet and not the beginning of gambling addiction.
However to a recovering alcoholic a glass of wine can be a catalyst to an indefinite period of destruction and despair to them and their family.
To a recovering compulsive gambler a bet can be the catalyst to yet another period of pathetically ridiculous sickening chaos.
Well done on your gamble free time Jonny I hope it continues for the rest of your life, but I wish you’d safeguard your money, for your ownsake.