Hi all,
First ever time posting on here or anything like this.
Let me walk you through from the start to where I am now so please bear with me if it seems a bit lengthy.
Ok, so I started gambling when I was 16 and was eligible for a National Lottery online account and use to load in about £20 a month and play on the scratch cards. At this time this was well within my limits but thinking back this was the point I probably I was bewitched by the idea of gambling and the idea that you could win £X by only putting in a small amount. This contiuned for around 9/10 months and then around my 18th birthday I had some personal issues with my relationship with my ex-girlfriend which pushed me into depression for 3 months.
I overcame this (well I thought I did) and at 18, was enticed by the convenience of online betting. So I opened some accounts up and again bet well within my means.
There was a turning point about a year later, where I had a 6 horse bet and one horse lost in a bet where I would have won about 4 grand. And from then on, I was forever chasing this win that never came. I'll stop after I lose this I used to say.
I run up about 8 grand in debt and hid this all from my family until I had to tell them and had to get support. However, I only ever told them about the debt not the source or reason for the debt. Family being family they helped me and I started to get my finances back on track and paying off my debt. However, I have had a relapse and got another 6k of debts and I am really struggling financially due to high-interest loans, which is ridiculous considering I take home around £1900 a month. However, the issue is I am paying these loans & credit cards off and then I have about £150 left and then I gamble this in order to try and make more money for the rest of the month. Obviously, this just goes in one big circle and the debt number grows and grows.
I do not feel like I can go to my Family again for support in debt and have lied to them a number of times regarding my current financial situation and I do not want to let them down again. My current girlfriend is speaking about getting our own house and I can't even think of this because I have so much debt. I am just haemorrhaging money and I do not know how to stop this.
Any support from any one on here or anything that anyone has done or any experinces would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you everyone.
A
Hi Aaron you might get more response if you move this to new members section.
I
Hello Aaron, you have come to the right place.
I have been where you have so many times, Iv gambled for about ten years. I can now say until 54 days gamble free and proud of this!
Similarly to you I earn a good wage but don’t see any of it due to paying off my debts. This is slowly getting better!
I now have a debt management scheme in place meaning I can not use my cards but also they have contacted all my lenders who have froze the interest. I pay a payment to them once a month and they split it across the lenders., I currently pay £500 a month but they adjust it to what you can afford. Iv also heard step change do something similar.
I also spoke to my family a number of times but their answer was to give me more money to bail me out, I read £££ and got into more mess.
I approached the doctor who has put me forward for counselling but to be fair Iv cracked it without that.
You need to be serious about stopping. My partner has all my money, I get £20 a week. I have no access to cards or large amounts of cash. I also bring home receipts so he can see what Iv spent and where. It sounds excessive and I always thought I can do better than thatbut it seriously has worked. The biggest help I think Also is blocking safari on my phone, so I couldn’t access any online gambling. I wouldn’t do it on the laptop as it’s works and would breach policy.
Seriously if you can talk to your partner it has made us closer and I can see light at the end of the tunnel fir things such as having a baby and getting a house.
Iv rambled a lot tonight but I hope it’s helped just even a little bit and I wish you luck!
Here to chat if needed xx
aaron
AlThank you everyone.
So I’ve had some positive feelings recently and download an App called head space which is a kind of meditation but not as hippy and that has worked really well for me. I use it when I might have the urge to log in.
Also, I positive excercise I have been doing which is really really eye opening is the fact that I write down how much I would have gambled and what on and over the last 7 days I’m down -£170. I know there is a chance that this might go into positive figures but I think by doing I over 2 months it will almost certainly be negativ and probably 3 figures.
Thanks again for your help and I will contact step change and re post in here in a few days.
I am going to look at this app. Thanks
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