This is getting out of hand

Hi... I haven't taken the time to compose my thoughts before writing this. But, I've come to this site in a time of stress and need, so I hope you'll forgive me if I ramble a bit. [Edit: I've rewritten it a few times for the sake of brevity [Edit-edit: *cough*]]

My name is Steve, I am 22 (23 next month), and have been gaming for going on 10 years. I began with the beta of Ultima Online, and later moved to MUDs for a variety of reasons. MUDs have proved to be a very compatible substitute. During the course of this history of gaming I missed out on years of development in social and life skills, real-life relationship experience, and forward progress I might have made had I not been spending so much time gaming.

I have never kissed a woman, I have never had a girlfriend. I *have* had a cyberaffair with a married woman, who I met through UO (which her husband also played... his answer to his fury when he found out was to kill me in-game, which I still cannot help but find some twisted humor in). More recently, I have been involved in an exclusive relationship for over two years with a girl I met through a MUD. We are no longer "together" (as together as a cyber-couple can be to begin with) as both of us have been trying to marshall our real lives back on track and there simply isn't much left when you don't spend any time together in the medium the relationship exists in.

I am a professional software developer as of a few years ago when I first began making real money at it. I consider myself an engineering student though I was out of school for several years. I chalk those up largely to my gaming habits, but have re-enrolled this semester. A big challenge for me lies in my aptitude and great love for the design and implementation of software solutions, including managing smart people and interacting with clients directly. I know this can be a lucrative and fulfilling career, but it is one that necessarily brings me into direct contact with computers. And there is no saving grace of just not installing the game... I play MUDs now, I can game from any working machine with an internet connection, no extra installation necessary.

I find that when I game, I do the "just one more thing" bit a lot. I never thought to ask myself whether I could predict how long I would play before reading a post on this board, but I have to say "No, I cannot make any estimation of how long it will be before I stop playing once I start". It's never costed me a job, but it's come close. It's certainly caused problems in my home life ... when family interrupts me while I'm gaming I am immediately furious. When I have been binge playing I am usually not 100% right in the head for hours, days, sometimes a week afterwards. There have been times when I've been in it so long that I don't know what normal should feel like. Over the calendar year before last, I did a consulting business from my apartment with only occasional face-to-face meetings with clients.. I drank a lot, I MUDed a lot, and I got my work done in between. My expenses were controllable because you don't need much gas to drive nowhere and you don't need a lot of food when you aren't very physically active. Effectively I was living in a crack-house that was supported by my expenses-compatible profession.

I want to stop. I've tried a few times but ultimately failed.. given all my characters away and begged the people to change the passwords. One guy had the heart to do it and I went for six months moving things in my life along. I had kept a low-level character to hop on and stay in touch with old friends though, and I eventually relapsed and went back to doing it full-time.

When I went to Navy Basic Training last September, some interesting things happened. One, there were no games whatsoever available to me for two months, and I was TRULY impressed and encouraged by how productive and stimulated I was without them. Two, although I have always been told I am capable of doing well at many things, I actually *did* well and was promoted both in terms of rank and in my responsibilities... that had never happened before. Three, my well-honed ability to rationalise and escape uncomfortable challenges helped me to escape the Navy with a medical discharge so that I could bring my lessons from 1) and 2) back to my civilian life and fix all of the wrongs I had done to myself over the years. The irony.. but it seemed like a good idea at the time.

I cannot blame gaming for my decision to escape the Navy, but I can say that gaming is what I always escaped into as I developed that behaviour pattern when I was younger. I am trying to work things out within myself right now... I felt when I returned from basic that I was in control of my life and I was eager to take it in the direction I wanted to go in. Since I have relapsed once again into gaming, I have seen my new steady job jeopordised, my grades suffer, and my relationships with my friends who were so supportive when I returned suffer as well. I can see that, with gaming, my control over my life slips away quickly. It slips away because... I cannot control it. I have tried and failed, I have tried hard and failed, I have tried very hard and gone for a while doing ok... but ultimately failed.

This has been tough for me to admit and I honestly do not think that the people in my personal life would understand or know how to support me in this. I don't even want to talk about it with my parents--- they were ecstatic when I took up programming at a young age, but their opinions took a 180 when they saw how much time I spent gaming on computers during my teen years.. I'll grant they are related activities, but my parents see no distinction at all.

I don't want to feel like I'm being judged, or even that my choice in careers is being judged. That doesn't mean I'm not open to criticism, but it's tough to take criticism from people who you don't think understand your situation.

I am hoping to find some people who really do know where I am coming from and who might have the time to just help me stay honest about this, preferably some sort of situation where with honesty in between there can just be some feeling of mutual-accountability.

All of the above having been said though.. and this last isn't easy to say.. I *need* help.

My goal is to take back control of my life completely, and learn how to keep it that way forever (or at least insofar as gaming is concerned).

Please respond!