I’m hopefully allowed back into rehab in a few months. The same rehab I was before, the same rehab that has helped me obtain 416 days of no gaming. I heard that they have a very strict policy for people who want to enter a second time. I heard they want to know what I did after rehab, did I take recovery serious afterwards? I wanted to write my analysis down for myself, but then I realized that there are some very important, but hard to recognize signs that others might have too. And you guys can get to know me better if I share my journey.
It starts around 2013.
GTA V was just released. I was not allowed to play it, so I started watching video’s of it on youtube. Then I added Minecraft videos to the mix. I quickly watched a lot of youtube.
When I went to high school, I was introduced to a lot more video genres through “friends”. I started discovering more and more genres by myself too.
A bit later my dad got netflix. I got my own account and soon I was watching tv shows entire nights if I wasn’t gaming.
Around 3 years ago, after my parents divorce, I’d started watching videos whilst gaming. I kept this up until rehab.
When entering rehab I was in denial off my screen usage apart from gaming.
In rehab we primarily focused on my gaming, the other screen usage not so much. I vividly remember in rehab that there was a speaker who was a gaming addict in recovery himself. He said it was okay to binge series from time to time. I also remember near the end of rehab when I read my diagnose that it only said gaming addiction. My addict brain registered these instances as a green light. This is a very important sign. I recognized it was my addict brain, but let it be. Don’t ever do that!!!
Out of rehab it wasn’t an immediate decline though… that was about 2 days later. I quickly started obsessing over LEGO’s, crosswords, puzzles or basically anything that could distract me. This is also an important sign. I had told myself only 1,5 hours per activity per day. I broke this boundary very quickly. If you recognize this, seek help, call a fellow or come on here!!! Also there’s the sign of finding distraction as much as possible
The same thing happened with tv usage. I told myself 30 minutes a day with binge day on sundays. This boundary lasted only a few days as I discovered there was a new season of paradise PD on netflix. It quickly became an hour a day. I edited those boundaries to 1 movie a day or 1 hour of tv shows. This quickly was broken when I discovered community. I quickly watched 12 episodes a day.
Another important sign, breaking boundaries again and even changing them to please the addict
2 weeks out of rehab I found sober time and another 2 weeks later TS. The first month I did nothing but watching memes on here, then I quickly became a regular and ended up trying to read all 1 million posts on here, by scrolling through them without even reading, this way it was registered that I read all #just-for-fun, #chatroom, #patreon, #relapses, #research-and-knowledge, #announcements, #voting, #feedback, #lounge, #motivation topics and many other topics up until August. For months it was my goal to read every new topic. Yeah… I don’t know how in the hell I didn’t recognize this sign, but it’s basically a huge red neon sign the size of the burj khalifa. Again obsessing, but disguising it under recovery this time
I had said a lock for a max of three hours a day on my phone. My mom was in control of it. She quickly disabled the lock if I told her I needed to work on recovery. I also decided to download duolingo to study english and spanish. DuoLingo could be considered a game to some. I didn’t consider it as one and still don’t, but I do know it is dangerous. I quickly wanted to get as many medals as possible and wanted to rise through the leagues. My mom would also disable my lock for DuoLingo whenever I asked. The concept of talking sober had a great deal to do with tthis. Since I was allowed to cross boundaries, for recovery, I also was allowed to cross boundaries for learning in my mom’s eyes. This sign is obsessing over perfection, to prove myself I’m not a "failure"
Eventually the agression came back, which is also a huge sign as it had to come from somewhere and the only possible thing it could have been from is a stash of stashed away anger, which evolved into rage
One day whilst watching hardcore pawn, I did some googling about it. I ended up finding a YouTube video and saw it, which was easy as I had the green light in the back of my mind. This ended the preparing stage of my downfall and started the beginning of the downfall.
The start of this school year was terrible due to bad grades caused by dangerous amounts of screen usage. Sign: parts of my life being affected by my obsession for bike crash videos on YouTube
I ended up deleting Netflix and YouTube, but got Disney+. I more or less traded beer for wine. sign: unability to give up tv
Not much longer I created my plan to watch Netflix moderately. Failed big time… sign: the addict brain negotiating with the sane brain to get it’s way
I ended up relapsing consistently on both youtube and netflix, which still happens occasionally. sign: relapsing…but remaining in denial about the addiction
I eventually had a huge relapse on youtube allowing me to realize I’m addicted, but unwillig to give it up. Sign: unwillingness
I replaced Netflix for another streaming service that I’m unable to stop using. I am in the middle of the good doctor, a show about a very autistic man becoming a surgeon and it’s given me lots of insight on my own autism.inability to give up addiction and romanticizing
These have been the most important signs on my “journey to self destruction vol. 2”. I hope this helps someone