Straw that broke the camel's back

Hi Paul, we are very much 2 peas in a pod. It can and will get better if you are up for this. I tried on my own three times and failed. I am now 7 weeks gamble free and beginning to find myself again. 

We are all here to support you. You have the motivation to stop and recover. 

Let's do this together x

Hi Murlo. Sorry about the same post 5 times. Don't know what happened ??. Yeah i agree. Ive tried numerous times but without success. Well ive gone a year without gambling but always gone back for woteva reason. Im determined this time as i believe ive hit rock bottom x

Paul, I absolutely know that feeling. Let's keep talking. I have probably been through it before. It is ok to not feel ok. 

I hope you can enjoy a good Xmas. 

I know Murlo. I will have to give you my number and we can keep each other going. Ive been GA and it worked for me but i got complacent and let my guard down. Inevitably that leads to self distruct. Much easier when theres people to talk too.

I can relate to your story brother. Hope you can stay strong and change. Change is difficult but possible if we keep walking toward what we want to achieve. Glad you have posted your story here. There is people here that can benefit from it.

I have also done shameful things for gambling.. lies, stole from a company I worked for. And feels very wrong. I could never steal anything before gambling entered my life. It changes your mind. It makes you forget about your morals, dignity and self respect and respect towards the others.

I have stayed almost two years off gambling. 

I am so sorry for your pain but it will really help you now to allow yourself to feel that pain rather than masking it with the addiction. It is the refusal to accept what you have become that keeps the cycle going. People don't choose to become addicts. It often creeps in really slowly and gets its feet under the table before we even realise that there is an intruder. Gambling is a parasite. We even welcome it, thinking it is helping us when really it is stealing our lives, our family, our time.

When we start to realise there is a problem, we can make excuses for it and we find ways to keep gambling, hating what we have become but unable to break away. We both love it and we hate it at the same time.

We are hurting and even though gambling is hurting us, it is familiar and it is hard to separate it from ourselves. We forget who we are without gambling, we depend on it and it defines us. In the end, we become inseparable. 

This leads to even more gambling because we feel hopeless and trapped. In the last year of my addiction, I lost more than I did in the 10 years before that. I think I wanted it to end so I went all out. I didn't seem to be able to hurt anymore. I was just numb. Broken. Even the pain didn't register anymore. I knew that I had had enough and I needed to get out. I was afraid of what I had become. I was just on a path of self destruction and I only ever felt safe when I was asleep in my bed.

When we stop using gambling to mask the pain we are feeling, be that from the act of gambling itself or from some other issues in our life, we are left to deal with the problem. It feels raw and it hurts. We are forced to face our pain and our suffering and once we do this, we stop masking the problem and start dealing with it. If we want to break away from addiction, this pain is a necessary part of acceptance, along with patience and forgiveness. It is really important to accept that you messed up and then you can change. Blaming yourself for thinking you are not a good parent will not make you a better one, but dealing with these issues will.

I hated what I had done to my family by gambling for 20 years so all I did was keep doing it. One, to try to undo my mistakes and win the money back as I thought that would help me move on, and two, to try to numb my own suffering and stop thinking about all the wrong that I had done. I avoided addressing the real issue and spent the last 2 or 3 years digging in and making things worse because I had a bucket full of self loathing and I refused to deal with it so I just kept adding to it.

Now that you have finally accepted that you want to change you will be able to move forward. Forgive yourself for your mistakes. You cannot change them. They are in the past but your actions today and each day forward make up the future. Time is the most precious thing of all. If only I had realised that my family didn't want the money back, that they just wanted their mum and their partner back. I could have saved myself and them from so much more suffering.

I had to learn the hard way that salvation doesn't come from winning back from losses but from accepting your mistakes and forgiving yourself which frees you up to get your life back.

I have stolen too. I stole from my kids. The shame kept me gambling and kept me hurting. But what good does it do? In the end, you just turn black inside. It eats you up and festers. Gambling is like putting a band aid on a severed artery. It did nothing for me. It let me bleed out until I had nothing left to give. 

Now I have to rebuild my life and the progress is painfully slow. I am still here and I am still fighting but I have accepted my mistakes. I did what I felt I had to do at the time. I was not a bad person but I made bad choices. There is a difference. You are not a bad person either. You were dragged around on a leash by your addiction and it forced you to do things that you didn't think you were capable of doing. Do not feel ashamed. People can change.

We are not what we are now, nor what we were. We are what we can be.

All the best to you moving forward.

@Paul & @LostAndFound

I'm new to this process, i'm nearly 40 & have been gambling (I've named it "Amanda") for near on 20 years now.  I have a young son who's going to be 7 soon & I have taken money from him to gamble & from friends & family...  I now put £35 a month into an account of my sons name & have done for 6/7 months now & it becomes his when he's 21 but that doesn't stop the voice inside my head that I took his money from him in the first place even if I have retuned in 10,20,30,40 times over.

I hear what you're saying & that we need to forgive ourselves first & work on us & do it for us & this is completely where I start this time around as I want this to be my last first time.  I want to be "Amanda" free!!  Not just for myself but for my girlfriend & for my son.

Hearing what you guys have to say really helps & I identify with a lot of your situations so in a strange way it's good to know I'm not the only one.

We'll do this!

Dear @sillyboy1981,

Welcome to the forum and thank you for sharing your post with our forum community, please continue to keep posting and feel free to join one of our daily chat room sessions from 1pm until 2pm or 8pm until 9pm.

It's great to hear you've put a savings fund in place for your son, well done. Please remember whilst it's not possible to turn back time, we can learn from the past and change our future. There is always hope.

It's never too late to make the change, break the cycle and alter your relationship with gambling. You have the ability to become gamble free, we believe in you and you're never alone in this.

Overcoming problem gambling is a challenge that many go on to achieve, please believe in yourself and be kind to yourself too.

If you'd like to talk things through, discuss possible coping strategies that you could put in place to help you or if you need details of other organisations that can help with things like debt and financial matters then please give us a call.

You can call our helpline on 0808 8020 133 or access our Netline (web chat) via our GamCare website, we're open day and night so we're always here for anyone who is impacted negatively by problem gambling.

Sending you all the best!

Kindest Regards

Joanne

Forum Admin

@sillyboy1981 Yes, I know exactly what you are saying. I have also repaid the money, then took it again, then repaid it....so it went on for years. I had hoped to have it back before she needed it but that never happened. Now I have too much debt to be able to help her out and that bothers me.

My son's money was safe in a trust fund but my daughter had a regular bank account that was meant to be for her first car, driving lessons, uni...How I wish I could change that. The best thing I did do though, was tell her about it. I was honest with her. She is 18 now and she knows the money is gone. She has a student loan to help her get through college but that was not the way it was meant to be. I never meant to lose it. I saw it as a chance to make money for her, to get some back for the family. So stupid looking back and as a parent, you feel the worse because you are meant to be the responsible one.

I am now almost 2 years gamble free and she is proud of me. I am proud of me too. She knows my story and we even jest about who is the most responsible one. My pain is still raw but we joke as a way of accepting what has happened. Now, I stay gamble free for her and for my entire family. They invest time and effort in supporting me and in return, I keep my promise. That is all I can do. I accept that looking back and going over this pain is doing nothing to help me and nothing to help them. If I continue hurting and self loathing, then so do my family. I don't want that, so I put my brave face on, I accept that I messed up badly and I move forward. I don't like what I did, not one bit, but I have to accept that I did it so that I don't do it again. 

People can make bad mistakes and bad choices for good reasons. We can be misguided sometimes but it does not mean we are bad. Not by a long shot. I actually carried on gambling and put myself through horrible stress trying to win back losses so I could close this chapter, so I could get their money back. 

I wanted the money back for them but it was futile and only making things worse. I know now that I should have just walked away. That's where closure comes from and that's how I got where I am today.

The hell with my mistakes. Yes, I made them. I did bad things but I learnt from them and I am sorry for them. I guess sometimes, the only thing you can do is make sure you don't do them again.

You are not alone and you are not a bad person or a bad parent. If you were, you would not be hurting. You have a problem and you can overcome it and leave this chapter well and truly in the past. We aren't defined by our mistakes but how we deal with them so don't dwell on what happened or punish yourself over and over for it. It will only lead to more gambling. 

Look forward to a great future with your family and don't look back except to remind yourself why you have left that life behind.

xx All the best xx

@lost-and-found thank you for your words... You’ve made me cry with reading what you’ve said. You’re so true & I agree with what you’re saying.

Ive put in a plan so that by the time my son turns 18 there’ll be c£5000 in an account to him & in another account there’ll be c£7500 for when he turns 21. My parents have always been there for me when I’ve needed a deposit for a house or needed help with a car... I’ve looked at myself & thought I’ll never be in that situation to do that for my son & again this made me gamble more to see if I could get that big payday to put it aside but as we know “how much is enough?” What I would win I bang back in to win more & it lost & lost & lost... So yeah over the past year even with all my problems of gambling I’ve made sure I’ve paid into those accounts & ive never touched them & I only intend to ever touch them to say here you go son happy birthday here’s a car or here’s the account.. But I will make sure he doesn’t hit the same pitfalls of this dark habit & understands it’s not a recreational play thing it’s a lonely miserable time thief.

So the positive I’m going to take away from this is that I’ve endured & enduring this pain hurt & upset so that I can tell him about it when he’s older so he can avoid it.

Speak soon xoxo

Yes, facing up to all of this is really hard but it is a vital step to freedom. 

Having made it nearly two years now, since my last bet, let me share with you some advice to help you get here...

One of the worst but most inevitable things is continuing to think about gambling. You have gone through so much and made your mind up that you don't want anything more to do with it, yet still your mind wanders back, daydreams and offers you thoughts and suggestions to bet. You go through the possibilities, you run through scenarios in your head.....the outcome....what if????

Trust me. The voices will leave you alone in time so long as you do not listen to them. You must accept that this is completely normal and don't fight the feelings. Acknowledge them and accept that feeling this way is part of the process. You are not stupid for wanting to bet after all that has happened. Remind yourself that you are conditioned to want to bet. This is the addiction crying out for a hit and you are the one that gets to decide and control this part. You are not a passenger any more. You are in the driving seat. The fact is, you always have been. The addiction makes you feel so vulnerable that you feel like you have no control, and because your brain wants that hit so badly, you give in but you always, always have a choice. 

During the first few months of my GF period, I even went as far as to deposit money in my online accounts, I carefully placed my chips on the board and sat and pondered over the possibilities....Most importantly, I gave myself time. I did not react on impulse. Sometimes, I will have quietly thought about gambling for days, weeks before I felt a moment of true weakness. Still, I would not act impulsively. That is the most dangerous part of addiction because it removes your ability to think about your actions. That's why gambling sites are designed to get you to deposit again as soon as possible after you run out of balance. Knee j**k reactions are what the gambling industry thrive on. The last thing they want is for you to have time to think about it and walk away. They want you fresh from the loss, back for more and still caught up in the trance. In casinos, people are employed to watch out for gamblers in distress. When people look like they are losing and about to walk away, the staff will come over and offer you a free drink and a cash incentive to play on. They may offer you a dining card or free perks to keep you sweet while you haemorrhage cash. Let this behaviour anger you and let it make you see gambling for what it is. 

In my times of weakness, I knew that I still wanted to bet but I allowed myself time to rationalise my actions and despite the barrage of thoughts and emotions, each time, I came to the conclusion that this was not what I wanted. This was just what my poorly brain wanted. So I withdrew the cash back to my bank and closed the accounts and settle down for another quiet period of being gamble free.

This was before Gamstop came in which helps you to self excluded from all online gambling sites. I used to have to do it the hard way....lose big, self exclude, and then eventually find somewhere else to bet. Each time, I would close down another opportunity to bet and I would feel good about myself.

I knew that once I hit that spin button just once, that I was either going away with a win or with nothing at all. That's how it has always been. Losing even a few quid was enough to send me into a tantrum to get it back. It was me against the machine and I knew that I should not be gambling as I couldn't handle even the smallest of losses. It was personal. 

While staring at the chips on the board and hovering over the spin button, I asked myself what I would feel like if that balance in the top right corner read £0.00. This was often the way it looked after a session. I would sometimes be in a battle with the machine for 6 hours, just to come away with £10 more than I started with. Wasting all those hours and going through all those ups and downs and stress just to get £10 and STILL I felt like a winner! I felt like I had beat the machine just because I fought it for hours to get my money back!

How bad must I have been feeling for this to make me feel like a winner?

I allowed myself to look at the gambling adverts, and to see them in a new light....To feel the rush of excitement and then allow my mind to sensibly acknowledge the true outcome of my gambling. At first, I would turn over the channel when an ad came on, I was afraid of it. I didn't want to feel either excitement or regret, then I realised that this was me avoiding that all important healing. I needed to change those connections in my brain....I needed to re train my brain to associate gambling with debt, hurt and misery. Slowly, my thought process changed. Now, instead of feeling pain or excitement when an ad comes in, I just roll my eyes at the folly of it all. I can see how stupid and pointless gambling is and the adverts just wash over me without effect. I guess it's like when you avoid things that upset you in life. You block them out and don't deal with them but then the underlying problem is still there. I had to face up to my pain and accept those mistakes. I had to feel the burn every time I was reminded of gambling and it worked and slowly changed the way I thought.

Now I truly don't want to gamble. I feel I am finally free from the torment. I can see the sense in remaining gamble free. People often gamble because they feel low or discontent in life. They look for excitement, for a sense of belonging and for distraction from everyday life. Gambling welcomes you in with open arms, calls you by your name and tells you it's all going to be alright. It is a liar and a thief. 

We often gamble because we want to feel the same way that non gamblers do.....on a level, normal.....They have contentment and inner peace and we want that badly. We think we can get it by gambling but all this does is fuel the discontentment.

It's like people who smoke cigarettes...they smoke because they want to feel on the same level as those who do no smoke. They don't realise that smoking actually drags them down and that they then need to smoke again just to get back up to where they would be if they weren't smoking. 

We think things like drugs and gambling are giving us a boost and a pick up but we are letting them take us so far down in the first place that when it does work and we win, that high is a massive reward for our sick brains. What we are actually doing is allowing the gambling to control the way we feel. We allow it to hurt us in the first place, then look for it to heal us. This is why gambling addiction is a form of self harm.

We throw all our energy into the machines thinking that what we want is money in return, but what we really want is a connection, we want emotion and we want to feel something and sadly, we are never going to get that from a machine.

That's why when we do win and we feel elated, the feeling is so brief. We can't even keep hold of the win for long because that elation doesn't last. The happiness doesn't last and we soon need to bet again. That's why gambling is so pointless. It is an empty and hollow experience. It can't give you what you are looking for and the sooner you realise that it isn't really the money that you want, the sooner you can break the cycle. If it were money, you wouldn't risk it in the first place and you wouldn't lose it again when you have it.

It's the high you want and because you will pay anything to get it, it is just a matter of how much of your life you are willing to pour into these machines because no amount of winning or losing can make you stop.

Why? Because it's not about the money. Money is just the way you pay for your medication, your therapy.....your gambling.

Hope this helps you leave the madness behind. 

xx

@sillyboy1981 the above post is in reply to your message. I meant to tag you in at the start. 🙂

I don’t want the cloud of gambling to steal any more of my time & money, it’s taken years away from my focus & loved ones time... I actually hate it so much & so happy that I see it clearly for what it really is. Thank you again for your words & time to share your experiences & knowledge, it helps like you wouldn’t believe x