Trying to be a supportive spouse

Thank you Half-Life.

It seems you know exactly how I'm feeling. My mum always says that when you meet the right person, you "just know". And I did. He's my world. But at the moment I'm struggling so much understanding his thought processes and now I've come out of the crying every 5 seconds stage, completely overwhelmed by my emotions and entered to the 'trying to think logically to move forward' stage, I feel more and more angry that he's put me in this position.

We don't have any joint accounts, they're separate and I now get his wages paid into my bank account so I have full control of our finances, but I just don't know how to get him to a healthy frame of mind or how I'm ever going to be able to trust anything he says ever again?

Nice to catch up in chat. Half life and CW bring the viewpoint from the partners side of the forum and for me as a CG it is very benificial.

Best wishes

Hi, Becky,

Sorry to hear it, I found it all a huge betrayal and it's rubbish as HL says. I had known my husband for a few years before we married, I thought I knew him and clearly I thought wrong.

Echo previous advice but would emphasise that it's not your job to fix him on a horses and water basis. He has to take the help that's out there and help himself - if that's what he chooses to do.

You've mentioned unconditional love, I'm not sure about that because it sounds more like mother and son than equal life partnership. With equal life partnership comes expectations and any healthy relationships come with healthy boundaries. Active gamblers drive coach and horses through all of this. To avoid him controlling you by threats of self harm or gambling, the best advice is for you to move your focus back to you. Concentrate on taking the help and accurate information and support that you need to cope with the situation that you are in, from GC, from GamAnon, from your family or friends. Otherwise you end up being caught in the chaos of what he's doing but you can't control what he's doing.

You can separate love and trust. You may love him but you can't trust what he tells you in financial terms. Conversely, I trust my GP/ colleagues/ the bank staff who handle my account but I don't profess to love them.

Take care of you,

CW

Thank you everybody for your advice. You all sound very well versed in situations like this, and rightly so, by the sounds of things, as it seems you have lived through it and come out the other side.
Do you think that a relationship lacking trust can ever be a healthy and sucessful one?

Hi,

For us, we work round it. We have high barriers and all family assets are in my name, so there is some reassurance of protection against financial damage if he relapses. He understands the need for the restrictions, that they are permanent and he actually welcomes them as they help to break his triangle. He goes regularly to GA and at the moment he is in recovery. Therefore he doesn't challenge the restrictions and chafe at the boundaries, he doesn't expect me or the children to trust him financially, he doesn't trust himself financially. He doesn't experiment with the blocking software or seek to open a credit card behind my back. There are stories of addicts who don't want to stop and therefore play "pass the card", they hand it over, then get an urge and demand it back from their "controlling" family. My husband doesn't behave this way, he doesn't seem to resent the barriers, which makes day to day life easier...but he could always relapse and get round them if he wanted to, so I don't trust him.

He can be trusted in other contexts. He does a responsible job very well and he can be trusted with the children. He's generally "there" now in a way that he wasn't when he was gambling, there's no more vacancy at the head of the house. We can live with this normality...but I couldn't go back to the abuse, eggshells, Kafka-type existence of the gambling. A relapse would be fatal, even if we are as well protected financially as possible.

When I first joined the forum, I was in a bad way as everyone is. Such progess as we have made has taken time, commitment, effort, therapy - and two ultimatums of required changes for us to continue as a family. It's a long term question that you're asking.

Keep the focus on you and what you need.

CW

Hi becky,

Its really difficult to advise on. I am a gambler so i know how frustrating it is to be constantly battling to live a normal life. On the other hand, I don't feel sorry for myself I feel sorry for my wife and those it affects. Its the guilt that drives me to depression sometimes but my wife is really supportive, don't get me wrong she gets angry when I have a re-lapse and reallt wants to understand my thought process but its difficult to explain what that actually is. Like Half-Life said, its as if a fog comes over gamblers and they don't think straight, just wanting to escape pressures from work or social pressures is enough to gamble, obviously this just makes it 10 x worse. If I win anything I can't buy my wife or myself anything as she would wonder where the cash came from and there would be no explanation - so often any winnings are used to gamble - the end result being left with nothing and feeling loads worse.

I found it helps when me and my wife do something 'normal' together like going for a meal. It takes me away from my thoughts and we can talk about unrelated things. Its good not to keep asking him if he's ok every 2 minutes but think its important to ask every now and then if he is 'feeling good about things this week' or 'how are you feeling without access to money, has it helped' things like that just to remind him you are there to help him rather than mother him.

I think its important to draw a line in the sand and suggest making a fresh start (unfortunately there may be more than one! but its worth trying) together as a team - warts and all. He will appreciate this and it may lift some of the guilt if he knows you are not holding a massive grudge (even though you quite rightly probably are).

Being positive together is the way out of the mess I reckon. I have a pressure job and totally overthink things which I feel combines to push me towards gambling but by being totally open with eachother and not forgetting it is an issue, its easier to keep on the right tracks. Afterall, its not just his life its yours too. Make sure he knows you love him and that 2 minds are better than one.

Genuinly wish you good luck

Gyp.

Becky

I am the parent of a gambler who has a partner so your story is quite familiar to me i.e. the suicidal side, the secrecy side, the broken promises etc. Our gambler is quite lucky in that they had a good family network supporting them as well as a good partner. You sound like such a kind and supportive partner and have taken all the right steps to help him so far. I would suggest you ring the Gamcare counsellors to get advice on finances, emotional support and general information on the problem itself and keep talking to people on these posts. When you get all this info maybe you could gently persuade him to log on to this site just to have a look at some of the posts and hopefully he may decide to come on here to get some more help. I now it is really hard but a calm approach is much better than an argument. When you mentioned the mother being distant from the problem it reminds me that when we were faced with it we were all completely ignorant about gambling these days and all the different sites and how easy it is to get into it aand how many young and aged people are addicted. It is one of those things that until you are faced with a family member having an addiction you realise that you are fairly uneducated about these things - we never think we will be faced with some of these problems and it is a real shock when it happens to you. When you get the info perhaps meet up with his mum to show her what it is all about and explain that her support would really speed up his recovery. It is a thankless task for you to try to tackle this on your own so please get as much support on here and try and confide in a friend or relation if you can or even local counsellors. I think you also need to be firm with him by making him realise that if he does not seriously stick to a recovery plan now that he really is in danger of losing your support. In the end you need to assess your own future and welfare and if you feel you have done all you can and are not getting anywhere it is then that decisions will need to be made about your relationship. The trouble is that his head will be in a mess with the stress of it all now but there are things that can be done to calm him down and Gamcare will offer advice on that. If you can get him talking and opening up to you then that will also help with that. As always I keep hoping that recovery is made and these relationships do succeed and I wish you luck for a happy ending. He is lucky to have you.

Good luck.

PS If you read posts on here there are success stories to show there can be light at the end of the tunnel.

Hi,

Just responding to the comment about a line (or lines!!) in the sand.

The gambling and living with the addiction does a huge amount of damage to the f&f and causes real hurt and trauma. That has to be dealt with by the f&f and by the gambler and it's a long term job. My experience - and others have posted similar - was that my husband kept wanting to brush it under the carpet and complained that I kept looking back whereas he wanted to move forward. But at that stage, he didn't "get" how the children and I felt about his actions, about the extent of our trauma, about how I felt about how the children felt. For me, the process of moving on requires the emotional mess to be cleared up by him. The fact that he didn't want constant reminders of it wasn't my problem.

At some point, long term (very long term for me), if you choose to stay, it is necessary to let go and forgive, for your own sake and when you are good and ready and not before. Not when the gambler decides that you've mooched around for long enough.

As part of staying and relearning a normal relationship, the advice is to spend time together and communicate. That's vital for rebuilding but a caveat: I found that the manipulation continued beyond the gambling - beware of those deep and meaningful conversations about the gambling which can end up with you being pressed into something that you're not comfortable with. In our case, he was trying to persuade me that we could sort it all out ourselves and it would be a really bad idea to become dependent on marriage counselling or therapy. Not so.

Keep the focus on you.

CW

Cynical wife wrote:

Hi,

Just responding to the comment about a line (or lines!!) in the sand.

The gambling and living with the addiction does a huge amount of damage to the f&f and causes real hurt and trauma. That has to be dealt with by the f&f and by the gambler and it's a long term job. My experience - and others have posted similar - was that my husband kept wanting to brush it under the carpet and complained that I kept looking back whereas he wanted to move forward. But at that stage, he didn't "get" how the children and I felt about his actions, about the extent of our trauma, about how I felt about how the children felt. For me, the process of moving on requires the emotional mess to be cleared up by him. The fact that he didn't want constant reminders of it wasn't my problem.

At some point, long term (very long term for me), if you choose to stay, it is necessary to let go and forgive, for your own sake and when you are good and ready and not before. Not when the gambler decides that you've mooched around for long enough.

As part of staying and relearning a normal relationship, the advice is to spend time together and communicate. That's vital for rebuilding but a caveat: I found that the manipulation continued beyond the gambling - beware of those deep and meaningful conversations about the gambling which can end up with you being pressed into something that you're not comfortable with. In our case, he was trying to persuade me that we could sort it all out ourselves and it would be a really bad idea to become dependent on marriage counselling or therapy. Not so.

Keep the focus on you.

CW

Hi cynical wife,

Apologies if this was taken out of context, all I meant was that as frustrating as the whole situation is for absolutely everyone there's literally nothing anybody can do to change the past. It's about looking to the future and making things right going forward.

I just thought it may be useful coming from a gamblers perspective. This obviously won't work for everyone and sometimes too much damage is done, however for those wanting to work things out there surely has to be a starting point?

Gyp

Hi Becky, another gambler here with a still very active parent gambler who does not believe she has a problem despite living in my flat, rent free & me having her wages to pay her bills! Each time I have bailed her out (I don't anymore) I've insisted on some kind of action but until she is ready to accept that it is a problem, she will continue to gamble with anything & everything she can get her hands on. GA isn't for her either because she 'doesn't have a problem'! I can't stop her gambling her own money, I can't see her out on the street & I have accepted that this is where my line is & yet every new request for money for petrol, MOT, new glasses, a pet unicorn breaks my heart & I don't know how much of that is guilt, how much is why should I stop if she's still @ it (probably not so much this nowadays but early on I was very jealous that she was so carefree) or just genuine sadness that she is in such a mess. I don't understand the addiction despite living with it all my life & being active for almost 3 decades!

I have control of my money again, I don't like it but setting up a standing order seems beyond my husband's capabilities & so the compromise is I periodically subject him to my rantings on GamCare & remind him to check my accounts (all of them). Difference here is, I went looking for help. You may love him unconditionally but don't do that @ your own expense. Sometimes loving us hurts & sometimes hurting us is exactly what we need to understand the devastation that we are creating. If someone is always there picking up the pieces, with no real consequences, it's a green light to continue the way we know how.

Is 8 counselling sessions enough? I would say unlikely...This isn't something that goes away & unless we are prepared to do whatever it takes not to give in then chances are, complacency will set in & you'll be back to square one, again! Can you get to a GamAnon meeting for you? If not, don't be afraid to call the helpline for support or even consider taking up their counselling...You're not to blame for him gambling or attempting to take his own life & having to deal with that on your own must be incredibly painful.

Stay strong & keep posting - ODAAT

Thank you everyone for your comments, advice and support.
I'm currently sitting in the car while my partner attends his first councelling session. He was in an incredibly bad mood this morning as he knew he had to go. Is that normal or do you think that's a sign that he's not ready to start recovery?

Hi...ive not had chance to read all your diary...but just thought id say..I'm the compulsive gambler in my marriage. ..
Your hubby is in with the counsellor right now.. I can't say if he wanted to go. Or if he's ready to give up gambling...
But he's in there so that's better than if he point blank refused...
The only thing I will add...don't expect any miraculously quick responses when he comes out...
And for me.. if id been bombarded with questions I think I would of froze up...it all takes a while to absorb....and actually on my first session it was mainly paper work....hope it goes well hun x

Hi Becky_25 don't beat yourself up about his bad mood. There will be all sorts of things he will be thinking & feeling, guilt, shame, regret, resentment etc. What you have to focus on is that he put himself here & needs to face up to his gambling problem if he wants to beat it.

You sound like a amazing person to support him so much but please remember to take care of yourself. Supporting a CG must be harder than bring one a lot of the time because you can't stop them being addicted. Make sure you put yourself first & by all means give him your love & support, but don't take too much on your shoulders. He needs to face this one day at a time.

I know. It's just so difficult dealing with everything that happened and then his bad moods on top of that. Some days it's SO difficult to stay positive for myself and for him.
He said he liked the councelling and wants to go back. He said he councellor thinks he has this underlying overwhelming need for success that he never achieves so gets frustrated. Eg. Darts - always has to win, relationship - has to make me happy, job - has to progress. And when he's not achieving these things he gets depressed. The councellor said that gambling is a quick crutch for this - even just a small win is like an immediate success.
What do you all think about that? I find it difficult to make sense of that. Do any of you have similar feelings?