Time for a change

Not written for a few weeks… I guess I’ve been suffering from bad beat blues. The first few days in April were ok but since then it’s been pretty abysmal. I’ve not lost massive amounts as I had reduced the stakes well down. But the beats had been fairly shocking, it seemed like almost every day I would be taking a massive hit or two and struggling to recover. I would be getting it in on a 554 flop holding 54 only to be called by an over pair and end up losing. When I have QQ and the flop comes QJJ the guy has jacks. When I hit middle set he rivers a higher set, it goes in on a AK flop holding AK and he’s been slow rolling AA etc etc etc.

Now taking hits like this day after day, week after week is bearable if you pick up the odd pot as well. But it seems that the gods were not for letting this happen. I’d hold AA vs his AK and flop would come As Ks Js 2s Tc !! This has happened 3 times in a week!

The trouble with a run like this is that it impacts your ability to play normally. After a while you start to see ghosts and become worried about playing the nuts on the turn in case the river does you. You become a calling station, and still end up getting your money in, but on the opponents terms and not your own. As things start to spiral the cards dry up and you can’t find your way into a pot, when you do pick up AKs on a King high flop you cling to it and overplay it walking slap bang into matey boy with bottom two pair. It short you end up playing like a total twat and this simply compounds the miserable run even further.

Things came to a head this week when after a brief resurgence I managed to blow 5 buy ins at £ 1 / 2 NL … It does not get much worse than this, if you are doing your nuts at this level then something is wrong! Afterwards I sat down and reflected. I came across a recent post on Dpommos blog where he quotes someone else’s mantra about recovering from a downward spiral and being a profitable poker player. At the end of the piece there is a sentence that resonated with me.

From time to time I will check my play and if I’m playing badly I will stop playing.

I’m playing badly… so I’ve decided to stop playing. I could go on but I’m sure in this frame of mind I’d dump the rest. So I’m banking it in the baby fund for security, Shell has just finished work for 9 months and now’s not the time to be living on the edge. I’m probably going to go back to work full time.

Poker has always been fun, but the past two months have been no fun at all. To compound this I’ve been playing more and more for the WSOP promo (shame cos I’m not far off on course for it… if anyone fancies taking over the account mail me and we can maybe talk) , over the past few years it’s gradually taken more and more of my time up, ive put on a few pounds and let my social life slip a little. Considering I’m going to be a dad in the next few weeks, now seems as good a time as any to claim my life back.

You could say that but for a small loosing run I’d still be happy playing every waking hour and I guess you would be right, but things have a funny way of working out and in some ways I’m glad to have made this decision. Poker has been good to me, I’ve made a lot of money over the past few years, I guess that’s more than most can say. It was good while it lasted and while I have more discipline than most it obviously is not enough.

I may well continue playing some casual poker for fun… With FUN being the operative word. I’ll probably keep the blog updated once every few weeks of so as well.