I would highly recommend that if you do decide to play online poker again to stay as far away from pit games as possible, I would even email support to have you banned from being able to play them online, this way there is zero temptation on that end. Good luck, you have the skills to win, but what is much more important is gaining the skills to not just give it all back.

lol. I'm glad I have you a good laugh.
No, I tip the cocktail waitress, of course. Just not from my stack.
I tip from the money in my wallet. I keep everything strictly separated.

I'm currently in Biloxi, Mississippi. I'm going to play and win the 300k gtd $365 buy in. Bankroll management for the win!

Busted. Shoved 88 called by AA. Flop 893. Turn A. GG. Probably have to put the whole roll online. Live is a bit too big for the roll currently. Oh well. I'll run it up online. Just need to be patient and stay disciplined.

What's up dude. ?

Hey what's up man. If anybody is interested in an update:

It's been a long time since the last post. Shortly after my last post, Hurricane Michael hit where I was living in Florida and knocked out power for weeks so I moved back to Northern Cali where my mom lives. I lost a large portion of the bankroll shortly before the hurricane and after my backer didn't want to take any more action. So I started playing exclusively online low stakes on Bovada and ACR with a $2k roll.

This wasn't the dumbest decision ever. I don't know, maybe I just am not good enough, but I feel like it's ridiculously hard to grind up a roll from low stakes nowadays. Especially with the rake and the games aren't great either nowadays imo. Try to get out of micro/low stake online as fast as you can, if you're trying to build a roll. Really work a job and skip it entirely is probably the best advice I've ever heard. Especially, if you have tilt control and mindset issues. Which I did big time.

So unsurprisingly, I went busto. This was a super low point. I was living with my mom, 31 years of age, no job, no degree, no skills. I sunk deep into a depression. For about a month, it felt like an impossible task just to get out of bed and shower and get ready, let alone do anything productive with my day.

So that goes on for awhile, I start to slowly pull myself out it. I realize being productive and feeling like I'm working towards my goals, progressing in life, makes me happy. So I do that. And I start to build more and more momentum and building positive habits becomes easier and easier. Eventually, I'm taking cold showers, running, meditating etc. daily.

After awhile I get a job at subway making minimum wage. Because 1) They were the only place willing to hire me and 2) You get free sandwiches. First paycheck I get I deposit half onto PPP. After a little less than a month at working at subway I have my PPP roll up to $4k. I'm crushing it on there and the games are amazing so I feel comfortable shot taking now and withrdraw $1k for live.

That was 3 weeks ago. Since then, I'm up $12K. 8.6K live and 3.4K on PPP. The live play is all 2/5 as there is no 1/2 or 1/3 spread at my local casino. And the PPP play is about 70% .50/1. 15% .30/.60. And 15% 1/2. 6max NLH, PLO, and 5card PLO with amount of hands played of each in that order.

I quit my job at subway a little over a week ago and am playing poker full time again and I couldn't be happier. This experience has taught me some valuable lessons. One thing I learned from all this, though, is that the poker dream is still alive in 2019. I was a huge **** up, I went busto several times, addicted to gambling, terrible mindset and habits and work ethic, felon who spent time in jail etc. And if I can get a minimum wage, part-time job, and go from 0 dollars to having a proper bankroll (20BI's for 2/5 live and enough BI's for PPP 100 and shot taking good 200 games) in about 2 months anyone can. The poker dream is not dead. If you have skill, learn to control your mind, find good games, be smart with your spots but don't be afraid to take shots if its an amazing spot, you can run up a roll from 0 to a lot really fast still. Poker is still amazingly soft all over America.

Sorry for abandoning the thread. It's been a crazy ride but everything is back on track now

Last 21 days since I've started tracking my results:
42 hours of live 3/5
and 94 hours of PPP

Whaat aap!!

Hey, glad to hear from you. Glad you're doing good again.

I'm sure you have many more fans. Maybe I'm just the most outspoken one

I'm trying to learn plo. So I started playing plo10 on Bovada and some on Betonline. Yeah, grinding a roll in micro is a living hell! The rake alone Will kill you.
But , it's more for learning.
Gl, gl.

So glad you are doing great again. Just read all the cooments today. I am now in the same situation you were some time ago. I'm 27 living with my parents, no roll, just trying to get hired and deposit all the money for 2months job. It s really hard to not get depressed, when you think of all that money you had and now you don't have 50$ in yor wallet. You really hate your life in that moment. Wish you all the best man.

Yeah it's tough man. The best thing is not to dwell on it. Just focus on being productive and working hard every day and results will come in due time.

Thanks brother <3

Sick results brah! Glad to see you are turning things around. Whereabouts are you in norcal?

Vincent! Thanks bro. Appreciate it and I'm in Redding.

So last night I had my first losing session live since starting playing again. It was a really weird night. I open AKo in EP and only the SB calls. Who is a tight old Russian man. Flop is A1010. I cbet 20 and he c/r to 50. I fold and he shows 44. Another hand utg opens 20, MP call, I call 88 in sb and bb calls. Flop 222. Checks around. Turn 10. I bet 1/4th pot mostly for protection. I don't need to bet much because the board is so polarized obviously but maybe I should just be in check down mode here? It's very easy for someone to have a 10. So anyways it goes: Fold, fold, MP makes it 100. I fold and he shows 89. He's also usually tight. I have no idea what is going on tonight lol.

One hand i did not get bluffed off I flop a set of 4s on an A43 flop. Limped pot, old lady stabs, I flat next to act, everyone else folds. Turn 4. She checks. I go to bet and she says, "I have an ace Josh." I bet 2/3rd pot, she calls. River A. She checks. I jam ~700 effective into ~100. I guess I got too greedy here because she folds. I really thought there was no way she could fold the nut full house for any sizing. But given her speech on the turn it is obvious she was already leery of committing a lot to the pot vs me and was trying to get to showdown cheaply. The A river changes things but still. You have to know your opponent. She was the one player at the table last night capable of folding there to that sizing and I should have known that. It wasn't even a tank fold either, less than 60 seconds lol. I got owned so hard, kudos to her.

Not really thrilled with my play last night. Could never get into the zone. I think bad sleep the night before is probably the culprit. I listened to a TED talk yesterday on the importance of sleep. I think we all know this intuitively, but it's good to hear it and be reminded of it, sleep is VITAL to high level cognitive function.

Got a good night sleep today though and ready to go crush tonight
Finished -175 live and up about ~400 on PPP yesterday.

-$700 3/5NL live

Played a 12 hour session. Started off good, up 1k+ then this hand happens: limp, CU 15, HJ call, fold to me in BB. I 3b AJo to 65. Fold to HJ and he calls.

Flop AK5r
pot: $153
I cb 50. he calls.

Turn Jc bringing bdfd. I have no clubs. I bet $175, he jams for $525 total. I call. River Q and he turns over K10o for the straight. Blah.

Stay at about +700 for the next 4-5 hours give or take a few hundred. Then we get down to 3 handed with a whale. We agree to a mandatory B straddle. I'm down to like a 950 stack when this hand happens: Whale covers and straddles his B for 10. I open BB to 60 with AsQd. He calls. Flop A63ddd. I cb 65. He calls. Turn offsuit 8. I bet 150. He calls. Pot is $550. River is an offsuit 9. I bet $200. He raises to $475!

At the time I thought this made no sense so I called. But in hindsight I think I could have gotten away from this hand. This whale is very passive and call happy. I have never seen him raise as a bluff post flop. Not on any street. He will bet out with bluffs sometimes. But IP he loves to call. He will call down super wide and I have seen him bluff when checked to. But never raise someone as a bluff. Always just fold or call. Certain villains are just not capable of bluff raising somebody. Especially on the river. I don't have enough of a sample size to say definitely that this guy isn't capable of bluff raising the river in that spot. But, I have a strong hunch he falls into that camp. Think I could have gotten away on river quite easily on that one :/

So I finish down -700 after being up over 1k at one point. Quite frustrating but a few hours of 3 handed 5/10 can be quite swingy. Think about how few hands you see. The variance will be enormous. So I can't be too upset about losing 700.

I will grind PPP for the rest of the week. Schedule will be PPP Sunday-Wednesday and live Thursday-Saturday. With days off whenever I feel like it. Looking forward to online grind where the swings aren't so intense. 700 isn't a lot of money but when it's like 7-8% of your bankroll the loss stings a little lol.

subbed glgl

nice updates! Glad to hear you're back on the grind. FWIW it was clear, after playing with you for a short while at Ebro, that you're a smart and talented player. Hoping you can get in a good grind routine and a healthy schedule. GL GL

After losing 700 the night of the last post I lost ~1k the next day playing .50/1 and 1/2 4card and 5card PLO on PPP. It became clear to me that I was still extremely tilted from the night before, and was just punting off stacks. Luckily, I was self aware enough to realize what was happening, and stop the bleeding before it got too bad. It was really troubling to me that I could tilt so hard after just one bad session. Clearly, I still have a lot of work to do, as far as mental game.

So after that I took the next four days off and have been crushing again since then. Have not degened and am sticking with the positive habits I'm trying to cultivate. Bankroll is now over 16K and up almost 10k for the month of June (First full month since quitting subway). Didn't get much volume in this week because of a family function. This weekend and the following week will try to put a lot of hours in (as long as I'm playing good and not tilting) and keep this positive momentum going. Let's get it!

Last four or five days have been pretty sick. Haven't put in very many hours but have won a ton of money. I've been running amazingly. Poker is so much fun when you're going through stretches like this... I have been playing mostly plo on PPP. Live game was just ok on Friday. I won $500. But Saturday the game only ran 2 or 3 hours and broke before I got to the casino. I think I am ready to move somewhere with a better live scene soon. I'm considering Sacramento, the bay area, Texas, Florida, or perhaps Boston.. That's still a little ways away though, first I'm going to go to Vegas for a week or two and catch the end of the WSOP.

Bankroll is getting dangerously close to 20k. I can't believe how fast I've managed to run it up. Two months ago I had negative money. One month ago I was working at Subway. One year ago I was in jail. I'm so happy with the way life is going right now. I just have to keep it up.

Here's my graph since I started tracking may 16th:

in before busto

That's kind of mean man

how much money is enough? you could have ample amount to make enough to live on and play poker all the time rather than going and blowing it.

Started today's session about 20 hours into a water fast. Not sure if that affected my decision making or not but not happy at all with my play. -$260 in 3 hours. One hand in particular stood out to me. I flat an EP open with 55KQ one suit to the K. BB calls. Flop 34Jss. I flop 2nd nfd. Bb checks, EP bets 3/4th pot. I call. BB calls. Turn 7. BB leads 30 into 32. EP folds. I raise to 100. BB he re-pots. I fold.

Anybody else try playing during fasts? How did it affect your decision making?

Going to play some basketball now. I'll probably play another short session later but will be very cognizant of my level of play and will make sure to end the session early if I'm not playing well.

so your making close to $70 an hour playing 3/5?

turn raise is spew in that last hand with second nut flush draw.

drinking a lot of water fast or no fast helps me concentrate at the table. i find i play better on a empty stomach but if i feel a bit fatigued or hungry mid way through i will eat something like bananas/nuts or drink a coke. the drinking of a lot of water though helps a lot. don't drink gallons though. 8-12 cups during a session should be enough.