[HIV]

Well, I am officially done, folks, at the age of 18.

About 6 months ago....was it really just 6 months ago? I was broke. I had no money and owed my parents $1,000. I had hit my low point, or so I thought. Somehow I scraped up a couple hundred dollars playing live poker with my friends and deposited into pokerstars. I lost most of it, and was on my last 40$, depression started to set in deeply, like it has in my past.

However, then, a breakthrough. I final tabled one of the new 20$/180 tourneys, and cashed for 300$. Then, I went on a heater like you wouldn't believe.

I started at 5/10, where I ran well. I eventually got to multi tabling, 4 tables, and just killing. Moved up to 10/20, got my ass beat down, moved back to 5/10, built up a roll and moved up to 10/20 for good, or so I thought.

Anyways, after a month of this, I cashed out 5K, left myself with a couple hundred to rebuild with, lost that, deposited another 1K or so, built it up and made another couple thousand or so, my memory is kind of fuzzy but I know at some point I went broke on stars, and deposited into BoDog.

What a fishfest boodg was. I started with a 500$ deposit and luckily ran good at the 20/40 tables. Ran it up to a couple thousand, started playing 30/60 there, found it incredibly easy, ran it up to around 10K or so. Cashed some of it out, had over a 5 digit bankroll and was feeling as good as I ever did. Left some of it in and continued to win, went up to Turning Stone with $4K in my pocket, came back from that with $5K so it was a winning trip. Played some more online and continued to do well.

At some point in this fishfest, I got sick of bodogs horrendous software and equally horrendous players. I put another $750 on stars and sat 30/60. I ran good so I didn't go broke, and ended up building that 750 into around $12K during an insanely good rush. I then emailed stars and asked for access to the 100/200 tables. I didn't know it at the time, but this would be the start of my even more horrendous downswing.

After getting access to 100/200, I quickly sat down and had a -$2K losing session at a full table. However, I kept trying, and sat at a shorthanded table where I quickly and efficiently busted 2 people for $4K each. This gave me such a natural high that I didn't know what to do. I now had a bankroll of around $40K and ended up cashing all 40K of it out. It was at this time the school year ended and I went home.

My parents did not know about my success, and it took me about a week before I spilled the beans to them. I told them about the money and they said they didn't care what I did as long as I paid them back and paid for my own tuition. I said fine, and was free to play poker all summer.

I played on bodog again for about 2 weeks, where I hit the 60K point for the first time in my life. However, I then went on the first prolonged downswing of my young career. I ended up losing all the 20K profit on bodog and losing another about 7K back. So my BR was 33K, and with that, I embarked on a mission to Turning Stone, with $10K in cash in my pocket, determined to break the limit games there.

Turning Stone was a success at first. I met a lot of cool kids who were huge ballers online, like empire, zappy, ozzy. I chilled with them and felt like I was THERE, I was one of the top young players in the world, and it would be no time before I went pro. I was up $7K in the limit games and felt like I was unstoppable.

Then came the worst day of my poker career. Turning Stone spread 100/200 for the first time ever, and I sat 3-handed as the game began. I quickly ran over the old guys at the table with me, but then the table actually filled up, which I wasn't expecting. I was never strong at full table, and some bad beats quickly put me on tilt, and I began playing every hand trying to get back to my 17K peak. I had sat with all the money I had on me at the time, and within 12 hours of playing this game, I didn't have a cent in front of me. I had been cleaned out by what I had viewed as inferior players. I was so pissed and depressed, and immediately left the casino.

When I got home, I was resolved to making the money that I had lost back. I jumped onto stars and started killing their 30/60 games again. Within a couple of weeks I had hit 40K again. Within another few days, I hit 60K. I was playing 100/200 often when I was around this mark, and this was where the WORST day of my poker career and my life was to happen.

I sat with a player called "lily420" heads up at 100/200, and absolutely destroyed her. She came back several hours later and I was waiting for another match. However, her play seemed, different to me, much much more aggressive, and I had trouble adjusting. It turns out that earlier I had been playing Mrs. Grinder, and now I was playing the actual Grinder. Well, he ran incredibly hot over a 24 hour heads up battle, and I went on tilt at one point and ended up losing every penny in my account, over 36K. I sunk into a deep depression and started depositing on other sites, trying to get back what I had lost.

I ran 1500 on absolute up to over 10K in the soft 40/80 games, but ended up losing it all at a tilt-filled session with mark seif and jennicide at 75/150, then lost another 5K that I deposited from neteller

I ran 2500 up to 16K at one point playing MINIVAN666 heads up on UB, but ended up losing it all plus another 2500.

I ran 600 on full tilt up to 9K playing 10/25 NL against drunk people on a saturday night, then sat the biggest game I ever played, 200/400 vs Tiger and lost it all within less than 15 minutes. This was the quickest I had ever lost so much money and I was very depressed.

So I had like 10K left in my roll, and resolved, once again, to build it back. I put it all back on bodog, my fave site to win at, and ended up building it back to around 25K. I put some of it on stars and built it up again to like 30K total bankroll. Then I had a rough night multi tabling 30/60, and lost about 6K in an hour. I then sat 100/200 and proceeded to not win a hand in 20 minutes, and lost 9K very very fast. I then stopped playing for the day, but the damage was done, and I would never again have over 15K to my name.

I took the 10K I had left after the tilt filled session, and moved down to 10/20, sporadically taking shots at 30/60. Whenever I would take shots at 30/60, I would invariably lose, and I would lose more and more each time. I finally got my bankroll down to 600 at one point, and got pissed at myself and said, JUST WIN. Which I did, I played 10/20 and built that 600 into just over 13K. However, then I played 30/60 again, and lost 8K, played 10/20 but found it boring, and continued to play 30/60 until I was completely broke.

I then got a stake from a friend, 1K, built it up in small games, paid him back, lost what I had left, got the stake again, worked it up again, paid him back again, lost it all again, got a stake again, lost it this time, but then my friend and I swapped 5% in the sunday mill tourney and he won it.

Now at this point, he sent me 9K, and I was set, because tuition + housing for college for me was just over 7K, and I had it. So I cashed out what I needed and played with the rest. I paid for my tuition but left my housing money in my bank account.

I got my roll from the 1500 I left on there up to 10K. However, then the downswing reared its ugly head again. I lost the 10K so fast I didn't even know what happened. I didn't want to play with my housing money but I had left 500 in there to pay for books and stuff so I deposited that. I lost it, and then said [censored] it and deposited 3K. Lost it, said [censored] it [censored] it [censored] it, and deposited the rest of my bank account into bodog, where I quickly lost it. I only thank god I had already paid for my tuition or I'm sure I would have lost that money as well. The next day I asked my friend for a 2K stake, which I played 30/60 omaha hi/lo with, god knows why, and lost that too.

Yesterday I played the stars and bodog sunday tourneys as a last gasp chance. I lost the stars but cashed in the bodog for $550, which I quickly lost to 3 3-outers in a row in the 20/40 game. So, now I am completely broke, I have 200$ in the bank and $10 in my wallet. I owe $2K to my friend and I don't quite know how to tell my parents and my girlfriend, who will be devastated.

I have thought a lot about this, and it seems my only choice is to get a job, live at home for the semester and commute to school, and completely stay away from poker, perhaps forever. I really like the game but right now I am just sick of it. I have to completely isolate myself from it and that means not contacting a few friends that I am very good friends with, and I will miss that.

However, I really don't have a choice, because I want to graduate from college. I feel that if I get great grades this semester and prove that I have turned things around, my parents will be willing to pay for my tuition for the rest of college, but who knows.

So, goodbye 2+2 forums, I will be removing you from my bookmarks...I will not be watching poker on TV, I will not be talking about poker with my friends, and I will not be playing.

I guess the hardest part about all this is that I now feel that all that time, all those hundreds of thousands of hands I played, all those thousands of hours I spent at the tables, are all now a waste. I really thought I could go pro, but I just don't have the emotional stability required.

Hopefully someone might see this and recognize some warning signs for themself and learn something from this.

Regards,
Jon (iamhiv)