I've been read this website for that last 6 months of so and thought it was about time I posted.
my story is all too familiar and started with small sports bets whilst at university - even worked in a bookies for 3 years so have great knowledge of what I shouldn't be doing!!! In total I've probably spent around £30k on gambling over the past 14 years.
I kept getting more and more credits cards to consolidate the debt and then gamble some more! Winning £1,000 plus was never enough as I kept wanting more and more to pay off this credit card debt that I had accumulated over the years and as normal you chase and chase and end up losing. I would often pick what I wanted to bet on this would win and then I've just keep betting on random things - corners in a football match, college football at 4 am in the morning and once it was all gone I would just feel ashamed.Time and time again this would happen!
I've been largely in control over the last 8 months as I had shredded the credit cards and paid off most of the debt to get it down to around 3k and I had a new arrival on the way so that was the motivation to finally change. But then for some reason I requested A new credit card to be sent and this was linked to the rugby World Cup starting!!
I lost £1.5k yesterday alone and that was it! Time to change - I've top my loan up and paid off my cards this morning and closed them. I've also self excluded myself from all the websites and I feel better already. My bank account is joint with my wife and I've never bet on that so my journey begins today. All statements going forward I will share with her as this massively helps me not to bet.
Day 1 stars now - wish me luck.
Neil
Hi Neil,
Welcome to the Forum!
I'm glad that you have found reading this Forum helpful in starting to consider your situation differently over the past months and that you have now decided to post, to admit to your problem and to start doing something about it. That's a massive step forward, well done!
You have put many strategies in place to help yourself, like closing your credit cards, excluding from websites and sharing your bank statements with your wife. It can make a hige change to start being honest about what's going on and how you feel about it. I hope that you will gain much support here, too and maybe you would like to start a recovery diary in the relevant section here on the Forum.
You can do this, Neil!
Kind wishes
Gabriele
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