Will he ever be honest? Is it time to walk away

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 MrsD
(@rkmg67v8el)
Posts: 1
Topic starter
 

Hi, sorry for the very long post.

I’m hoping for some advise or support from anyone going through similar. My husband and I have been together nearly 15 years and have a young Daughter. Around 9 years ago I found out he had accrued debt gambling I estimate around £4K. He had never done anything like it and both his parents and I were totally shocked. He convinced us it wasn’t a massive issue just a few bad bets and naively we believed him we repaid all the debt and had him close down any online accounts messaging the companies saying he needed to be banned etc. We weren’t aware at the time of all the support you could get and thought we were doing the right thing. Fast forward a year or so after welcoming our Daughter I started noticing behaviour and personality changes he was be coming very cold and sometimes mean towards me and just not himself I put it down to being the normal new parent strains but eventually after my gut telling me something was wrong found he had started gambling again. I found it relatively early so the loss was no where near as great as before maybe around £1k but that had been build up in a matter of around a week. The money he had used to gamble with was a PayPal account his mum and dad were saving up for things for out Daughter which absolutely killed me. He denied it and lied and lied up until  I provided him with evidence. He begged me not to tell his Dad as he had just had a heart attack and knew it would kill him to know he had done it again and had taken the money he had saved for his granddaughter so again naively I didn’t but spoke to his Mum about it. At this point I knew there was a bigger problem so I contacted a charity and did some counselling sessions to understand more about this illness and what I could do to support him. He himself didn’t do any counselling because he said he didn’t need it and could do it on his own with my support. I took over all the finances so he no longer had access to any money that I couldn’t see…so I thought. 

fast forward to a few months ago his attitude has changed again being increasingly mean, disrespectful and disengaged when at home. On his phone a lot more not coming to bed too very late after I’ve gone up. I put it down to marital strain again as we are currently building an extension. However I coincidentally found some torn up betting slips in the bin this week and things are now starting to add up. He has been coming home with the odd £20-£60 here and there  and when I have questioned him on it he’s said things like he paid for lunch or drinks on his card and people have been giving him the cash back. That customers of him have been giving him tips, which I’ve not seen before. When I confronted him about the slips he has tried to downplay it saying it was just a one off when he went on a night out with the footie lads but deep down I know that’s not true I’m not in spiral of trying to unearth and find more because I know he never comes clean unless backed into a corner. I have asked him to leave which he has done willingly has shown zero remorse or upset and is now making out that I’m being dramatic and over exaggerating things. I feel like I’m going insane and he makes out it’s because I’m insecure and anxious that I’m imagining things that aren’t there. I’m absolutely terrified that I’m going to be left with debt on top of the huge costs of this extension we’re in the middle off and now having to face reality that my family might finally have broken down past any chance of repair. 

I’m going back and forth about what I should do. The last time this happened I warned him if it happened one more time no matter how small that would be it so do I follow through on this or do I support him again? I know this time if I do it has to be the final time and he needs to get help and show me he is getting help before we look to repair our marriage but I worry I’m setting myself up for another fall and honestly I’m not sure I’m strong enough to go through much more. Has anyone been through similar and can give any advise or share their stories? 

 
Posted : 7th February 2025 10:53 am
(@pep1952)
Posts: 176
 

Hi MrsD i’m sorry to hear about your story. Only the compulsive gambler can decide if they want to get into recovery. As partners, we can only support them. From what you described, your husband is not ready to leave gambling yet so if you reconcile with him, expect the worst because it will only get worse there is no other direction for it. Reflect on it - do you want to carry on a life with an active compulsive gambler who will choose gambling over his family any time? Now if he is ready to get into recovery it’s a different story but he needs to lead on his recovery. He needs to put in the hard work. He’ll take proactive actions. In my opinion, those are the ones worthy of our support as partners. 

 
Posted : 7th February 2025 7:52 pm

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