I discovered yesterday that my boyfriend has spent our savings and taken money from our joint account to fund his online gambling. I realised what had happened our joint account card was declined.
i asked what was going on and he said he has spent it gambling on football. He said at one point he managed to win it back but then gambled it away again. He has also taken money from my savings account to lend to a friend.
i asked why and he said it was because he was bored and it gave him something to do. He said he isn't depressed or unhappy just bored, though I wonder how true this is.
He has never denied having the odd bet, he told me he won a bit last week and bought a round of drinks for his friends. That made me very angry as he was buying drinks with money meant for our future. It sounds silly but this has upset me the most.
He has apologised but is very defensive and quick to anger, when I explained how hurt I was he told me to stop stating the obvious. He has promised to start paying the money back and I watched as he deleted his betting account.
This type of situation has happened before, we went for a mortgage and when asked for his statements every other transaction was for online betting. I asked him at the time to stop and assumed he had. I don't know if I have a right to be angry and upset, I feel he has broken the trust we had built up together. He put on such a good front of pretending everything was ok I don't know who he is anymore. I am not sure how to move forwards, I have called the helpline and told him as much but he doesn't think he has a problem.
Maybe it isn't a problem but from reading other posts I think it will be harder for him to stop than he thinks. How on earth do we get back to normal again?
Any advice would be much appreciated, thank you for reading.
I'm sorry to say that, in short, there is no going back 🙁 There will be no progress either unless he accepts he has a problem! I wish I could tell you that witnessing him deleting his account is a cure but until he wants to stop, you are powerless against this addiction! Us CG's are very adept @ manipulating loved ones & blaming other people so it is no surprise to me that you had no idea! In order to move forwards, you must continue to seek support for yourself & unless he can prove otherwise, don't trust a word he says about money! I would be inclined to insist on full access to his credit report, otherwise, you will need to consider how to protect yourself financially!
Be strong & look after you - ODAAT
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