Ok, great - Pokerstars assigned me the monthly challenge right on the start of the month. I immediately jumped into action and grinded some points. I always like to grind more at the beginning of the challenge and later I can comfortably continue playing as I can slow down the rate/volume or move down in stakes. So today I was probably to focused on points and started with grinding all leaderboards in PLO and then I had not enough time and energy to grind Holdem. Therefore I only played two stakes, but the results are pretty ok/break-even.

Graph doesn't include PLO as I don't have HM paid for omaha. I hope I will soon move my volume mostly, or even better only to NL. PLO was, as usual, swingy and tilting. I had a moment I was pretty nicely up. I've already had enough points grinded that I could stop the session, but I wanted to keep going and there was still Holdem to grind. Then, of course typical omaha action happened on two tables - top sets in multiway pots, AI on flop and both couldn't hold vs some draws and other nonsense. I must admin, it was toughest moment of the session. Fortunately I was completely not thinking about gambling more to win it back. However I decided to take longer break after those spots and don't play more PLO today. Then few hours later I just grinded above-showed 1,2k NL hands.

Anyway, I finished session with a small profit, which is obviously great and there is also big chance to grab some leaderboards money. I prepared a spreadsheet to track my progress, points/day ratio, profits and etc. So after every session I will write percentages as it is now my main goal for the month. Also, it is very important for me to keep the big picture. I don't need to win everyday (which was a problem for me in a past). I want to look at this from distance and the timeframe is tuned to the challenge. So, to cheat my mind I tell to myself I already have this money from challenge (but it's locked) and as long as my result+this bonus is above 0, then I in total enjoying profit. I just have to do my best to bring as much as I can to the finish line.

To sum it up:
Current Monthly challenge progress: 8%
and there are 27 more days to go. I will skip grind at least at two days. Still, with such a great start, and few similar days early on, I should be able to calmly grind through the challenge. But hey... it's just the first day and I am pretty sure tough moments are ahead of me, waiting for me to make a mistake.

Hi guys,

It is me again. Broken and gravedigging again. Unfortunately.

First of all, I am sorry I stopped writing here. I know there were at least few people reading my story on regular basis. It was also mistake for myself too, to stop writing about my problems. And it looks that they are still real.

5 months ago was my last post here. Unfortunately September 2022 was really bad for me. Everything was looking good, I was on in a great position to make things right. Finally, it was a month when lot of things could go in the right direction. Well, again my gambling problems and urge to quickly make some progress crushed my hopes and perspectives. It was in really bad combination with some partying time after losing a lot of money on roulette. I had no willpower to write it all here, felt really bad, almost depressed. It took me about month to get some luck again and almost climb it out. Then there also one great opportunity at my regular job become also very real. If this would happen at least half of my debt is covered. The results of this project was postponed about 3 times and I was super happy to get this opportunity. But not all that great, as in the meantime stressing it out and waiting for the results I was digging a deeper hole. Hard to imagine, but if I was now as 'little' down as I was when starting the blog.... now it will be very easy for me to handle all this mess. Or maybe this is just my illusion as I am still in serious gambling problem and exact numbers doesn't matter until I sort it for good.

So what happened then. I had pretty good last two months. I was about to write here a sort of good mid-journey summary and what is ahead of me. Just had few other things to take care of first and then last week - I had another bad relapse. I could blame again the circumstances - first I was on a great party, of course it is always a dopamine rollercoaster and then the day after, its usually suffering at the bottom. Right at that time my cat got really bad diagnosis from the vet. Very bad circumstances to open a roulette table again. Don't need to finish it how it ended up...

To somehow sum it up and organize a little bit, there are bad news and some good news.

Bad is of course I still has some relapses into pure degen gambling in quite compulsive way. Now it is only roulette. Haven't played any slots, high stakes or other forms. I don't know why I felt into this stupid game. Probably it is easy to bet and get quick outcome. Not much to think, watch, decide... Lost? Increase bets and go for more. Really bad for me, but it is the honest truth.

Bad is also my financial situation. Big debt. Not improving with it basically in last 5 months. Just hanging there almost at the edge.

Bad is also I kinda lost some drive to play poker. Well maybe it is difficult due to my current situation and mood to grind patiently and comfortably. But I have about 50k hands this year and nice small profit.

What is good?
I got 3 additional projects in the meantime. One big and two small, but all give me some profit on a side. Now my monthly income is good enough to cover monthly debt costs and I can pay some more if I don't have too many spendings in a given month. But with recent accidents I need to be extremely careful not to waste it all. And now I am quite scary as the situation is slipping away from my control. Again.

Good is also that I stopped doing desperate shots at high stakes, gambling on sports or many others. I don't event enjoy this stupid roulette thing. It is just rather the feeling that it so easy to win little money there, especially when feeling down. Such a bad thinking pattern. It happened only 4 times in last 5 months, but it is still 4 too many and 3 of those times ruined me.

So what now? I am currently in uncomfortable situation with my bank. Last month I planned to close early one part of my debt and filled the papers for it. Unfortunately, after my last degen hit I am a little bit short to pay it off and somehow it is difficult to unroll it. Not sure how to handle this situation, online consultant didn't help me too much and I probably have to do a personal visit. A very uncomfortable one. That is part of the price for being such a stupid degen dork.

Probably one of the best option for me is to stay away completely from gambling, of course including poker. But I can find a lot of excuses and argue with it infinite amount of time. The truth is the problem is real, but I would prefer to eventually get back on the right track. Play only poker and no other forms of gambling - at least here now I am winning just some small stakes. It is ok for me. The endboss of my gambling problem apparently is roulette. Probably blocking all of these and uninstalling poker rooms with this option is pretty good start.

I know that writing is even better idea. That is why I am here again. Typing this chaotic stream of my thoughts but hey... it is honest and direct from my head.

It is sick and almost depressing how good and confident I felt just a week ago. And suddenly got hit by 2 almost deadly blows. Health condition of my pet and first relapse this year. Can I make it last one? I will try but can't promise.

I will need some more time now to get back into shape. Not thinking about lost money, spins and that last one that could save me but... , not thinking about debts, World problems, war, covid and other.... Clear mind and focus.

My cat is top priority now, there is a chance she can live for 2-3 more years or if the situation is really bad, then probably we enjoy together our last days. I am sort of ready for this moment. It is always painful, but I had a lot of dogs and cats in my life and had to see them passing.

Financially, I am now far from any kind of danger zone. Just need to sort out with my bank current situation and then I really don't want to lose more. All be good and on right track if I just keep working, enjoying my life and maybe play some poker online.

Yes, finally poker. Lots of thoughts here also. It is really not as good and as easy to make money in online poker nowadays. I don't claim it is impossible, not saying poker is dead etc. But there was more games, more people playing, more recs and less rake everywhere. I see many streamers and players failing to keep making (enough) money, challenges, winrates. People study solver a lot to beat NL25 or even NL10. Cmon... When I was playing 8 years ago, I was making more that twice my salary by playing half-drunk most times. Now it is really hard for me to earn similar money in poker. I know I could do better eventually, focus more, study harder. But honestly, there are some top regs making ok money, and only few superstars making around 1milly per year. This is not as "good life" as it was advertised 10years ago

I still love playing cards. This will probably not change, so even playing small stakes is cool for me, but without a big dream it takes away some part of motivation and this spicy expectation to reach the high stakes and heaps of gold.

...just me complaining bad condition of online poker in 2023.

Well, enough for today. Especially that still in suboptimal mental state.

I am back!



I will be posting regularly (at least try to keep it very regular). I am pretty sure next days and probably month I will post almost everyday to steam of my bad emotions. I hope I soon can play some poker again but for now I still need few days away from any form of gambling.

I appreciate any words, comments, support or hate

Welcome back!
I re-read your thread and the only advice I can give you is:
Stop playing poker and stop gambling at all. Lock your accounts forever!

You are a gambling addict - you will never win longtime as you never stick to your plans.
One day you write you will stay at 5NL until your bankroll will reach a certain amount. The next day you post a graph of you of 50NL. And this happend X times in your thread.

Poker and gambling is unhealthy for you and destroy your life. Stop it and become happy.

Hope this doesnt sound too harsh - you seem to be a nice guy….

Thank you for indeed harsh but honest comment. I definitely need to stop gambling, not that sure what with poker. It might be very painful for me to fully convince myself to stop playing cards.

This weekend I am staying away "from everything" even from computer. Just switched it on and i will not open a poker client. Spend today with family having good dinner and good time watching some classic movies. Such things are very important in difficult moments and it can help to deal with poor mood. I really enjoyed this time and tomorrow is sort of replay for me. Then I have quite a busy week at the office so lucky for me my headspace will be pretty busy anyway.

The most painful thing right now is health condition of my pet. Nothing I can do here, just putting lot of time and care and hope for the best. Definitely I understand it is not a good time to play right now and expose myself to gambling. Fortunately have some more movies for tomorrow planned.

The very best to your cat!!!

I have a cat and a dog (and always had cats my whole life) and I know how it hurts if something bad happens to them.

Thank you for good words. We really need all good energy. ATM I'm still superfocused on work and cat's health. But the blog is not about pets but poker and my gambling troubles...

I solved the problem with my bank and here things look stable. I am still not playing anything but probably near the weekend I will go back to grind small stakes.

It is really good to write a blog. I also re-read my story I put here so far and see some improvements I did in last time (unfortunately it is still not enough). I behave pretty properly at the poker tables - I don't play out of my bankroll, I have this year nice sample with positive winrates at all stakes from NL2->NL25 and did only one shot at NL50 with b/e result. Now I feel like the gambling/roulette issue is something completely separate from cards. The problem is they can be accessed very often from the same client. Of course all of this can be my excuse or false image - well, every addict can find some excused and create lies just to keep his/her addiction going on.

Recently I watched many videos devoted to the topics from broad range - emotions and control, addiction, dopamine. Definitely something I can highly recommend almost to everybody. Lots of useful info is out there and it can really help at least to better understand some mechanisms. Of course watching online videos is far from professional help and academic teaching, but I am pretty sure most of us know how to find valuable content online. In the end I have a person who takes care of me and my problem in a professional fashion and we also discussed and agreed in that matter.

It is still painful that I've just busted a bankroll worth about 25% of my total debt. The plan was to keep using this money to pay it off early, while slowly grinding and trying to keep a roll at reasonable level to play on NL25/NL50. But I must admin had a good run on poker tables in last 3 months and it is definitely doable for me to stick to this rhythm, without eventual blast off at roulette. As usual at least a small goal or plan is in my head, almost ready to be executed. The stars recently spoils me with medium sized challenges which is great as they are within my confident range of volume and stakes. Additionally, the award is significant enough that can improve early payments.

So right now I still stay away from poker couple more days, a lot depends on the weekend plans. Then I get back to NL10/25 to grind monthly challenge in February. I am pretty sure if I can do it and close the deal, my mental confidence will get solid boost. I still need to workout some additional measures how to avoid all bad temptations.

I think my current "detox" from play is doing good for me. Overall still in quite "sad" mental state, so it is probably best decision to stay away from any games. One thing I did in this matter is I blocked all non-poker possibilities for me to gamble and left poker restricted only to small stakes.

With above I see now following valid and reasonable options for me, with regard to playing poker:

1. Continue playing on stars NL25 and grind out monthly challenge this month.

Then probably I will have a low volume March as I have a business trip scheduled and then there is no way I put enough hands to finish similar challenge. I like this option financially if all go smooth. However I still want to stay away from tables for at least few days. With each day it will be harder to finish the bonus and time pressure and deadline is the last thing I need right now.

2. Cashout my current roll. Leave 20 BI for NL2. Grind it slowly from the bottom, without looking at RB, challenges and so on.

Currently this is probably my favorite option. Only disadvantage is that I drop the challenge where I have some nice progress so far.


In case of either option 1 and 2 I also plan to change my current mind-frame and goal. I completely drop the ambition right now to have success in high stakes or anything similar. I go the minimalist way. This also takes away unnecessary thoughts in my head about the future of poker, if there will be high stakes good games or any serious money in poker that can change my life in 5 years, etc. I was definitely thinking too much about such distant unachievable goal for me, while the real problem is elsewhere. It also added some frustration that I can't get there fast.

I will play only on PS (all other clients uninstalled/blocked) and only zoom tables. Goal is to play up to NL100 and grind there as long with positive wr as I can using winnings to support paying of my debts. I dont want to attack 200z before that. I will not play elsewhere or higher before I'm out of my financial "grave". It is currently the top pool as 500z is not running on regular level, so playing on NL100 should be much easier than 200. And any reasonable winrate on 100z is really enough to boost my monthly budget. Damn, I remember times I had 2bb/100 there on a solid sample. Is it really that hard now? What has broken in my head? How to fix it?

Such approach will also simplify my studying process a lot. Have a tons of materials, videos on zoom poker to study and some good cash streamers usually play this format. I have also some software to help study these games.

3. Stop playing at all. Or at least for some longer period of time.

This is also ok option for me. However, I have to give up some dreams and agree the game defeated me. Maybe it is not a big deal in terms of pride and my gaming soul, but I still have some strong believe in myself. I handle many other difficult situations and understand technical and scientific concepts very well - poker from that perspective is relatively easy for me. Clearly, my issues are in different area. Can I eventually fix them for good? If I stop playing are those issues fixed or my weakness can happen somewhere else in my life? No one has answers for these important questions. Time will show.

Another sad part if I stop completely is that I will no longer write in a blog. Well, I can promise I will do some random post-poker, post-gambling life updates every couple of months or so.

For now - I don't play. Gonna enjoy the weekend and some more, maybe then decide. All three options are open.

i literally dreamed last night where i was playing micros and it was the final 4 in an sng and top 3 got paid and everyone had like 40bb except for one guy with like 3bb and i noticed the screename was maragedon

don't remember anything else, i know the dream itself wasn't about poker just i briefly was playing sngs at one point

kinda weird, even weirder to post about it, but here i am posting it

Haha... great story, however my situation in your dream is not favorable. I am not an sng player, but 3bb looks bad even in this format I guess. I basically played only few sng's in my life. Probably most happened in spin n go format at the beginning of my gambling problems around 14 months ago. I 'decided' to play few HS spins and actually I might be there in a profit. I'm pretty sure I hit x25 multiplier at 100 and won and also 10x at 1k and also won. Of course I also lost some but general was in nice profit due to variance. It was a moment that basically rescued me from my first big bankroll hole. Good times. I remember the stupid feeling of greatness, being "so smart and lucky" and relief. Of course I told to myself I will never let myself to lose it back and well.... two months later I was in trouble again.

But to clarify, maragedon is not my screen name on any poker client. I was hoping it is my original name I came with when establishing this account, however now I find that there are some maragedons out there in the internet space.

Wasn't me!

Now I'm enjoying the weekend. Slept well, eat healthy. This is what I always try to take care of, especially in difficult times. Mood is a little bit better. I also feel like I might open soon some NL2/NL5 grind back again. Probably I will also restrict higher limits to be 100% sure nothing bad can happen.

However I am not sure if I decide to grind for monthly challenge. It was always tempting proposition, but somehow under the time limit and pressure I often performed bad. I have one factor that can help me decide on it, but I still need to wait few more days for this, so for now... reading a book, cooking, movies through the weekend, and Monday I start with micros.
...with more than 3bbs.

yeah i only noticed because it was like "oh this guy's in a bad spot... oh i know him"

Intense week for me, so I will probably post only short bursts of thoughts and feelings.

First of all, I decided I will grind out the Monthly Challenge. I am already at 70% due to the combination of early gambling and high volume grind. Right now, I can peacefully grind it till the end of the month and I hope I will not hit another bump. There is temptation inside of me to finish it as early as possible and have the money in the bank, but I really don't need to hurry with this business. So the plan is to grind it out mostly on NL10-50 at the same time trying to hit something at Leaderboards. I had small successes in this promo recently. Maybe stars will provide more support in this matter.

Pokerwise, when I finish the challenge I am not going to grind it in March. Half of the month I am on a business trip so there is no possibility to grind it at all. Maybe good, maybe bad for me. On one hand I would prefer to grind the monthly challenge on regular basis and now it is perfectly fitting my volume possibilities and financial goals. But maybe the break will be good for me. I will study a lot during this time and for the second half of the March - I will grind a lot without rakeback goal, but instead I will focus on the quality of game. This mean more focused grind, maybe 2 tabling zoom instead of 4.

Mentally I am in really mixed state. There are moments with some sort of optimism and there are difficult moments. In general, I am safe and have good life, but it still hurts to have this big monkey on the back. But besides some more expensive things, my life is similar to what it was before my crush. So... how to handle this? Somehow a lot of my pleasures don't tastes the same when I know I should spend less money. Even pizza. Really? Not really, I still love it and tastes the same. But you probably know, what I mean. So I think I really need to think it through, find essence of the things that make me feel good and happy and enjoy them anyway. Especially they are within my reach. I am pretty convinced that it is better to be happy and enjoy life but in debt for 3 years, than 1 year but in real unhappiness. Well...it is interesting dilemma, for now I will try to be somewhere in the middle, depending on how I feel about it.

Another good day for me.

Grinded two sessions, both in small profit. Challenge is going nice, 78% done. Probably grinding on NL10/16 is enough to finish it at current rate of remaining points per days left. No need to hurry, but I book small winnings on NL25 and NL50 and hit one LB very nicely so I will keep going at this pace. No plan to hit NL100 anytime soon - it is only as a backup plan, when I need more points.

I must admin last Sunday was probably the worst day in this month. I kinda easily stay away from my bad gambling games (well, they are actually blocked). What I mean by that I don't feel the need or urge to play and I am fully convinced internally that I won't bring me anything good or even any small kind of joy. However, somehow I got a little bit nervous and triggered throughout the whole Sunday. I managed to control it, but I am pretty sure it was a small sign of withdraw from roulette. Well, poker is very nice but when I was degening, my roulette bets where many times bigger than my poker games. So it was always stronger and more exciting to bet 10x or 20x my standard BI on red and dopamine rush when winning was huge. Now I definitely don't want to put half of my bankroll on the table. In any game.

In order to deal with it and to avoid similar 'triggered' day again I want to find other enjoyable things and give myself more joy and dopamine somewhere else. Fortunately, I really like a lot of things in life. I have access to many sports places in my town paid by my company. So the first idea is to visit many different sports venues and start various sport activities. Gym & sauna for a good start, but also martial arts - I always wanted to learn some BJJ. Then maybe also dancing. I hope 2-3 times a week is doable for me. Then also every 1-2 week I want some social or music party, to enjoy time with more friends or random people.

And from the other side of the spectrum I will add some end of day meditation or similar practices to calm down. I don't think I can do it everyday, but I will try something like 2-3 times a week and if I feel like it's working out then keep it as a good habit.

Tomorrow is the most demanding day of the week for me, so a good night sleep is probably the best I can do. Here, I also have some mixed thoughts (as usual). Good sleep or grind? Should I always maximize usage of my time or sometimes allow to just enjoy lazy procrastination?

We are (not) the robots

Difficult last few days, both physically and mentally. I had many office hours which unfortunately wasn't as fruitful as I needed it to be. At the tables also results are below average. I am close to finishing the challenge but the bankroll is on the life support. Slight sleep deprivation, work pressure and long hours, bad mental game - all those factors don't help to perform at the table. So again I am in the spot that playing for rakeback/challenge bonus is pushing me too hard and can result in a bad outcome. Well, we will see it in couple of days. For now I give myself 50/50 shot to get there, but I don't lose much if I fail.

Next few days I just grind a lot, especially during the weekend, then I possibly finish it off next week. Either way, I gona bust or succeed.

Will post more after the finish(dead) line. Ciao

Just in time - Friday sunrun finally was switched on for the gravedigger. I really needed good profit and nice session. Won like most flips and had a lot of setups in my favor, however at the very end I lost a final 60/40. Still great for roll and confidence. Actually I am getting better and better with the confidence, I had a lot of winning sessions this year on the poker tables and up to NL25 included games feel really easy to me. NL50 kinda ok, but really depends how focused and clear is my mind.

Anyway, super happy to book the fruitful session (although I feel I did nothing special except to keep getting dealt better hands by a notch every single time). The finish line now looks really close - Im at 88%. So I think I can easily grind few more days only NL10-NL25 book the challenge and then think what next...

Time for some good night sleep. Tomorrow I drink some and it is important for me not to do stupid things after the drinking. Gonna be really careful with respect to that.

Great weekend everyone.

Crazy time! Too crazy, too much...

but I did it. I finished the monthly challenge. Was grinding today like 10h. I am a little bit triggered because I had a nice peak around Friday/Saturday and last distance that I had to cover I started to run superbad. Could be better results overall, but it's still fine. Moment to take a breath.

I am supertired right now so I am not gonna make clear plans and next goals. However I have a lot to think about. Now I will take easy poker for around next month. Probably just study and play micros as I no longer grind for a challenge bonus. It is slightly annoying form of rakeback as it seems to always push me to play more and a little bit too hard. Also when I have a lot of business trips and other activities it is basically very tough to do regularly. That is why I plan to skip it in March, and I aim to go for it in April.

One other possible solution is to play on GG with a weekly rakeback. But I somehow prefer to stick to the stars. I already moved my games between these two rooms way too many times. Also on a fundamental level I generally dont agree with the approach GG has. So I rather don't want to play there.

Ok, my mind is still buzzing. Yesterday I was drinking, had little to no sleep, today grinding the whole day - need a nice long sleep for a good start of another week.

Had a good night of sleep and pretty long Monday at the office. But now all is much clearer for me and the way of how I want to continue in my situation.

As mentioned in few posts before I want to stick to the Pokerstars and focus on grinding Zoom. I am used to this, I enjoy it, I trust stars etc. But I don't like the challenge style of the rakeback as it always gets me wrong. So for now I don't have to think about it too much. I am not going to grind it in March. So now I have like about 4-5 weeks of slow grind without chasing the rakeback. Let's focus on a good solid game. Was considering GG for a while but the idea of big rake and dealing mostly with reg tables is not something convincing me to go there.

Ok, lets keep playing on stars. First of all, I need to increase the volume. In past I was always grinding about 4k hands per day. Now I don't think it is possible as I have more duties at work, but something like 3k should be doable, 4k maybe during the weekends. I need volume for some real results, practice and to really know when and how much I am winning (or losing). Therefore, today I cashed out most of my last challenge bonus and bankroll. Now I am left with small fraction available to play. I don't think I can bust it gambling, so it is pretty safe move and it forces me to grind some bankroll from the bottom again. Actually it is really not that much from the bottom. I played some amount of hands in 2023 and so far I was winning on all stakes from NL2-NL50. As current roll is good to go grind NL10 this is my entry point.

My plan is to grind NL10 for at least 1 week. If I am winning there and make like 10BIs or more I am moving up. Then I want to play NL25. I can sit there for at least 2 weeks and then see how it is going. My current ultimate goal is to get to the NL100 and be winning there. If I achieve that, I grind there as long as I am in debt. It will take quite some time. But the gravedigger needs to learn patience.

I expect stars to give me similar challenge as I had this month. So in order to have a shot at it in April, I need to successfully grind through NL10 and NL25 in the remaining time in February and in March. On NL50 it is doable for me to grind this challenge although NL100 would be better. If I fail to reach NL50 before April - I keep playing lower and I definitely don't aim at the challenge from lower stakes as it is really painful and won't end up well for me. I just don't want to risk/gamble again playing under the pressure and doing inhuman volume. If I also need April to grind NL10-25 then let it be like that. I have nice regular income right now from my job so it is more important not to gamble and degen, than super fast grinding up the poker bankroll.

I hope I can soon focus more on poker posts, stay tuned...

Finally, getting back on track with playing poker.

Last three days have quite good results but the volume is too small.


I worked out a general plan to grind around 3k hands per day while I try to add some small rb from Leaderboards. I want to play 600 hands at each stake starting from NL2 -> NL25. So my graphs will have a kinda funny look with flat period on lowest stakes and more variability when I progress toward NL25. If I am not in the zone and focused or just have a bad day I will try to stop at early stages and play higher only if feeling super A-game.

If grind go well, I might add NL50 or cut some of the smallest stakes as probably it is still less EV to start at NL2/NL5 than grind more hands at NL25, even without LB. But for a while I will stick to this plan and treat is as a good poker warmup. I play with BB displayed instead of money so it doesn't concern me a lot.

I also need to improve my study time. It is quite limited at the moment and I also don't use it efficiently. I am watching too many old videos and streams. The mandatory change is to put in more work with solver. So probably depending on the amount of time I can dedicate to study - max is 1 video per day (sometimes I used to watch +3 and usually after second vid it is really not efficient). Then I add 1h of solver/training/hh analysis. If I have more time I can add maybe another 1 video, but no more than that. Also If I watch some cash game streams I skip 1 of the planned video. And currently I don't plan to study more than 3h per day, it should be definitely more than enough.

Financially, next two months will be quite difficult. I can handle it and frankly I have no other choice. Unfortunately there are some expenses I have to cover, so I won't be able to pay upfront any parts of my debt. But if this time goes well and I just "survive it" things gonna get really much easier starting from the May. Right after a full year of my blog here about my degen problem. Of course, this will be only if I won't return to roulette tables. But last few days I feel really strong in this matter, so I will do whatever it is in my willpower to stay sober from this gravelette.

Time for a short summary of this week and February month.

Definitely not the best time I had, since I establishing of the blog. My another gambling relapse at end of January put me again in very dark place. I was heading into good direction and of course all of this what happened on roulette tables was wrong, bad and stupid. So sad it is another time and I still struggle with this sickness. However I handled February pretty well and there was no bad moments for me at all with respect to gambling issues. Unfortunately poker is still in crawling mode. Low volume and super small stakes. I managed to get financial stuff under control and I am not under really short budget as it happened few times before but the loss is still painful and demotivating.

Well, I grinded some in February and the results seems to be nice but the volume and stakes are currently too low for any reasonable budget recovery plan. Soon I have a longer trip so I think next few days I just play smallest stakes aiming to make 1-2k hands per day and do a little bit of study. Just for a good measure and training a good habit. Then I handle the trip and when I'm back in the second part of March I will switch full mode to poker grind. I really don't want to have any stress and uncomfortable situation at the tables before my incoming event.

I will post some very easy and relax posts in the next week and then probably I take a short break. It is probably great idea to get some mental reset, but overall I now feel pretty ok that last month went good so far and everything was under control and I didn't even had any sort of a strong urge to gamble. I had this impression many times that I am on a good track, now I can only hope that this one is stronger than previous and I won't screw it again...

I put a lot of effort not only toward work but also other activities. Have a lot of sports and also social stuff is sort of "on fire" so it really helps to keep my head excited and fueled with dopamine, so I don't need that feeling from bad places like roulette tables. My trip will also be exciting experience, and then I have some more fresh plans.

If I keep my February pace and vibe till May I will be super happy to write a post here after a year with a feeling I did some progress. Not financially, because I will be still in worse place than year ago, but I think that time last year was really crazy, stupid, the wheels were off and tilt was in full mode. So for now this is definitely one of my smaller but important goal, to keep current mindset and focus only on small stakes poker till May 2023. May 2024 I want to find myself financially much better than it is now but I will need a lot more work and patience! And control. Lets go!

Ok last session in Feb and also last before 2 weeks break is finally in the books.

I managed to play 3k hands which makes me really happy.
Despite small swings in the session and finishing in red I am very glad and kind of optimistic for what is coming next.
I played a lot of micro/small stakes in Feb after my last roulette blowup. I had almost all sessions in green or break even. In last week or so, after the challenge, I played really disciplined poker and I also started to feel better about playing cards, while my urge to play and gamble on other games was under a solid control. Moreover, it was also important that I had couple of session ended in minus and not have the need to gamble back my loses in any other stupid way. Somehow it was now natural and easy (just like in past) to accept that I have to lose sometimes (or ever around +40% time) and it really hasn't created any pressure or discomfort inside me. Maybe it is a good sign that im on a good track to proper poker grind?

Now it is time for 2 weeks pause from the tables, so I won't be posting it during that time. I will return in the middle of March, ready to grind more zoom poker while trying to get some luck on the leaderboards. I think I will keep grinding circa 3k hands per day, up to NL25 and make myself ready for April and monthly challenge grind. For this I need to be prepared to grind NL50.

GL all at the tables and see you soon!

Welcome back!

After prolonged, almost 3-week business trip and at the same time a considerable break from poker and gambling I am back and ready to dig some gold and fill my poker grave.

The trip was overall very good and nice experience, also profitable for my future career. I never like the ideas that sometimes we need to take a break (from poker) to get back later with the motivation, fire, energy, passion, whatever... but it feels now that it worked like that. The chaos due to my gambling addiction that mess with my life for over 1,5 year now is much more under control. I am back to quite safe place financially and if I am not going to screw anything moving forward on, I should be fine, doing a smooth sail and after some time if patient enough, there is a finish line far at the horizon.

So what is the plan now?

1. I want to keep grinding poker (while not returning back to roulette tables or any other form of gambling). I have to do it in a slow and conservative manner. Not playing too much, not forcing the volume, meanwhile study a lot. As simple as this, and this should be more than enough. Currently I want to grind zoom on pokerstars. My recent samples indicate I easily win at NL10 and NL25. However for a nice monthly challenges I need to b/e NL50's or might try also NL100 in future. I know I am perfectly capable to get there soon with some work and discipline. This will be the main focus here on the blog to write about me going on through this process.

2. Of course I need to pay off a lot of debts. I have around 15 small debt packages and one big - which has worst interest rate. Firstly, I want to deal with this big one as it is most +ev to get rid of this as early as possible. In past I was planning to start paying off early the small debts and then as I progress and have lower monthly payments for remaining debts it should make life easier. But currently my income is decent and I can safely go from month to month without worrying too much about my budget. So it is clearly best to start paying off deal with worst interest rate. I should be able to do it in a few months. Maybe 3 or 4? I will be superhappy if I do it before the summer and it will be really big milestone for me. Then I will just switch to paying those small packages depending on their rates and my financial situation. To early to be specific here and thinking now about one step ahead is just good for my focus and mindset.

3. Last but not least - probably the most important for the success of previous two points is that I must successfully stay away from other gamblings. I had completely no urge last weeks so it might be a good sign. There is one big thing that changed for me since Nov 22 is that my financial situation now is much better due to higher monthly income from my regular job. Now, after few months with higher salary it really makes a difference I can feel and less worry about surviving from paycheck to paycheck.

This really changed a lot in my head!

Earlier I just had a strong need to book at least a small win every single day at the tables. I know - very stupid and not possible. But that is what dominated my mindset. I needed to win everyday to have some hope and feeling that I slowly progress. With such approach - every losing day was very painful and the quite often a bad poker session was starting some thinking about gambling it back. Usually I was able to control it, but with time this accumulated during longer bad runs or bad events in personal life and then I often destroyed my bankroll one more time.

Now, it feels really different. Better. Safer. As I am doing good with my regular job I just want to keep grinding poker at a peaceful rate and if I can add some profits every month to ease dealing with my debts - that's perfect. That is the plan. I don't think anymore I need to hurry to jump to higher games or become a poker pro. Maybe I will be one day, maybe not - im not thinking too much about it right now. I Just want to easily play a game that I love and if good results happens that is even better. This takes a lot of pressure from my mindset and I am happy I can now take such approach.

But I am fully aware the devil is still inside. Waiting for my weakness and mistake. Need to be very careful all the time. Just by browsing my previous posts here on the blog I can see how many times I was almost sure I am on the right path and then another bump on the road happened.

So I have two recent improvements in my life to help with this, and another one I am about to add. I increased amount of sports I am doing right now and time I dedicated to staying fit. Good for health, stress management, focus, wellbeing etc. Everybody knows about it but sometimes it is still hard to incorporate and execute such simple steps in life. Another point is that I have some more "action" in my intimate life, which is also good Finally, I want to add just a little bit of meditation or similar form of practices to keep my mindset clear and calm.

Ok. Great plan - let's see how about the execution. As mentioned before I will focus here to write about poker and less about other stuff around it but if something important happens or I do a next step in getting out of my debt I gladly report it.

For the rest of the month I will play small stakes NL5-NL25 zoom on pokerstars. I need to get back into the games and prepare for April and Monthly challenge.
I also have to review my finances after the trip and clearly see the place where I am with debts and how far I am away from paying of the Big one. As soon as I sort it our I will add some kind of progress bar/tracking % of this goal here. I always like looking at the numbers. I will try to always keep here my current (small) poker goal and progress and debt goal.

So... lets grab some coffee and for today the aim is to crush NL2 and NL5 as a warm up after a break. Big goal

I wish you good luck!

By the way, on the stars, it seems that you can block access to the casino for always or for a certain period.
I think blocking for a few months would be a +EV solution

Thanks for good luck, slyless! I am aware of this option and it is already in use. Casino games are already blocked, also spins, sng, MTTs and HS cash. Just left myself with the option to grind zoom where it is not easy to do a serious damage to my roll.

I did some serious "math/accounting" today and things look better than I thought. If I get a bonus for last project and next paycheck, I should be able to close my worst debt position. It is around 20-22% of my total deficit and it is the one costing me the most. If I beat this one, then it would be much easier in next months. I think I will have around 15 small packages and sooner I close them, less I pay in some additional costs. So there is definitely some incentive to do it as fast as possible, but I really don't want to push it to hard.

Slow start so far at the poker tables. Was mostly watching some study videos and grinded maybe 2k hands of micros at break even. I need to incorporate a good and efficient study plan while keeping decent volume. For the remaining days of March I should be able to study 1-2h per day most days, so its usually 1 video + some solver/hh analysis. At the same time I would love to keep volume somewhere between 2-3k hands per day. Very doable for me if I keep focus and don't have any other extra events. It is still time to get some hands on NL25/50 this month and see if next month challenge on stars is a realistic option. In April I should have a relatively peaceful grind at the office and a lot of time for grind in the evenings. It is still a big question what bonus do I get from stars, but I assume if I failed this month to grind it out, they are not going to increase the points goal. I would really appreciate a smaller one thou.

So far rather slow week in terms of poker for me . It is hectic time after the trip and I am busy with lot of non-poker things I need to do asap. But I still manage to dedicate some time to get back into game.

Last 3 days I mostly study in form of few training videos and longer sessions in training mode of gto. Probably played more hands in training than at the tables. Still managed to grind more than 1k hands per day and win like 2 buyins on 2z, 5z but it is still far, far away from my goal. But I really need it, to build confidence and slowly get to the proper grinding routine. I think I need two more days and then on Friday I switch to put more time at the tables and add 10z and 25z. If the weekend goes okish on these stakes then next week I probably focus on grinding just NL10/25 and increase the volume.

With respect to study I also want to start focusing on one spot at a time and perform a good analysis, study and training. Not sure how to select the spot, but now all solvers/trainers have a lot of preprogrammed settings, ideas etc. I can also look into my DB and see where I need to improve. I think 1 day is probably not enough per spot, so I will try to do following:

0. Select what spot do I study for next 3 days.
1. First day - more analysis, stats, ranges, betsizings etc. while taking notes. Short training at the end of the day.
2. Second day - review again and more for training part.
3. Third day - mostly training and memorizing with notes reviewing.

Then I can do a break from study for another day. After that I look for another spot to improve.
For now I don't think I really need so in-depth study, but doing about 2 spots/scenarios per week is still great. Later on, when around NL50/100 I can spend more time on 1 spot. Probably to make it simple 1 week - 1 scenario. And then I can really analyze it well, learn ranges and strategies and incorporate it into my head.

Study also needs lot of time, not sure if 1h per day is enough, 2h is surely ok for me. But then I want to grind for at least 3h. Normally I think I prioritize study, but in times when I grind for monthly challenge - the grind has to go first. So the study might go slower than assumed, but if I just add a day or two without study, just purely grinding it is still not a tragedy. I will try to watch then 1 training video just to warm-up a poker wheels in my mind.

Some difficult circumstances and thoughts while heading toward the end of March...

I already know I will have pretty busy schedule at the office in Apr-Jun months. Most likely easier time will be during summer. As I decided some time ago that my job is my top priority, I need to sacrifice some of my poker passion/obsession/addiction now and then and as a result I can't play and study as much as I would like to do.

Knowing that I will be not able to play enough volume to get next monthly challenge I think I have to change my grinding strategy. This month of course for over two weeks I was not able to grind due to trip, rest of the month is played on very low stakes but I will barely make 20%-30% depending how could last week go. I can possibly push myself really hard and do it in April, but usually such idea worked bad for me and for final result of the challenge. And now I am sure that I will have some additional events in April that force me to skip couple of grinding days completely. Quite annoying but there is not much I can do about it.

In few past posts over last year I expressed that GG was always tempting me with some advantages - mainly rb which is better suited for my grinding possibilities than stars monthly challenges. There are a lot of things I don't like about GG, but in my current situation it looks like optimal solution anyway. It is still not the live or death situation or that I have to take decision that I will stick to for the rest of my life/year or even month. My plan is to give it a shot in last week of March, starting today. There are some news that stars want to change rakeback system to weekly - this can keep me back at stars and would be great for me. So there is strong possibility I just play on GG for a moment and move back. This is ok. I just don't want to make any nervous strategic moves and now I can comfortably sit out and wait to see what is best for me and where to play.

I really understand how bad is rake at GG and don't like their approach to take so much money from players. Even if the games are better, and there is more traffic. I also really don't like that there are things that make play harder in terms of UI etc. (sitting out from all table for instance). What will win for me in my current situation? Let's see.... history tells that I attempted GG grind multiple times and usually after few solid sessions I was moving back to stars. Oh well....

First few hands at NL5 and at least I started with a small profit. Usually GG pushed me into red right from the start.

After what I saw at the tables and also during few streams with GG Rush n Cash - it should be rather easy to beat the pool. And obviously main enemy here is rake. I probably need to get used to the software and slightly different pool tendencies. Not that this is super important for me right now when I am trying out NL5 but I hope I can soon progress and grind somewhere between NL25-50.

So next week I plan rather relaxed grind on GG. Maybe 2 days on NL5 and if games are easy and I run decent, then I move to NL10. During weekend I have a small family party so probably I skip the grind and in April I want to finally generate some volume. It is still possible I change my mind one more time and go back to stars - depends how the rakeback system will look like there. If they really introduce nice and profitable weekly challenges then it is excellent solution for me. Let's wait some more patiently and then act accordingly.

I also reviewed some other possibilities and ACR is another option. I never considered it before to be honest and only heard some rumors it's tough and bot infested. But still lot of people play there, there are winning players too, clear rb system, blitz games. Last but not least I could get a nice welcome bonus. Not sure how much time would it take to grind it out, but if I break even and get the bonus, it could really support the broken gravedigger.