Hi everyone, I am new to this forum.
I will tell you about my situation and I hope to get some advice please? Please bare with my this is a long one!
So I have been with my partner for about 4 years, we have a 1 year old baby together and are currently saving up to buy our first house together. I sold my 1 bed flat when I found out I was pregnant and we are renting while we save for our first family home together. We moved house in march 2017, my son was born April 2017. From then I was on maternity pay so save very little, my partner was in charge of his own money and I had very little to do with it. He just paid me x amount each month and I manage the bills etc. At Christmas time we got discussing money, I commented on how he was always skint even though he earned a good wage, he said he wasn't able to save anything because his outgoings were so much. We both went through them and I couldn't work out where the money was going. Anyway a week or so later I looked through his wallet and found a credit card he'd not told me about. I confronted him about it and he lied and lied and lied more. Eventually he came clean after I threatened to leave him. Turns out he had stacked up a lot of debt, had problems with gambling and desperately needed help. I agreed to help him with his money as long as he promised to have counselling and from now on he needed to be totally 100% honest with me. i took charge of my partners money, I had his online bank accounts on my phone, I managed his money each month and began to pay off his debts. He went to counselling, but said the sessions didn't really help much. He said he had no intention of gambling though. I thought because he had less money worries that he was less likely to gamble. Anyway, last week I found history on my laptop... he'd searched for a gambling website while I was out. I confronted him about it and he lied. I confronted him 2 more times and he lied. He then admitted he hadn't actually gambled because he hadn't spent any money, it's just his way of dealing with it when he has an urge to gamble. I was so upset he hadn't spoken to me first so we have had ALOT of talks about it and I've been thinking about what I should do. Anyway I asked him to tell me if he's gambled at all since xmas, he said yes about 5 times. He is unable to gamble on his phone so he bought a top up card from newsagents. He said he's spent less than £30 gambling so didn't see it being a problem but can see now that he was being dishonest. Going forward I don't really know what to do... I've told him I think it would be good to tell his family and he's agreed. He said he will contact a counsellor again but that doesn't seem enough for me. How can I ever trust him? Do I want my son to be involved in this horrible situation? I feel like I'm at breaking point and I honestly don't know where to go from here. Thank you for reading if you got this far!
Hi Annabel. What do you want to do? Having control of accounts 100% means credit reports too. You can also get alerts when someone applies for credit. Realistically a gambler will gamble if they choose to. £1 in the bookies. You can take control, download software blocks onto your laptop. He can have cash and supply receipts to the penny. But if he wants to gamble he will. 'Counselling doesn't work' is often an excuse, but sometimes it doesn't help. GA is what works for my husband. There are different opinions as to whether a gambler can ever say 'I won't gamble again'. Normally just getting through a day when they first stop is an achievement. Look after you, secure finances, get support. A relationship doesn't have to be over. Your partner should be actively seeking support, 100% honesty and complete transparency.
Hi Merry go round, thank you for your reply. I don't want the relationship to be over but I want to know I can trust him again, which I am not able to at the moment. Thank you for your tips re credit checks and software blocks I will definitely look into them
It's fine not to trust him. Mr L can look at the bank accounts any time he asks (he never does) but he will never have unscrutinised access to them again. Four years down the line and no sign of a lapse as far as I can tell (we can never be 100% sure) he has access to a very limited amount in savings but they are in accounts I monitor very, very regularly. Everything else is in my sole name, larger purchases are made in my sole name and that's the way it's going to stay.
You can't stop him gambling if he's determined to. Worrying about whether he is or not will drive you slowly insane. What you can do is protect your own interests. Start with a password and gambling blocker (K9 is free) on your laptop and anything else he uses to access the internet. There's lots of advice on locking down family finances and ensuring you have independent evidence of any debts he's run up on this side of the forum. If he really wants to stop he will comply with anything you ask and understand it's for your own reassurance and safety.
stay blessed
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