New here

Hi, I am new here too. 

I am on the other side of your dillema. I am a partner with a 2 year old son who has been gambling in secret for the whole of my sons life. The reason for not being open about my addiction is because I'm scared of my partners reaction and don't want to end up in your husbands situation. I have gotten myself in debt and know I need to quit but there are times when something comes over me and I can't help myself as I want to make back my losses and then no one needs to know what I've lost. I feel like a piece of cr4p for spending money that could be used to make my sons life better. 

Honestly, if she came to me and said let me take control of your finances let's get through this together I think that would make it impossible to continue gambling and I would do it in a heartbeat. 

If your husband refuses to let you control his finances its because he still wants to gamble. Give him the ultimatum and you will know for sure whether he wants to make things right.

I hope I'm not speaking of of turn here just wanted to give you perspective from someone in similar position to your husband. I have made the decision to stop and utilising resources like this helps but I'm still finding it difficult. If my partner knew and supported me to stop I think that would be the key. Still undecided whether to tell her for the fear of losing everything. 

I think we both know the answer to this.  He has gambled £30k of your money, taken your sons money to gamble with and shows no signs of remorse

Time to move on with your life or you will be on rinse and repeat for years.  If he really valued his family he would make the effort given that he is totally in the wrong.  I would expect him at the least to show signs of putting blocks in place and asking you to manage his money, counselling would also be advisable

If he is not prepared to do that, you can either try to glue back together the badly broken jug, knowing that you will never truly be happy with it again and always think it is about to break.  Or ditch it and hope to get a better one in the future

Hi eeyore

i hate it when someone says sorry but continues doing what they’re apologising for. What’s the point?

I didn’t want my husband to apologise I just wanted him to stop gambling 

in my experience they have no remorse, they have no emotion, they have no sense of the chaos they are causing.

your priority is you and your child.

your partner needs to repay the money into your sons account. You need to take his name off that account so he can’t access it.

do credit checks in your name to see that he’s not taken debt in your name 

do you want to remain in this relationship? It’s ok if you do. 

has he talked about what he’s doing to make amends? Has he put blocks in place?

you’ve set your boundaries which is very important.

i think if you’ve made it plain you don’t want to be with him, in his mind he has no reason to stop. He will probably be thinking all the time about how to win the money back. 

how did he get a 30k loan? What was his plan? Do you own your house? These are questions I would be asking. You don’t have to answer them.

I learnt over the years that it didn’t matter what I did he continued secretly. So after a very long time I learnt that I could protect my share of the house. ‘Tenants in common’ is what you can look at.

get some support, find a meeting or counselling from gamcare. 

Dear Eeyore,

First of all, I hope you are ‘managing’ as best as you can emotionally and psychologically.

I read the replies and I will totally agree with merry go round. Apologising is absolutely useless and a total disgrace if the person does not ‘repair’ what he/she has done. It is stealing what your husband did. And yes it is an illness but HE needs to do something about it. And if he does not then he is not ready to get better. 

From my experience, as also stated by merry go round , compulsive gamblers show very little emotion (if none) and remorse. So you need to do what is good for you and the little one. 

I am conscious it is very challenging as he is your husband at the end. But it will lead you to chaos (emotionally and financially) if he does not stop. Look for actions and not words if he does. 

Candy xxx

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for your thoughts and advice I really do appreciate it knowing I'm not alone in this situation. 

Kind regards

Eeyore