First step is to recognise that you have a problem. So gz for that. 
In your case the best thing would probably be to delete all of your characters and uninstall the game.
I know this might sound incredibly hard to you, but if you make sure that you loose all of your stuff in this (quite frankly really dated game), then it probably won’t be the same, even if you fall back and want to start playing it again.
Best of luck to you. I hope you will find better and more fulfilling hobbies!
Hello OP,
I just wanted to say that I think you’re doing a wonderful job. You realized you needed to turn your life around by losing a whopping 115 lbs that in itself is not easy. Most importantly, you’re honest with yourself. Admitting you have an addiction, is hard to accept. Just know that you are not alone. I myself go through the same struggle as you. Lol, It’s taken me 8 yrs to get this game under control. And honestly, while some say you don’t have to take breaks. For me, I do. That is what works for me. I feel overall cheerful, optimistic, and energized when I’m away from WoW.
What has benefited me is determining if I have more pros v cons of playing this game. How has WoW affected me emotionally, physically, and mentally? Has it negatively affected my rl goals or interactions with others? From my personal experience, it has. I find myself grumpy/depressed when I speak to others, I’m less inclined to want to hang out. So yeah, it’s been a real relationship ruiner. I don’t need a therapist to offer me a solution to this madness. When I had family and friends telling me all along that I should quit this game.
In addition, I recommend speaking words of encouragement to yourself. Telling yourself that you can overcome this issue. Walking away from WoW might be difficult at the start but like all obstacles in life, it’s only temporary. You mentioned your interest in reading, watching tv shows, and working out. These are all better options that I think you should revisit. Having a good support system also helps. Pretty much any positive outlet that can replace WoW.
In regards to going cold turkey. Take it day by day. Gradually work on trying to remove/block anything related to WoW. I myself will have to cease visiting the forums. I seem to be just as active on forums as I was in game 
. Plus it might draw me back to WoW.
So remember you can do this. Take it one day at a time. And don’t be too hard on yourself if you return to WoW. 
Depends if he goes back to 375 lbs. May be more of a roll.
Moderation is key.
Congrats on the dramatic weight loss, keep it up with some exercise when you can (something i need to do myself) even if its only 1 or 2 nights a week for an hour.
Im pretty close to you in terms that i have used wow as a crutch and dont want to let go for whatever reason.
Moderation is key.
When you get a job back youll see that 2 or 3 hours a night is more than enough WoW, then the weekend comes and you can go wild.
Just gotta maintain that monday to friday dicipline and dedication to work, health and everything else you need
HAPPY FRIDAY
Dear OP: When you are addicted to something, you cannot bargain with it. People who haven’t been seriously addicted in this thread will tell you “moderation” “only do 2 hours per day” and I’m sure you have already tried these things.
Even this thread is on some level a wish for someone to tell you what you want to hear, which is that you can play wow, if you are just smart about it!
But that’s not how addiction works. Uninstall the game right now. Uninstall battle.net. Remove the forums from your browser history / recent tabs so that it isn’t autopilot to come check the forums (which will lead you inevitably back to the game). Leave your wow-related discords, and tell your friend-discords that play wow that you are taking a break.
I second the advice of others to try playing less time-consuming / treadmilly games to fill the void until you get your life back where you want it.
Play single-player games. They wait for you, they are less total hours, and they have a finish line. (They’re also cheaper!) There’s plenty of amazing games out there that you haven’t been playing while you’ve been keeping up with WoW.
Do not try to barter with your addiction. You know the changes you need to make, you can revisit in a year or something. Dragonflight will still be here, even a year from now.
As someone who IS addicted to WoW and is very severely depressed, its a completely different beast. Anyone in this thread who says just quit or modereate it, has never truly been in our shoes.
Hell most people view depression/addiction as a choice, not a mental disorder. in b4 anyone comes @ me for this, I’m on $3000 a month of medicine for my addictions and depression. My problem with WoW is ive played it LITERALLY my entire life. I can’t see myself waking up and doing anything different. I hate DF, but I still play it bc well yeah…
“Fast forward to today and I realized I don’t even enjoy the game anymore. I think dragonflight is boring as hell. I think the game is unnecessarily difficult to the point of frustration and I am softcapped at 8/8 normal vault and 3/8 heroic. Can’t seem to progress no matter what I do. I also don’t enjoy the new profession system or the mythic plus scene. Again, I might be in the minority but I feel like the game is severely punishing and extremely mechanic heavy for no reason other than to cater to the e sport crowd of hardcore players.”
Yes.
Takes real guts to face the truth and admit you have addiction issues in regards to WOW. My sincere hope is you find balance.
Peace !
Just sunk cost… try finding and sticking to a hobby… finding other things to occupy yourself with. Checking out YT vids or streams of WoW is fine. But there is a point that after crossing it after focusing on yourself and your health, becomes basically ez street. Just as with any ‘‘addiction’’ , you kind of have to tough it out for the first long while. Once you can shift that to something else that perhaps gives you more enjoyment, it’ll become much easier to move on.
Just keep at it.
I blame scores and sites like wowlogs.
I went though something similar in other lanes. The kicker was that I had no reason to be depressed and that I had already worked through nearly ALL of my two decades of demons at the time.
It wasn’t that I had no interest which is a marker of depression, but that I did have interest but couldn’t actually get motivated to do the thing(s).
Why is this distinction important? I spent my life chasing everything to overcome depression and I didn’t really THINK I was depressed. I still ate and drank, I still DID things, but the things I gravitated towards most were low mental resistance activities, and I realized that EVERY such activity was one that I could deep dive into and consume knowledge or improve against myself, especially WoW.
After having been on a myriad of meds, nothing seemed to work much, and at some point I had to change therapists for some reason or another. My new therapist specialized in adult ADHD diagnosis and probed around a bunch, my childhood, my patterns, and it was enough for her to prompt for testing.
Skipping ahead, TLDR, it turns out that as I had been a gifted kid, I was sitting on a nice helping of undiagnosed ADHD and autism. I had since started treatment on ADHD meds while paralleling skill growth, and this very distinction is what stood out.
Depressed individuals lack motivation AND interest.
ADHD and other processing issues often have PLENTY of interest but cannot always muster up the functional minimum to DO things.
While I cannot speak to whether that is the case for you or not, I can attest that your very problem was something that fell to the wayside since my diagnosis and treatment. At this stage, I realize that I gravitated towards low resistance to entry activities with high mental stimulation, and video games is a HUGE win for those boxes. Now, if I were to decide I wanted to work out, I have a fighting chance to do so. Before, that chance was effectively 0 unless all other activities werent doing it.
I mean, you didn’t just start working out and pitched it, you kept up with it for a decently long time to lose that weight. You obviously have discipline, and your posting here obviously demonstrates interest, but you’re lacking sufficient motivation.
Or if latent ADHD, it may be more accurate to describe it as you have a finite amount of energy and the things you want to be doing overwhelm you because they feel draining.
Either way, my point is that many things can PRESENT depression symptoms without BEING depression, and usually people in your pattern fit the bill of individuals who belong to the former more often than the latter. Just to give you another foothold for overcoming things.
Sorry about the struggles. I do want to call out your real life Feat of Strength Achievement: losing that amount of weight. That’s not easy. That’s something to be proud of.
Take a break from raiding and do something else for a while. You don’t need to go cold turkey. Moderation is what you need.
Dude… go to therapy… Honesty. I don’t know if your making this stuff up cuz your bored, or you’re actually this self aware and dumb enough to think that getting a few “stay strongs” Or "omg me too!"s is gonna help. You obviously know you’re extremely unhealthy and obese, all you think about is a video game at an age when you should be starting s family, and you have no self control. The people saying “I blame meters!!” And “its the games fault” are just enabling and you and giving you a copout from taking any personal responsibility. You cant blame a game for having engaging systems for your addiction any more than you can blame delicious food for your weight. Take some responsibility, get some therapy. Its time to grow up.
Hey yo…
OP…I feel you boss! And sending much love your way to overcome what this is. I’ve been there. We get so worked up over the next piece of gear or the next rating push or this or that…it’s all pixels. And does t define who we are.
Go get healthy. Chances are you may come back and as you know…nothing will have changed. But you get one shot at this life…
Don’t let pixels and a bad marketing strategy take it from you!
With love boss ! Fight the fight
Similar story, been playing this thing from when I was 18, it did have some negative impact on my studies, but once I joined workforce, I understood where my priorities were at. Still managed to put in hard core hours in evenings. I too had a health kick and shaped up quite well and only did this while on break from wow for a expansion. Now I have family, and I accept that if I want to play WoW I need to regiment it and it simply cannot dictate my schedule.
I don’t think wow is addictive, however if you have a compulsion or a complitionist mentality, WoW does have a lot to keep pushing you to keep putting in more time.
My advice is, either manage it, decide how much time you can and are willing to give WoW (in a healthy way), and tailor your own expectations as to what you can do in WoW. (eg I love raiding, but I currently cannot commit to two nights, so I settled on LFR, pug raiding and pug pushing M+)
Or if you cannot do it, quit the game.
It’s like ice cream, if you cannot keep your hands off the tub, don’t buy it in the first place.
Hope it helps.
Honestly I feel the same way. That’s why if usually become depressed. Just stay offline until my mental state goes back to normal.
When usually have panic attacks or whatever else. Try to take medicine.
Good for you bro. WoW is just not catered to adults. If you want any progression at all, you have to go hard at it and devote 70% of your time. Thats just how it is. Casual WoW is not fun. It was never fun. WoW is a game designed to progress as fast as possible or get left behind.
If your job is to play WoW or you have tons of free time then its a great game but for average adult with responsibilities its just not worth investing into it at all.
Other mmos out there atm basically respects your time as an adult. You can try those and have progress your character while having time to work out and do adult things.