Tucked up in bed, late at night, he would ask “what are you doing?”
My answer was always the same “nothing.”
I wanted to hide beneath the covers and disappear under the guilt. If he didn’t know, if I didn’t tell him, then maybe I would feel like it wasn’t real. But my deceit was very real. My addiction even more so.
I am a candy crush addict. And I can’t play to save my life. So I buy my way through levels, buy up boosters and buy up lives. The temptation is too easy. The ease at which the question lingers at the end of another failed level, play on? Of course I want to play on! My friends are passing me on Facebook, leaving me in the dust cloud they leave behind, full of failure and disappointment. I can’t keep losing. It is crushing candy for goodness sake, no one fails at that!
So I cheat. It really isn’t something I even think about. I just close my eyes and click to play on. Constantly ticking over on my credit card are Facebook charges. I don’t even look at them. I’m too ashamed. No one knows my secret. After all, it has to be a secret. I can’t admit that I am a failure. A failure at a kid’s game.
The deceit worked. I paid and passed levels, slowly moving through the candy crush kingdom. Life was good. But the good times only lasted so long. A credit card statement left lying on our kitchen bench was my undoing. In the past ten years of our marriage, my husband has never questioned my spending. Never. But the repetition of Facebook charges on this statement caught his attention. Of course they did – there were so many of them!
“What’s this all about?” he asked.
I had no choice. I had to answer. I had to tell the truth.
“It is candy crush, when I get stuck I pay to get help.”
I felt like I had just confessed to a six month long affair. I felt sick. Dirty. Ashamed. I had never lied to my husband. Yet, here I stood in our kitchen, exposed, vulnerable and stripped bare. I had cheated on the love of my life, my soul mate – with candy crush. What was wrong with me?
He fell silent. Put down the statement. “This needs to stop.” That is all he said and walked away.
My world came shattering down. The vows I said ten years ago mocked. With my lies exposed. Every level I had passed felt insignificant. The thrill of winning was now an empty gaping black hole. Dancing in my head were candies, laughing and mocking me. Pitch forks in hand, dancing around a fire, with me in the middle, held at the stake.
I had sold my soul to candy crush.
The road to recovery has been slow. I have no will power to delete the game. I just can’t. I want to keep winning. I want to reach the end. If wish I had the strength to just get rid of it. Cut all ties. Abandon the addiction. But I am weak. I still lust the adrenalin of passing another level, getting that sugar crush and watching the fish swim across my screen.
But the payments have stopped. No more bought levels, boosters or lives. Even if it means I never pass another level again. Candy crush is now a level playing field. And so is my marriage.
What secrets do you hide?
Are you a candy crush cheat?
The next Conversations over Coffee link will open on
Thursday November 28, 2013
The theme is Conversations with Death ~ everyone is welcome xx
