Good evening all,
I just wanted to take the time to tell you my story and hopefully gain some real help with this terrible gambling disease I have.
Apologies for the very long post, but I feel that I need to get all of the below off my chest first, prior to asking for your help and support.
I left the British Army after a hugely succesful 24 year career, 5 years ago. Being in the Army was a tough, but enjoyable life with good pay and lots of disposable income. I got to travel the world, but at times had to serve my counrty in places like Northern Ireland (During the Troubles), Iraq (Twice), Bosnia (Twice), Afghanistan (5 Times) and Sierra Leone. I received medals for these tours and in addition to my 2 Queens Jubilee Medals and my Long Service & Good Conduct, I had a nice row of 10 Service Medals, for which i am (was, more later) extremely proud of.
My gambling probably started during my Army days, the lifestyle i led meant s******g £500 in a casino on a night out meant nothing to me. However, when i left the Army, my gambling was a big issue (and still is).
I got heavily into debt and confessed all to my wife at the time (I am no longer with her). She, after going mad at me, was very supportive and we slowly cleared the debts. I started going to GA and almost made it to my 1 year pin...
Then it all started going wrong again..
I split with my wife (I have a 10 year old daughter, that adores me) after I was found out having an affair. Stupidly for me, I put the blinkers on and started gambling again, this time more heavily than before. I gambled because I knew finances were tight and I just thought if I could get that BIG win, my life may turn around for the better. I have now ran up over £15k in debt (which I am still ignoring and have buried my head in the sand to!).
I have a great job, but am a mobile worker, so am constantly driving around the UK and staying in hotels overnight during the week. It is fairly well paid, but once I have taken care of the mortgage for the house that my (ex) wife and daughter live and paid the rent on the flat I habitat in, I dont have a great deal left. Instead of paying off debt, I tend to gamble, once again, still hoping for that BIG win that will take all the debt away and make my life better.
I just cant seem to reset, I think about gambling all the time, I cant sleep due to worrying about debt, I fear I am suffering from depression, this disease is making me ill, moody, grumpy and often makes me cry (46 years old, ex rufty tufty serviceman, supposed to be the backbone fo the country!!)
It got so bad, that last month, in order to gamble, I sold the 10 medals I had earnt whilst on active duty. The 10 medals that I have so wanted to pass on to my 10 year old daughter, who adores me and is so proud of me (she doesnt know about my gambling and thinks me and her mum split up because we fell out of love with each other). It has broken me in pieces.
I am so tired of all of this, and I wont lie, I have considered several times of a quick way of ending it to take the pain away. The only thing that stops me doing that at the moment is the love for my daughter.
I havent joined this site for sympathy, i just want some help, PLEASE. I find it difficult to get to GA as my work on the road just doesnt really allow for my regular attendance.
I know there are a lot worse problem gamblers out there than me and I know from my GA experiences that this disease can be put to rest, but I dont know how anymore.
Thank you for taking the time to read my post, I really hope that some of you take the time to maybe offer me some words of wisdom or support. I really think time is running out on me.
Hey you, firstly, can I say a huge thank you for your active service! Your medals may have gone but the work that you did to earn them can never be taken away from you!
Secondly, depression doesn’t discriminate any more than addiction does so rufty tufty serviceman or not, there’s no shame in asking for help from your GP to help figure out a way forwards. Life in the services is structured & to lose that whilst carrying addiction is a lethal combination. GamCare can help with gambling counselling but I think you should get PTSD discounted 1st!
You don’t have to get to your local GA room so have a think about whether it is your travelling stopping this or your pride? Pens & keyrings & pins are all very good but they are just tools to encourage us along the way, it doesn’t matter if you walk into a room 20 seconds clean or 20 years clean, it’s the want to stop gambling that’s important as we’re all only one bet away from our next disastrous chapter!
You must get your gambling (Time-Money-Location remove one & you cannot gamble) triangle broken! If you gamble online, you need to install blocking software (K9 is free but GamCare can help with what is best for each device) & sign up to GamStop, maybe report your cards damaged & get new ones sent out then scratch off the CVV. If it’s in casinos, sign up to SENSE & if it’s bookies, MOSES T0800 294 2060 is what you need...Excluding from any areas you know you will be going to.
Advice is pretty standard unfortunately so no miracle cure from me, just the usual fellow gamblers wishes of strength & courage! We’re the same age you & I (well, almost, 72 was a good year) & whilst I don’t have the background you have, I have had a fulfilling career & yet a life marred by addiction...I can also say with absolute certainty, life can get better! I don’t know if the disease can be put completely to rest but it can be managed so it remains dormant - ODAAT
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OODAT/Positive Action,
Firstly, Thanks for responding. Both of your post replies put me in a bit of a mess. There is something about forums that can often be false people hiding behind their keyboards (Keyboard Warriors), that give out advice without experiencing the experiences, but both of you got my full attention, because you both understand.
I need to write a list of priorities and put them in my new 'folder'. Not too sure what the priorities are as my head is racing or which order they need to go in, but I suppose, as GA taught me a while back, JUST FOR TODAY is the best place to start. I need to focus all the energy I have left in me towards not gambling TODAY. Hopefully if I can crack that, then the other priorities that are swirling round my head might start to become a bit clearer and achievable?
I do have a lot of time to myself of an evening whilst working away and that (fuelled with motorway service stations and the lure of flashing lights) is one of my first barriers to overcome.
I dont know what else to type with this post becoming too long winded, so will finish it the way I started it and that is with thanks for taking the time to reply to my intro post. Despite sending me in to a mess, whilst sat in a hotel room, it has urged me to step away from the computer/ipad, run a bath, put some tunes on, have a soak and try to switch my brain off from the vicious thoughts of gambling tonight.
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PositiveAction wrote: Deleted
Hi mate, why delete the last post? It was extremely useful to me and maybe others
I had a slip, I gambled. I'm shot to pieces about it. I concluded that anything I've wrote is a crock of sh***t as I feel like a fraud so I'm just waiting for admin to delete my profile.
Apologies if there was something useful there, I just have lost confidence in my methods of battling gambling addiction so cut it loose.
Just waiting on admin to delete my account. I've been doing this gambling destruction for 30 years I'm done.
All best to you.
Strange thing is I've never once gambled in my military uniform but outside of my uniform in my personal life I'm a disaster to myself.
Again, apologies if you had the post for reference but I am pulling the plug on my involvement in this forum. What I tried has failed so I've scrubbed the slate clean and hopefully admin will deactivate my account ASAP.
Very sad to see you have had a slip but seriously, is there any reason to throw the baby out with the bath water? Your diary is one thing but removing posts that other equally desperate compulsive gamblers have found comfort in helps no-one!
I gambled for 30 years, kept it completely separate from my career & with help including GA, I have my addiction under control...You can do it but you have to keep standing up, not just throw in the towel. Just because you haven’t found a way to follow your own advice, doesn’t make it any less important to others.
Please, I beg you, leave what is left of you on the site & just walk away but never give up fighting!
Hi JA, I hope you are doing ok & can remember what PA so eloquently put before.
Sorry that you have been caught up in this @ such an early stage of your recovery but as you know, addiction takes us to dark places where our rational thinking goes out of the window 🙁
If I read anything powerful now, I tend to screenshot it because then I’m not @ the mercy of addiction if I ever want to refer to it.
I hope your emotions have stabilised & you are starting to feel stronger & ready for this new chapter in your life - ODAAT
Hi there, would it be accurate to say that when you were in Service, you ended up in quite a few traumatic, dangerous, even life-threatening situations ? And now later on, might you be recreating that danger through gambling ? PTSD springs to mind reading your story, that there's something unresolved from your Tours of Duty that you are recreating through gambling dangerously. Maybe consider exploring PTSD & if you're affected by it and consider approaching ex-Service charities that offer help with this ?
Subjectively, reading your story, I feel you may have (delayed onset) PTSD & are recreating dangerous situations through risky gambling in order to recreate the stress in order to feel something again. Maybe there was also something 'risky' in having an affair ? Please look into this if it isn't too painful. The gambling activity / losses are at the surface level, the causes with you are much deeper than that. Until you get to the roots I fear you'll just keep repeating the same behaviour over and over. I believe there are loads of ex-Service charities that help with PTSD & give counselling for it etc.
If you've been in very dangerous situations in the past, this can desensitise you to more 'normal', lower risk situations. So in normal, run of the mill, day to day life, you may have become more numb than most people, don't get or feel anything much from it, so become bored & fed up with it. You may need quite extreme situations, traumatic ones even, in order to feel anything, in order to feel 'alive'. I take it you have seen The Deer Hunter ? Maybe watch it again for an insight, as the character in the film who becomes addicted to Russian Roulette goes through a traumatic, life-threatening, war situation beforehand, the same as you. All the best.
Davey,
You are quite possibly right and although I wasn’t a front line soldier, my job in the army took me very close to the frontline action and I did/have seen a lot of things, and had to do a lot of things that I wish I could erase from my memory.
Service life is extreme and gambling blinkered some of the military emotions and gave me an escape from reality.
i have never been good talking about myself and I do shut my emotions and feelings away, so to type and talk on this forum can be quite difficult. When I was attending GA, I did find it difficult to talk, but gained a lot from listening.
I am now a week gambling free, which is fairly good in my eyes, but it has been a hard week and the barriers I have in place have worked, but this is mainly because I don’t have the funds to gamble, as payday approaches, I will have to try and put different barriers up and change my tact. But so far I have abstained.
i will do some research on PTSD, as I have always felt that the thrill of service life has been missing since I left the services and it could be the cause of one of my gambling triggers?
davey wrote:
Hi there, would it be accurate to say that when you were in Service, you ended up in quite a few traumatic, dangerous, even life-threatening situations ? And now later on, might you be recreating that danger through gambling ? PTSD springs to mind reading your story, that there's something unresolved from your Tours of Duty that you are recreating through gambling dangerously. Maybe consider exploring PTSD & if you're affected by it and consider approaching ex-Service charities that offer help with this ?
Subjectively, reading your story, I feel you may have (delayed onset) PTSD & are recreating dangerous situations through risky gambling in order to recreate the stress in order to feel something again. Maybe there was also something 'risky' in having an affair ? Please look into this if it isn't too painful. The gambling activity / losses are at the surface level, the causes with you are much deeper than that. Until you get to the roots I fear you'll just keep repeating the same behaviour over and over. I believe there are loads of ex-Service charities that help with PTSD & give counselling for it etc.
If you've been in very dangerous situations in the past, this can desensitise you to more 'normal', lower risk situations. So in normal, run of the mill, day to day life, you may have become more numb than most people, don't get or feel anything much from it, so become bored & fed up with it. You may need quite extreme situations, traumatic ones even, in order to feel anything, in order to feel 'alive'. I take it you have seen The Deer Hunter ? Maybe watch it again for an insight, as the character in the film who becomes addicted to Russian Roulette goes through a traumatic, life-threatening, war situation beforehand, the same as you. All the best.
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