What to do

Unfortunately, your child seems to fit a very common profile of a young gaming addict. Many of the gaming addicts here always had top grades, scholarships, etc., before we blew it all due to gaming addiction. I myself used to call in sick to work to play. That job didn't go so well.

It's very difficult to deal with an adult child with these issues. Have you read the link on the home page for parents of addicts 18+? For advice more specific to your situation, it would help if you could give us more info.

How do you know he is gaming?

Has the gaming continued while he is home from school?

Has he gotten help for the suicide threats? (If that is still an issue, it should be addressed first!)

Any other pertinent info.

One of the tricky things about college students is that although you may still be supporting him financially, the college sees his educational progress as none of your business. I know you'd like him to get help, but unfortunately he may not really see the problem until things get truly bad, such as losing his scholarships. Tough position for you, but he needs to face the consequences of his addiction.

Well, there's a few things you can do while he's still home. You said he eats while gaming. Do not cook for him if he is on the computer. Some people insist the gamer take meals at the table, but most that live with a gamer simply make just enough for themselves and other family members. Eventually, he will want to eat, and if you don't feed him and don't allow food at the computer, that will be an inconvenience that is a natural consequence of his gaming. Also, don't let his gaming interfere with your normal living room activities. Find a very loud activity to do in the living room. Run into his feet with the vacuum cleaner, and maybe yo bump the power cord to the modem out of the wall by accident. Maybe you suddenly need supplies for a project out of the computer desk. It's your desk and your living room after all. Do be prepared for a tantrum if you try any of these though.

The other thing you can do is to simply say, "this is my computer, and I don't want it used this way." Take the power cord and/or modem and only hook them up for yourself and family members that don't game. It is still your house, and you have the right to set rules in your home. You could also talk with your husband and determine if it is possible to temporarily turn off your internet service or downgrade to dial up. I've tried to game on dial up. It was awful. He could technically go back to school early, depending on their policies, to get online, but it sounds from what you said they may not be allowing him to reenroll.

If he returns to school while gaming, you have the right to withhold financial support. No book money, paying the balance of tuition, laundry money, cell phone bill, food money, etc. He would have to be responsible for getting a job to cover those expenses. I know that sounds harsh, but supporting him enables him to keep gaming.

From the perspective of a recovering gaming addict. I don't know what it is like to be in your position. Hugs.

Addiction is a disease. I encourage you to read the American Society of Addiction Medicine's description of it. There are five elements:

1. Inability to Abstain: The person cannot control how much they play, can't avoid playing, even if they want to.

2. Loss of Behavioral control: The person's behavior changes; becoming irritable, refusing to speak with someone you love, engaging in socially inappropriate behavior, etc.

3. Craving: If you have never been addicted you have no idea what this feels like. It can be almost unbearable at times.

4. Denial: The person does not see any problem with their behavior, even if it is inappropriate (lack of hygeine) or damaging to others (lies).

5. Dysfunctional Emotional responses: Emotions are out of control, they don't care about what they used to care about, they are angry, or when not using their substance/behavior, potentially very depressed.

There is more at:

http://www.asam.org/for-the-public/definition-of-addiction

As long as people will help me game, I'll game. As long as I'm protected from consequences, I'll game. The only thing that can help an addict wake up is having to face consequences of their addiction. Usually we have to lose something that is meaningful to us in order to wake up and decide that we are at our bottom. Usually it's something very important, very serious. Unfortunately. Something like a job, a marriage, a college education, the ability to have money, or live in a home.

Some questions that occurred to me when reading your post:

1. Are other people able to function in the living room? It's everyone's living room.

2. Does he pay rent? If not, it's your house. You get to say what happens. If he pays rent and pays for his portion of the internet connection and it's his computer, then he can (legally) game in his room.

3. Does he pay for food? If not, it's your food, and you can decide where and how and if you will give it to him. In the kitchen at mealtimes, but no access to your refrigerator, for example.

Here is an important point, from my perspective as a gaming addict: It's important not to try to get him to quit gaming. It's also important not to enable his gaming. Those are two very different things.

Many people seem to get this backwards: They argue and cajole, trying to get the person to quit or go to treatment. But they refuse to stop enabling. This simply makes the addiction worse: it actually feeds it. Instead, one could say: "OK, your gaming is your business. We won't bother you about it. And likewise, our food, our house and our expenses are our business. Now that you're an adult, you pay rent here or you leave. We love you, and if you decide you would like treatment for addiction, we'll be happy to try to find a way to help you pay for it. We'll help you pay for your college if you get reasonable grades, and keep us informed of them." This is an approach that could make sense to him. He won't like it, but too bad, he's an adult and it's fair. It also hands him the consequences of his addiction in a nice little package.

Those are just a few of my thoughts, from my perspective. If it helps you, I'm glad. If not, there are lots of parents here who have been through this and they probably have other ideas that might help. Very best wishes to you and your son.

(By the way, you may want to ask your husband to read this forum and the ASAM page)

I agree with what dan is saying. It is your hosue your money your food your rules. I am a recoverying attict and its not easy. But until i hit rock bottom and had something very prescious to me that i would loose well there was no reason to really quit. I relapsed bad and after the relapse I found the one thing that was more important to me then gaming ever could be, my marriage.

So once i found that and realized i could loose it gaming took a back seat to life. Id say find something that hes very fond of, or that he cares about and remove it. Posetion is 9/10s the law as the saying goes. So if hes gaming gon your computer remove it from the equasion and see what happens.

Another thing I would say to do is ask him to check out your post. Let him see how your hurting. Let him see what his addiction is doing to you. Hurt is a very powerful modivatator.

Medsd, if the interventions you mentioned meant removing the ability to game from your home, then the behaviors your son exhibited are the same as most of us have witnessed. You're among friends here...we really do understand what you're going through. Sadly, there has always been a parent or two who finds us mid-semester with a similar problem.

I never had to deal with an adult gamer child. But many here have, and I know they will agree with my advice to make your son unenroll. Until and unless he addresses the issue at hand, nothing will change. We've had a number of young men whose educations were irreperably harmed because they were permitted to return to a challenging university. So many have lost scholarships and been refused readmission.

One method used here is to have the child pay the tuition forward...and always to a Community College near home. You may want to insist that your son get a job and start saving for his schooling. If the grades are good, then the tuition is reimbursed.

Most of all, he has to feel the pain and suffer the consequences of his choices. That often means you'll have to use some tough love and be prepared to be disliked or even reviled for a time.

Tell your son about this website, at least he will be informed about this addiction. He's not alone. Big hugs.

medsd wrote:

My plan at this point is to try to talk with him. What does he want? What does he think the problem is? What would be the best plan for him? Asking questions rather than telling him.

If he refuses to admit to the problem and he does go back to school there will be no financial assistance only encouragement and support. If he cannot go back to school he will need to pay for internet, cell phone and food. I plan to have him get a job. . . I will not charge rent as long as there are No sick days or being late and he pays for those things.

Should he decide to seek help he will know that we would support him during that time.I don't think I could get him to view this site (he's not there yet).but I'll be sure to mention the 3 C's and the the American Society of Addiction Medicine's description of it.(thanks dan1). All of this is of course dependant upon him cooperating during this dicussion.

My husband will also not view this site. I am telling him about it and all your advice. I'm hoping this time he will back me up.

Our greatest fear - not the tough love part - but the fear that he'll walk out again (did twice last summer) with nowhere to go and and be hurt or killed or to do it himself.

I think I have answered your questions. Your advice has greatly helped me to be more passionate and understanding. I m addicted to nicotine and when I read the AMA's description of it I could relate much better.

My plan (that you have all helped me to formulate) will not happen til after the new year so there is plenty of time for anyone to critique it. Please feel free to tell me if there is anything wrong with it or anything more I could do or do better.

Welcome to OLGA medsd! I am another mother who was fortunate enough to discover OLGA about 5-6 months ago. My son was also 19 years old (turned 20 since than). I feel your pain I understand your suffering. Even though there are differences, there are many similarities. I am really sorry that you have to go through this. Seeing our loved ones sucked in to this disease and not being able to help them is so demoralising. It hurts deeply!

I am really glad that you found this site. Only after discovering this site and learning from the experiences of recovering gamers and other parents we started to make progress. We are still at very early stages of the 'recovery' process so we don't know what the future holds for us but I am happy to share my experiences with you hoping that you may find some of them useful. There are other parents here who have been on this path before us and saved their children from this hole. WoW Parent is one of them and I am glad she responded to your post. She has helped many parents here including me and we are very grateful for that.

Every family is unique and everybody's circumstances are different but the people who catch the 'addiction disease' are affected pretty much the same way. I wold like to go through your plan and talk about my own experiences. Trying to talk to him is always a good idea but my son had responded to my attemps to talk to him in a few different ways: 1) totally ignore me(either turn the volume of the background music, block his ears or simply sit there continue playing completely ignoring me 2) made fun of the situation. Never gave me a serious answer. Made jokes etc 3) Answered my questions (this was a rarity). Made promises. Made deals. He had great plans bla bla bla. Sounded great but none of them ever eventuated 4) Replied angrily. Making it very clear that he was in no mood to talk.

I tried to talk to him many times over the last a few years but never really got anywhere. So I learned that action works much better than the words. Having said that I still think during my attempts to talk to him, even he totally ignored me, some of the things I said registered with him. Especially after discovering OLGA, I read things which I found really helpful to him and he sat silently but I think he listened. So I believe it is a good idea to try to talk but be prepared that his response may be quite annoying.

It is a good idea that he has to pay for his own fees. I like Wow Parent's suggestion that if he gets reasonably good grades, you can reimburse him. If he can't continue to the college, It is great idea that he works. But how can you force someone to go to work? My son would not look for a job even though we said 'either school or work'. He was making enough money by doing some online business(buying and selling computer parts). Therefore he could cover the expenses without even leaving his chair whrere he would play games (occasional trip to post office ) If it is just the money, they can find ways to make some to support themselves as long as the shelter and the food is provided. But we want them to work outside so that they learn about life and they meet people. So I hope your plan of him finding a job will work.

I also didn't think my son would look at this site. But I decided to email him the link thinking that the worse case scenario being the message deleted. But to my surprise, he came to me the next day and started calling me with my OLGA name! He didn't only looked at the site but searched and found my posts and read them. I know because he asked me if I am going to follow the advices given to me by the other parents! Emailing the link and some other links (links of information about how addiction affects the brain and how addictive tha games are etc)worked for us.

I can relate so much about your concern of him walking out. You mentioned he walked out twice this summer. He must have come back. Did he stay away for long? Do you know where he went when he was away? If he kept coming back, maybe he knows it is not such a good idea to walk out after all.

I learned from the recovering gamers here that for as long as we enable our children, they will continue playing. I also learned from the books I read (recommended at this site) that sooner they stop playing quicker for them to get better. It is by no means an easy process to stop enabling but I think that is our only option as parents of adult children. We cut down our internet time for example. When we realized he was about to go to the internet cafe to play we did not give him our car keys. Up until then he must have believed that they were his rights but all of a sudden he realized, it is our car and it is a privilege to drive it. Internet likewise,we pay for it and it was a privilege for him to use it . Once the priviliges are abused it is our right to stop the access. We haven't gone as far as charging him for rent and food yet. But if he returns gaming (hasn't played for nearly 3 months), they are on our list as well.

My heart goes out to you. I sincerely hope your plan brings what you expect from it. We parents have a chat meeting every Thursday 9pm EST (even though I wasn't able to join for the last 3 weeks with internet related problems and visitors but I am sure there will be someone you could chat and share).

Please keep us posted. You are definitely not alone and we totally get it. We love our children and wish the best for them but at the end it is their life and there is only so much we can do. We will certainly try to help them to help themselves but unless they accept they have a problem and decide to tackle it, we can not do it for them. My son admitted and accepted he had an addiction issue with online gaming before we could move forward. I hope your son acknowledges his problem.

Big Hugs!

Welcome, medsd!

My son was 19 when he flunked out of college. We made the mistake of sending him back for a second semester after he failed the first. He promised he had deleted all the games from his computer and that he would not play them again. It was the first and last time he ever apologized to us for what he had done. He tried for a few weeks, but in spite of close monitoring from us, his profs, and his advisors, he failed again.

Do NOT, I repeat, do NOT pay one dime towards the coming semester if he insists on going back to college. It is NOT too late to disenroll and take a medical leave of absence, but if he insists on going, do not risk even one cent of your own money. He is going to lose his scholarship, but maybe that will be what it takes for him to hit bottom and get help. If I could go back and do anything over again in my life, it would be to go back and make GamerSon enroll in community college rather than go back for that second semester at the university. Here is a link to our story:

http://www.olganon.org/?q=node/24780

It's a long story, but some of it might be relevent to your situation.

A caution: If there are mental health issues, you may need to consult a professional before proceeding. Be sure you consult a professional who acknowledges the existance of video game addiction. Consulting one who does not will be a waste of your time and money.

Good luck and welcome to OLG-Anon. Come to our parents' meeting tomorrow night in the chatroom at 8 PM CST. Just log in to general chat with your username and password, and someone will send you an invite into the private chatroom soon. Click accept and you are in. Unfortunately, I will not be able to make the meeting this week, but there should be some other parents there. Or you can PM me anytime with questions.

Hugs to you.

Glad to be of help. PM me any time. Your account is still blocking PM's though. You need to go into your account and check the box that says "Allow private messages."

Glad you found this site! I, too, was in a similar situation with my 19 yr old only he was asked to leave school on medical leave, losing a scholarship to play a sport he previously loved. As a result, he came home and gamed nonstop for months. It was utter hell. With the help, wisdom and support I found here, I was able to set limits, stop living in fear of my son's erratic and often threatening behaviors and face the fact that thebottom line was that it was my house; he could leave if he chose to continue gaming. I finally realized that I wasn't being unkind in declaring my home a game-free zone. My son is now attending community college WITHOUT the use of a computer and doing OK one day at a time. Someday he hopes to return to his previous 4 year school but he has a long way to go. This is a cunning and dangerous addiction and we both have been through a living nightmare. So, I am glad that you are here. Read as much of the parent blogs as you can. And I hope to see you at the parent mtgs! PM me also anytime you'd like.

Welcome again. You are in the right place!

In our experience, he will never bring it up himself. If you are planning on shutting off access, you will need to bring it up.