One Day at a time

I have the same thoughts.

What will my team do if I'm not there to spot them?

Sometimes its hard not to check if they are online.

LOL! I know when they will be online and pretty certain what they will be doing.

What is important (and please realize I am saying this for my own benefit and have no intention of preaching - i am just a hopeless addict) is for me to get to the point where a) it is not my responsibility and b) it does not matter what happens.

Without going into specific game details, what i need to do is step outside myself and give this away. In my case my 'higher power'. He will take care of them... It is not my problem anymore.

If I can remind myself of this constantly then maybe i have a fighting chance of avoiding my biggest relapse triggers. There are many because I am so addicted, but in the short term this is the one that kept churning through my mind until I logged on again.

PS I dont trust myself to log on and give formal goodbyes - I just want to get through today without gaming. I have removed all links and references from my PC and that will have to do for now.

All I can say is that when I quit game, the people in game that I thought were close friends didn't bother to call or write me. A few weeks after quitting, I emailed a few of them and told them I quit game permanently...haven't heard from them at all yet. So, I can say that those friendships were a figment of my imagination. The only gamer who called me is a 10 year old girl in my family guild. She wanted to tell me she got a horse for Christmas.

Even family members who are deeply into the game have failed to call or find out how I'm doing. There is only one family member who supports me in recovery, and he continues to play WoW and Eve each day. He thinks my gaming was abnormal and his is normal...so be it.

I have spent almost two and half years in Second Life. None of my friends or family know how this game has taken over my life and i didnt want to stop, but it was because of a failed realtionship in game that has forced me to reevaluate my life. This morning I gave away my lindens and contemplated about canceling my SL account. I just feel so alone in all this. I want to live my life without this game. I hope this place will help me.

We'll help you for sure. Please read as much as you can here, and know we're all trying to rebuild our lives after going overboard in the game world (or watching a loved one do so). We've been there and collectively we know the way back. Keep coming back and let us know how your recovery process is goign, aNEwLife.

Hi New,

Lindens dont make it easy to cancel your account, so I am not doing this...yet. I have decided that today i will not log on, see friends status or have anything to do with SL in any way. Today.

Tomorrow will take care of itself.

My wife had a very frank conversation with me on Monday and made me realize how far removed from reality I have become... Its really time to quit and get back to RL.

The mind plays such strange tricks - am I spending so much time inworld because my life really sucks or does my life suck because i spend so much time inworld? Chicken or the egg. Round and round.

All I know is that I need help. So I go to the place only the desperate like me can - I pray. I pray this obsession will be lifted and that I can live a life which has purpose and use for others - particularly my family who need me.

CU

LaurelS9: Thanks for the support. I want to tell my story because its getting harder for me to keep all of this inside. And I dont want to hide anymore, I realized living my life in secrecy and looking for happiness in a game is slowly killing me.

dark: If you dont mind me asking: How long have you been on SL? and thank you for posting your story, it really helps to know i'm not the only one that is trying to fight this obsession.

Best of luck to you!

My wife has been addicted to SL for about 9 months now, and still will not admit it (despite spending 12-20 hours EVERY DAY in-world). She has had two failed relationships in the game, and is on her third now. She says does not love me and our real-life marriage is over, but we stay together for the kids sake. (She has her on-line lovers. I have nothing.)

I wish she would wake up as you have. Your real-life relationships wil thank you and reward you, and hopefully you will no longer feel alone.

If you want more real-life activities and friends, the "meetup.com" site can help.

Hi New, lets see if I can remember. Around Spring 2007 so that would be almost 3 years.

I lost my job in spring 2008, and if the truth be told it was because I was more focussed on SL than my job. I started my own business working from home and then was online a minimum of 4 hours per day and often 10 or 12 hours. Needless to say the business did not go anywhere. So here I am still out of work, most money gone and still playing more SL than doing anything else.

Insanity by any definition.

I pray I have hit my bottom, because that is what it takes to fully understand the insanity of this disease.

And at least for me compared to Alcohol (which I also was addicted to once - but not anymore), a gaming addict can keep up the appearance of normality much more easily than the alcoholic (no boozy breath, shakes, red eyes, or other physical symptoms).

I hope this helps! Its helping me tell it and at least im not inworld - for now.

I'm an alcoholic in recovery as well, although my use of alcohol is very limited and I had a slip on 1/4 of a glass of wine in the year 1983...my last drink. It is a hereditary disease and is progressive in nature and incurable. The only solution is complete abstinence from alcohol. Just wanted to point out that if an alcoholic slips, they are right back where they were when the quit. That is a well-documented fact...so as far as being no longer alcoholic...it just isn't that way. Could be that you were a heavy drinker but without the biochemical disorder. In that case, you could quit with motivation.

Gaming is probably the same way. Some of us are born with the predisposition to obliterate reality through the use of...x, y and z. In my case it was WoW, and other process addictions. The only solution, for me, is complete abstinence from online gaming. My focus must be on real life, "with all it's adds" as someone stated recently.

Firstlife,

Yikes, sounds like me! I wont go into detail but now I get all the sex and romance I need from the game. In the clear light of day this brings me 'shame'.

I hope its not too late for my wife and me, and that we can begin sharing things together and at least be friends.

Thank you for the meetup.com tip! It is awesome. Found a ton of things and I am in a pretty obscure place...

What helped my wife cope was Landmark Forum. It took the course as well but was too far into my addiction for it to have any effect. And I hesitate to recommend it because its pretty commercial. But my wife did benefit.

I will pray for you Mate.

Thanks firstlife, I'm sorry to hear about your wife's addiction...i have only had one relationship in game and now that its over i cant imagine ever getting involve in another one. At first it felt like one of the worse things i've experienced, but now i'm beginning to see that it is a blessing. It shook me out of my SL daze. I pray your wife will realize that the only relationship she needs is the one between you two, the ones in game wont last and theyre just figment of one's imagination.

dark: It does help. And I'll keep you in my prayers as i also pray that i find the strength to get me through this.

I have a question if anyone can help me. Forgive me but this is my first day here, and I notice some members keep a blog here. And I like to start one and tell my story. How can i start one? Thanks.

Welcome, dark. I hope you find all the guidance you need here.

I'll echo what others have said: chances are, most of the people you gamed with are going on fine without you, and may not even notice you're gone. I play WoW addictively for four or five years, and out of all that time, there are maybe two people I still keep in touch with, and then only through Facebook. In fact, playing WoW actively lost me some real life friendships - something I am still working through with the Steps! In WoW, all I was good for was the role my character played in a party or raid, and they could easily find another warlock to take my place (and probably a better one, at that!)

The fact that you have a grounding in the Steps will stand you in good stead, I believe. As always, it's most beneficial to work through them with a sponsor, so I definitely encourage you to find one. I've had good luck with PMing people who inspired me here on the site and asking them directly to sponsor me.

Best of luck in your recovery!

You will find that when you leave the game, the online peeps you thought were "friends," will try to get you to come back and/or stay in touch for a while. As time goes on, they forget you quite fast. Sadly--it is true.

Gaming friendships are forged deeply in "what can you do for me?" When you express disinterest or leave the game, their interest in you irl wanes.

When I was first told this here in OLGA, I didn't believe it. But--it IS true.

aNewLife...you asked about your blog. When the administrators decide to add you to the OLGA membership, you will get one. It took a week or two of daily posting about my addiction, and suddenly I got mine. :)

Heya...I've played SL for over 5 years...3 years of those proberly average of 12 hours a day...

I've many so called friends all over the world, but I do talk to some IRL on MSN...so some people do forge friendships outside of SL...but I wont expect others to contact me if they dont see me online. I never did if I didnt see someone for a while.

I'm seperated from my husband. He gave me an ultimatum, stop gaming or else...it was my choice to seperate as he took me away from my gaming ie time taken looking after him and the house kept me away from being online. At the time, it didnt bother me at all because of the blurred reality vision I had IRL. In retrospect, I think our relationship had been struggling before my gaming took hold and the gaming gave me an excuss to leave him.

I have had a long term relationship in SL...having been partnered to the same person for most of the time I have been in SL....we met IRL 2 years ago and we are now a IRL couple....so SL relationships can work but rarely do....unfortunatly we dont live together at the moment but plan to buy a house once both our finances have been sorted out...he is the one positive thing I have gained from my gaming.

Luckily, my IRL partner doesnt play very often now, due to work, so my amount of time spent in SL, has dwindled off...not alot of fun on your own in there and when you have been in SL for so long, nothing much new to learn...but i still get the urges to play at times, maybe this site will help keep me out. My IRL partner has changed my password, giving me a new one for each log in, so I can still visit SL with him as we class that more as a IRL date, which we do once a week, and this will end once we move in together. My IRL partner doesnt seem to experience the addictive symptoms that I do, but this maybe due to his job as a games tester and programmer which allows him access to play many different games. He recognises I do have a problem and is suporting me as best he can.

I have "KILLED" all my alts and have a very limited inventory on the remaining avi...if I had put the money I have spent in SL into a bank account, over the years, I would have a very healthy bank balance....

I realise I have an addictive nature in regards to games, having been addicted to several MMO's as well. I think the difference with these is the competitive nature of them rather than the social aspect of SL. I have always been very competitive be it at school, college, at work so I expect I am addicted to "being the best"....I found in many MMO's, as you progess through the levels, more and more time is required to be a competitive player and a good one as well, in order to join groups, in order to progress...if I had spent this time in studying, I would proberly be a very educated lady...all subscriptions have been cancelled and a random password selected that I do not remember, so I cant activate remaining toons.

Anyway, free from MMO's for 3 months, and although I play SL for 2/3 hours a week, that will soon stop.

My problems are, currently without a job so loads of free time on my hands, little money to spend on things to do as I am trying to save what little I do have, the weather, no friends or now family in this area...I'm unable to return to my old job due to health issues, I do have other qualifications but these are linked to computer games...artwork and graphics and proof reading game frames for glitches...laughs....so the urge to log in for something to do is very strong at times.

Good luck everyone in keeping IRL...sanity starts here..

Welcome, Early,

Hope your new relationship gets on solid footing, and that you are able to keep boundaries about games and that all your entertainment/recreation choices are healthy ones.

Thanks LaurelS9, I also received a message from one of the administrators here answering my blogging question.

Today is day one, I havent logged in the game since transfering my SL lindens and uninstalling. It hasnt been easy, earlier i almost had the urge and I was about to download the program, but I forced myself to shut the computer off. I'm going to mark my calendar to keep track, maybe that might give me some incentive.

Day one is the best day! Keep on truckin!