Living with my biggest mistake

Day 238 GF.

Football World Cup coming up and while we are not really hard core football fans will probably watch a fair few of the games. Son asked me again if we were going to put any small bets on games. We have done this for last couple of big tournaments (Euros and Worlds). Only a £1 or £2 online on a game to make it more interesting (now that is a worrying statement for a start). Previously have picked up a promotional deal up at the start and overall winnings/losses were extremely low and never for one moment did I considered betting more to chase losses or hid any of it from anyone. Probably all pretty harmless stuff for many people. Obviously I won't be doing this for this tournament - don't want to and could not anyway because of Gamstop. Son seems a little disappointed and to be honest so am I as I feel like my inability to control myself is stopping us from doing something that at the time seemed like fairly innocent fun.

Guess this is a fairly minor regret compared to what could have happened if I continued gambling.

We are still running a family (including grandparents) sweepstake where we all stick £5 in and get 4 random teams. I am participating on the basis that I have 4 teams so as far as anyone is concerned I will be cheering on my teams although should I win, the cash will go to my wife. Daft really as we share all our money anyway but it is the agreement I have come to with myself to balance my need to not gamble whilst trying not to spoil things for those around me who can control themselves.

Feeling slightly ackward about this and know some on here will probably not agree with this approach and see the hypocrisy in it from someone who keeps saying they are never going to gamble again. I think the very fact I feel uncomfortable with this answers my own doubt and I should not be doing this.

Checking in day 245GF

No gambling urges although do still have irrational thoughts of how gambling could turn £500 into £1000 so glad to have Gamstop in place. It is a posion that I am not sure will ever leave me completely.

Son currently sitting his A levels so keeping busy trying to help with his revision where I can and making the rest of his life as easy as possible so he can focus on them. Looking forward to him finishing them so we can get out and do a few more things together.

250 days GF. Should be happy but not.

Son asked again about betting on world cup last night. Said again I was not as I did not feel comfortable gambling anymore generally. He pressed me on why and I just made some vague comment about damage gambling industry doing to peoples lives. He did not seem convinced and said he thought it was just a bit of fun to make the games more interesting. Long and short was he asked me if I did not want to do it, would I place a small bet (£1) for him as he is not 18 until August and so could not use the sites. Of course I cannot even if I wanted as because I have signed up to Gamcare which i do not regret. I slightly paniced as I did not know what to say and said something about "yes, we'll sort something out". I have no idea what this "something" is.

So I have two issues to deal with. One, I do not really want him gambling and second, how to deal with explaining to him why I can't place bets for him or rather won't.

I know the stock answer is to tell him the truth. I have advised many people on here how much the gambling demons love secrets. Starting to feel physically sick just thinking about the thought of telling him - all the feelings of humiliation and disgust with myself are coming back. I am also going through all the same arguments with myself that everyone has about the right time to tell him. He is in the middle of his A levels (has one tomorrow and Friday) and now I land this on him.

Gambling really is the gift that keeps on giving.

Hi Muststop123

I can see why this is tricky on many levels.

But my hand on heart advice would be not to open up about the reasons why you won't gamble anymore. You're aware the time really isn't right, smack bang in the middle of an already stressful moment in his life, and it's not something he needs to be aware of. I'd only ever feel compelled to share my gambling woes with my son if it was causing an ongoing problem in the home and it'd help him to make sense of any unpleasant or unexplained changes going on around him.

I also understand that my advice, having relapsed a good few times, is far from something you should quickly follow - but when the Grand National was happing a couple of months ago I was visiting my mum and was joined by my brother. She wanted us all to put a £1 bet on a horse and so we did. Different temptations for different people - and maybe I'm being naive, but it really did feel a million miles away from anything remotely dangerous. I didn't feel as this was gambling and so I didn't count it as gambling. It fell into some vague category of family tradition. So I just gave my brother a one pound coin and he placed the bet online for me. We watched the race, all very light hearted, then all lost and that pretty much was that.

Gambling for me was a very solitary act - all hidden and secretive on roulette or blackjack - and I think that's why I could separate it from family time having a flutter on the National.

I know some people's jump back into gambling will be triggered by putting a small single bet on a horse, so I don't under estimate the power of a small and foolish step in the wrong direction. But I knew, in my heart of hearts, me having a flutter for a pound and enjoying an 'innocent' tradition in the family was not going to inspire any thoughts of gambling in me.

Maybe there was a clash of principles - Nasty gambling vs Family fun.

As awful as it might feel, in some ways it's good that there's still feelings of humiliation and disgust when you think back to the gambling days - because this is maybe what's given you such strength to steer clear of making a return. Forgive me for saying this if it comes across as clumsy or inappropriate, but I do think your being too hard on yourself.

But I can see how there's no easy solution out of this - you can't place the bet online and you might not want to enter a bookies. And I think it would be a bridge too far for me to ask my wife or friends to place the bet.

I'm circling here ... because after writing this, I'm thinking differently about what I've initially said - maybe it might be better to do what you did in the very first place - just say no to your son and tell him you want nothing to do with the gambling industry.

Maybe have a bet between you (would that count as gambling?) - he wins, you treat him to something nice, you win he buys you a little something that would suit his budget?

I feel as if I waffled on a bit here but I just wanted to offer some support in exchange for all the brilliant help you've offered me in the past.

Thanks Equinox, appreciate the thoughts. Just had to leave the office for 10 minutes and walk around the block as was getting a bit emotional.

Know this is selfish as how this will make me feel should be totally irrelevant - my actions are my responsbility. It is just bringing a lot of memories and emotions back from the early days.

Asking someone else to put the bet on for him feels like asking someone else to buy illegal drugs for him. Going into a bookies is just not going to happen.

My normal default position here would be to mention it to my wife and often a few hours later she would come out with some blindingly obvious simple solution. In the middle of thinking about this I get an email from her saying she is at work and feels like crying so probably not the best time to burden her with my problems.

At the moment I am leaning towards giving him an abridged version of me making a bit of a mistake last year, doing a bit of research on gambling online and then deciding I did not want to gamble again so just signed up to Gamstop. He is not daft though and I imagine he will see through that and realise there was a bit more to it.

By coincidence I got an email through this morning from someone at work who is going to run a worldcup sweepstake where you all put in £2 and predict the results of all the games. I have done these previously and they have been a bit of fun seeing who was where each morning in the points chart but obviously was not going to do it this time as a form of gambling. Don't want to encourage my son to gamble in any way but wonder if this would fulfil his need to have a bit of interest in each game as the competition is open to friends and family as well.

Day 256 GF.

Issues with son and gambling subsidised a bit but slight underlying worry for me. Said I had decided not to gamble anymore as not happy with behaviour of gambling industry so did not want to fund them and had signed up to Gamstop so could not place bets for him. He has got around this by getting one of his friends who is over 18 to bet a few £1 bets for him. Hardly ideal from my point of view and now having to balance trying to discourage him from gambling with not turning it into a confrontation with a son who turns 18 in Aug and is then off to university in Sept and so can pretty much do as he pleases at that stage. Fortunately, he has lost every single bet so far which is good news as far as I am concerned. He has also said that he has transferred a small amount of money to his friend and once that is gone he will be finished for the competition. If he does that and the gambling ceases completely once the world cup is over I will be reasonably content.

Great day out with him yesterday on Father’s Day and came home to a pile of beer, chocolate and cards from my grown step children which was very kind of them.

Not even a slight interest in gambling myself on the world cup. I realised part of this was putting £1 on a bet to win £2 holds zero interest because of the value. Having won and lost reasonably large sums of money, there would be no “high” from playing with such small amounts. I guess I have de-sensitised myself from the value of money when it comes to gambling. Not sure if this a good thing or bad.

Day 257 GF

Been coming on here a bit more frequently last few days. Issues with son gambling and general increase in world cup related gambling exposure (even more gambling adverts on TV, multiple sweepstakes going on at work and others talking about bets etc) has just made me feel a bit unsettled. Difficult to explain the feeling but a combination of worry/nervousness. Since I stopped gambling I have have had periods of being scared of gambling (and its potential impacts), periods of being really angry with it to periods of complete dis-interest as if it just has nothing to do with me any more.

I have no urge to gamble at all, quite the reverse, but any pictures of logos or mentions of names of betting/casino companies are making me feel sick. Shame because I am actually quite enjoying watching a few of the football matches with the family.

Checking in day 259 GF.

Spend 10-15 mins most days reading diaries or members intros recently as now I do not go to any counselling and have never been to GA meetings so I think I need to keep contacted to some sort of recovery support rather than get complacent about keeping GF. It goes in cycles, sometimes I feel the need to come on here, other times I can go a week and give it little thought.

The new members stories are depressingly familar but when you read about someone acknowledging they have a problem and starting to put the actions in place to deal with it, then regardless of the damage they have done in the past and the immense pain they are currently going through, I can at least see a potential better life for them in the future. The ones that are most distressing to read are where the new member is for whatever reason unwilling or unable to see through the fog of their gambling addiction and just can't take on board what is fairly consistent and proven advise. These are like watching a car crash that you just know is getting worse and you can't do anything about. Fair play to those who are about to continue to advise/question/challenge these people but I think the awful truth is they can't or won't listen until they truly hit their own rock bottom. Not sure where I am going with this one. It is just so upsetting to read.

On a more positive note, day off today to meet up and have a few drinks with some friends to see one of our friends who has been abroad for a few years. Known these people for 30+ years and years can go by without seeing them but within 10 mins of getting back together it is like we were never apart.

Checking in day 263 GF.

Is there actually a C list celebrity out there who is not prepared to sell their soul to a casino/bookies and appear in a nauseating television advert? Guess I remain fairly sensitive to them - feel guilty everytime they come on and pretend to suddenly be interested in something else.

Day 266 GF

Feel exposed to quite a lot of gambling at the moment, mostly related to the world cup, whether it is discussions in the office about odds or sweepstakes or the stupid amounts of television adverts.

Outwardly I am happy to be open and be upfront with people that I just do not gamble. Inwardly my mind still occassionally tries to create the image of gambling as a pleasant idea, like a cold drink on a hot day, a piece of really delicious chocolate or something else!! Almost like a seductress. This is odd beacuse as soon as I see an advert on television for gambling I feel nothing but revulsion.

Not going to gamble because I have too much to lose and I know any pleasant thoughts about gambling are an illusion based on the past memories of the endorphins that gambling created. Of course my mind conveniently forgets about the utter despair it created.

Day 270 GF and will not gamble again.

The poison inside me remains. Fairly strong thoughts yesterday about game I lost a lot of money on and how I could find something with a similar bonus game to try and create the same "high". Quite impossible as excluded from sites it was on and Gamstop in place but thought was there. Did not get as far as searching for anything and my revulsion of the act of gambling remains strong so not actually too worried that I will do anything about it.

I know part of my problem is boredom. Job does not challenge me so I need reasonable amounts of stimulation outside work or I start looking for something to do or occupy my mind. Like to get back to my speed walking but hot weather is putting paid to that at moment.

Checking in day 274 GF.

Thought for the day is about what do I now consider acceptable activities to partake in when it comes to family/work sweepstakes/raffles etc. I know I am not the only one to be having these thoughts because I have seen it on a couple of other diaries but I do not want to comment on other diaries as I don't want to risk suggesting things are "ok" for others to do because I do not know what other peoples triggers are. So that is the health warning.

I do not generally deal with ambiquity well - things are either good/bad, acceptable/unacceptable, I do things full on or not at all. I know this is not particularly healthy or helpful in life and it means I have to make a deliberate effort to realise my natural tendancies and try and rein them back.

So back to the issue on my mind and to date I have tried to be pretty black and white about it and just work on the basis that I will not have anything to do with anything that could in any way be construed as gambling. This is obviously easy when it comes to any type of organised gambling, so anything related to the gambling industry including online, bookies, casinos, horse racing, scratch cards etc is completely unacceptable.

So what I am talking about is the work and family stuff that occurs around the bigger sporting events. My thoughts about this are evolving and I am now able to differentiate these from "proper" gambling and here lies the dilemma, am I getting complacent or am I just getting on with life? This is certainly at odds with what I was writing a few months ago.

Two situations over the last few weeks:

First, at work, someone in office organises a world cup sweepstake where everyone puts in £2 for which they get a randomly selected country. Half of the money goes to our corporate charity and half to the final winner. Person comes round office janglying a jar and we all stick £2 in. I get Nigeria so no hope anyway.

Second, grown up children want to run a family sweepstake for £5 each with 8 of us in it so 4 randonly selected teams each.

I have partaken in both of these and feel ok with it. I think the point is they both have in common are:

1. I do not have any control over them - no perceived skill that I incorrectly thought I had when gambling.

2. There is no opportunity to increase the stake or number of entries regardless of the result.

3. There is no rush of excitment involved which was the real reason I gambled.

I am relaxed about this in a way I would not have been 6 months ago.

Bit of a ramble this morning but writing this down helps me organise my thoughts. As I say, this is just how I feel, don't take this as a recommendation to act like I do.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Day 279 GF

Still getting fairly regular post from various online casinos despite having self excluded from all the sites I used. Guiltily rip them up and put them in the bin before anyone else can see them. Obviously I am on some sort of "mugs" mailing list for gamblers. Not a major thing, just a little unnecessary reminder of that dirty little episode of my life. Hopefully they will disappear eventually.

Get a similar thing on facebook where I occasionally get adverts for online casionos. Hit the button to report advert as offensive and that seems to have reduced the number quite significantly.

Guess if I read the ones I get through the post there might be the opportunity to get in touch with them and stop them sending anymore but I am always in such a hurry to get rid of the evidence that I have ripped them up before I get the chance to read them.

Have a GF day everyone.

Day 280 GF

Disappointed England are out of the World Cup but partly happy it is over due to the increase in gambling related activities and conversations it creates. Went into a staff meeting this morning and first thing my boss mentions is a bet he lost last night. Then colleagues start talking about how it affects various sweepstakes they are in. It is everywhere. It does not cause any urges to gamble on my part but still find the whole atmosphere a bit distasteful although I understand that is my problem rather than anyone else's.

Spent a lot of time watching the matches with the family and enjoyed it but now is the time to get out in the evening a bit more and get some execise. Going to go for a decent walk tonight rather than sit in front of the tv for a couple of hours watching a match.

300 days GF today.

Time for an update.

I am not cured. I will never be able to gamble again because I have broken the part of my mind that allows other people to gamble in a controlled way and walk away after losing £10 or £50.

I do not have any strong urges to gamble but I do miss the “highs” that I got from it and I know these could only be gained from high stakes gambling in the future. I have read some people who will gamble with whatever they have so if that means 10p slots they will do it because they need to feed the gambling urge. Just would not work for me, I would need the high risk/reward aspect to get the high.

I do not profess to having a through understanding of either my gambling issues or gambling addiction generally. Why would I? It has only been 300 days. I do think I am learning though. For example, one of the things I could not understand early on was how I had got to the age of 48 without any real interest in gambling and then suddenly within a few months was gambling uncontrollably. I now understand it is an addiction and it would probably have been the same if I had suddenly decided to try some highly additive illegal drugs – it would not matter what age I was, I would undoubtedly have become hooked. The obvious difference being I would have absolutely no idea where to buy illegal drugs whereas gambling is legal and easily accessible and pushed at us all continuously online, on television and in the high street.

I do believe for me that secrecy is my worst enemy when it comes to gambling. The very fact I kept it a secret when I first gambled online, even with the “free” bets was a pretty good sign that I knew I should not be doing it – it was my dirty little secret. Being more open with my wife both about my feelings about gambling and our finances has helped a lot. A good indicator of how gambling and secrecy seemed to go hand in hand for me was when a couple of times I received money through a PayPal account which was effectively “unknown” money my mind immediately created ideas of how I could gamble it without anyone ever knowing.

Whilst I have been completely honest about finances since I stopped gambling and tried to be a lot more open about my feelings I have never actually burdened my wife (or anyone else for that matter) with just how dark some of my thoughts got. Not sure she or anyone reading this would really understand how such a relatively small financial loss could cause such utter despair. I imagine it reads as a bit ridiculous and a huge over-reaction. My only explanation is perhaps a relatively successful/fortunate/lucky/cocooned (take your pick) life to date had not prepared me to deal with what I felt was such a devastating mistake and lack of control. Oddly enough if I had had a tougher life to deal in other areas I might have been a bit mentally stronger and better prepared to deal with this. I struggled to reconcile what I had done with who I thought I was. All a bit pathetic and self-indulgent but the truth. Counselling has helped me realise I am possibly not the only person in the world to ever have made such a stupid mistake and whilst I need to learn from it, it is more important to concentrate on the future than worry about the past I cannot un-do.

No intention of releasing any blocks. Gamstop is like a great cosy safety blanket. I have not tried to get on any gambling sites but just knowing it is there seems to have finally stopped any thoughts of one day having a sneaky “controlled” gamble. Pressing the button to activate Gamstop was not as easy as I expected which was a clear sign that I needed to do it. Deep down I obviously had not accepted that I could never gamble online again. I have now and it is a bit of a “born-again” refreshing feeling.

As far as other gambling is concerned I remain a bit of a hypocritic. I tell others it needs to be black and white, all or nothing, but still manage to blur the edges a bit myself. I have partaken in a couple of works and home sweepstakes which is something I said I would not do previously. I understand this is still on the spectrum of gambling and something I probably should not do. I will probably carry on doing it until or unless it starts causing me a problem. I will undoubtedly continue to do many other things in life that I should not, but I see this one as fairly low risk.

Life is good. Off on holiday with wife and son in a week or so for one last big holiday before son goes off to university in Sept. Not sure if he will want to come on holiday much after this as probably the lure of holidays with friends and girlfriends will be a bit more of an attraction than a holiday with mum and dad. Normal I guess but a bit sad and the end of an era. Also going to miss him while he is at university so need to find something to fill the space – devil makes work for idle hands and all that. As he is our youngest I guess we will be going through a bit of “empty nest” syndrome. All those years of running children around to school/clubs/activities and looking after them suddenly coming to end. I would get a dog but wife not keen.

So that is enough waffle. Still immensely grateful to this forum and the many good people on it who have helped me. I know I got out fairly undamaged so far from my short period of gambling. Getting out so early was 100% due to finding this site and quickly coming to realise the potentially devastating affects this evil addiction can cause. I am not so naГЇve that I think I have got this cracked and never need to worry about it again which is partly why I continue with this diary and reading posts on here. Too many stories on here with people relapsing even years after stopping gambling. Biggest danger seems to be of one day thinking that I can gamble responsibly again which at least for the moment I 100% understand I can’t.