How healthy are video games for us?

[On the edge of hope]

Do they hinder healing?

I survived my abuse by immersing myself in video games for hours on end (and creating music).
I'm 36 now, and feel embarrassed to still have this ravenous hunger to play them, every few months. I don't know what this hunger is. They are soothing but temporarily.

Just curious.

[Dutch Uncle]

Not easy to answer.
I'd say: No, they do not hinder our healing by definition.

That said, many video games are very cleverly set-up (especially browser-games) to draw on addictive behavior in the human mind. Quite like a lot of advertisement keeps us 'hooked' on the need to buy stuff. "OMG, my iPhone 4 really was pre-historic! How did I ever manage to live with one?"
I used to be quite addicted to so-called 'god-games' (turn based strategy games like 'Civilization') where the central theme basically was: "just one more turn, then I'll go to bed". Ad infinitum, off-course.

On the whole though I think there's no 'moral' difference between spending a weekend gaming to spending it 'camping out in nowhere' and returning home fatigued and damp, just wanting to crawl in your comfy bed. 

Do take care, dear 'On the edge of Hope', they can be a 'too big time-sink'.

[On the edge of hope]

Dutch Uncle,
Thank you so much for your gentleness. 
So, so appreciate your balanced points of view on this topic.
Only thing is, I reckon that camping out in the wilderness carries many more benefits than camping out in a pixelated game. Fresh air, nature, something new, Vitamin D, and good for the eyes.

Can I share this, if I may...?
Prior to this year, there was only one "part" of me I was aware of that took over my body and mind, and insisted on returning to a game. Nameless; paralyzing. Now I see three parts, and one of them is still this part. Another one is sort of an adolescent part that puts her foot down and yells, "But I don't want to!"..."I don't want to play!". Last part is a mysterious observant presence.

So basically, I don't actually want to play them. But this all-encompassing nameless part is dying to play. This hunger is such a deep part of me, and so difficult to break away from. It comes and goes. I think it comes a few times a year, when I'm deeply missing something. It's a hunger to belong to a community where I am valued and cherished for my contributions, I think. A hunger for adventure and exploration of unknown lands. And the hunger is always for MMO's (massively multiplayer online games), in which I can pseudo-connect with people and pseudo create and contribute towards some greater goal. I believe that naturally, my sense of community is almost primal.

These and other games act also as a pacifier for my soul, when painful feelings and emotions get too intense and unbearable. It sort of helps to "blank out" in a game, and feel a relief from the former.
But it doesn't take long for me to log off feeling hauntingly empty and so lonely. I can't even play them normally. I have to log off because I feel crushed. I get uncomfortable and quit once again. I'm a deep thinker, and start thinking "What is the point of all this? What does it amount to, if no real connections can be made? In the end it's all about connecting..."
But the yearning returns sometime later and I feel powerless. How many years I've wasted on games... and I have nothing to show for it. No skills gained and no connections I could take with me to IRL. I don't know what it's like to be a part of a community in which I am valued, IRL.

Sorry to have made this long. The nameless, overpowering part could probably destroy my life with no  consideration for my well-being. But to refuse it is to kill something that's glued to my soul, it feels like. I'm a slave to this part and I don't know how to break free