This topic really felt relevant for me to write about, as I have been up against this topic myself last week. A few weeks back I was told on short notice that I would no longer be able to run my gambling support group for the homeless- a group that I have invested heavily in during the last 8 years.   When I say invested heavily- I am not necessarily talking about time spent running the group. It was just one hour per week, albeit over 8 years that add up. But I referring more to the about emotion. This group has been an eye opener, a learning curve, a remarkable community and an extremely worthwhile venture. I have reflected on the learning and on the sad stories presented to me far and beyond the hour spent with the group. Their often cruel but honest humour, and ability to laugh at tragedy may seem ‘twisted’ but is an often necessary response to the deep end of human suffering. Needless to say I have derived great joy from helping these men and women, achieve change. For some that change has been at the level of seeing a smile on their face. For some it has been a new suitcase to replace an old bin-liner. And for others it has been the mere commitment of showing up for this one hour per week when everything else has felt chaotic and out of sync. Many have even made real progress in reducing or quitting their gambling, and have made it into accommodation. There was little doubt that we all struggled with this final goodbye after so many years but we were at least all in agreement;  when good things come to an end they don’t need to go on forever in a practical sense. They will live forever in our hearts as fond memories.  We all agreed that it has been a lot of difficult but good times in the group – and we all accepted that it was ending and that a goodbye was necessary.   This is what I would call a ‘clean’ letting go.  Not sure there is anything called a ‘dirty’ let go – but I will spend the rest of this article looking at what it looks like when letting go is necessary; but the circumstances are less straightforward.  This is often the case when you have invested yourself wholeheartedly, but the sense of reward and reciprocity has not been present, not consistent or in some cases not there at all. Somehow things are not adding up, it feels unfair and/or unresolved.  Gambling tends to be an activity that produces all of the above, but there are of course other life circumstances too, not least the area of relationships. In both gambling and less healthy relationships, the common denominator is often the case of one person’s one-sided ‘chasing’ and clinging . You have invested (be it time, money, energy, emotion or all them ) but unlike in my personal example about ending the group, here we are talking about those times when there has not been returns on that investment. It leaves you feeling bereft and desperate, obsessed and confused. Like you have been ‘cheated’ or are at a loss. Often even though you have yourself watched the process unfold. This is the daily experience of a gambler. You are trying harder and harder, in spite of accumulated losses. In these situations- letting go is the most logically obvious- but the absolute hardest thing to to do!

Let’s explore some of the reasons why this happens…..

# you feel that you have invested a lot….and that consequently you are owed returns on your investment. Read the below…does it sound familiar?  

‘ but if I walk away now- what did I get for all of that money, time and ‘effort’ that I put in. And what about all the losses – how would I recover them if I don’t even give myself a shot at winning…? Better give it another go in case this is the time that I will strike lucky’

Our human nature often contributes to a couple of inaccurate assumptions. We often assume we should have control over situations and our life (which taking a step back we can immediately conclude we don’t have). We also often assume that there should be a sense of justice to situations. If I do X then he/she/it should do Y’.  If I am kind to someone, they should be kind to me or I had so much bad luck yesterday - today I will be lucky. We might feel that things we do for others should be reciprocated. In gambling this translates to an expectation of a particular outcome that is being ‘earned’ as you are putting money and time towards the activity.  ‘this machine is definitely due now’ ‘it has to pay out soon, I’ve stood here pumping in money for hours….  

It is no news that there is a HUGE illusion of control at play in gambling disorders. In fact this constitutes one of the biggest drivers of the addiction both early days in the addiction and often throughout recovery as well.   ‘If only I pursue my gambling like this – then I will be the winner…’ 

One of the underlying processes that make gambling highly addictive is the concept of intermittent reinforcement schedules. This forms part of the underlying gambling psychology and is why gambling is addictive to human beings.  If you are curious you can look it up, and if not we will come back to that topic another time in this blog. Briefly; intermittent reinforcement schedules refers rewards for a behaviour that is delivered on unpredictable and often random intervals, and sometimes in varying strength. This is known to foster great compliance and high motivation to continue engaging in a behaviour.

# many gamblers are competitive, hence the feeling of loosing or feeling ‘defeated’ leads to wanting to gamble even more to get a chance to ‘get back’ at the industry for taking your money, time and energy.

# the illusion of control, (referred to above) one of the well known cognitive distortions that problem gamblers present with. Essentially this is when you fool yourself to believe that if only you applied different formulas/strategies to your gambling, you will probably strike lucky… This type of thinking fuels further chasing and on a purely psychological level it can lead to intense obsessing and ‘clinging’ to the idea of winning.

# if you stop there is often an immediate and overwhelming sense of loss since there is no longer a hope of recover any of your losses  - this feeling will pass however can understandably be very strong right at the beginning when you try to quit. It may become easy to misinterpret this negative mood state as a signal that stopping is not the right thing to do, and before you live to experience the sweet relief that comes with properly letting go – you go back to cause more damage to yourself

# The gambling may have acted as a surrogate (although a bad one) for emotional coping skills, lift from boredom and escape from difficult problems and feelings.

No matter what role the gambling has played for you or how attached you feel please DO KNOW that whatever excuse your mind is giving you - the fact is that you would not be in the position that you are with gambling if it was a working formula. Put mind over matter quickly before this addiction drags you further down a hole- and ACT quickly even if a large part of you is struggling against. 

‘ Since I stopped gambling my emotional pain is at an all-time high. Am I meant to feel worse when I finally stopped?’

Not that I think I need to tell you this – but just in case you don’t feel it:  putting an end to your gambling is a major achievement. Those of you who have done it would know how much effort, failed attempts and agony it took you to get there.  Unlike the treatment for substance misuse, people addicted to gambling typically are treated on an out-patient basis. That’s if you access treatment. For this reason you will probably not be reaping the benefits of being ‘locked away’ from the gambling (unless you are one of the few who has been to a residential rehab to help you deal with your disordered gambling). Constantly needing to keep yourself away from the gambling, even in the early days when the feelings tend to run particularly strong, is a challenging task that requires tremendous work and energy.  One of the most difficult challenges during this time tends to be the emergence of unpleasant feelings that have typically been suppressed and avoided for some time. Coming from the perspective of a person who has gotten their brains used to instant relief and gratification through the use of gambling, this is not the best of news. Whilst the negative feelings push through, so does the realisation that you might now be finding yourself feeling very vulnerable and bit ‘bare’ without the option for some ‘pain medication’ in the form of more gambling.

Let’s expand on this for a minute; Having realised that your addiction did not lead you to a good place is a valuable realisation, and certainly a piece of knowledge you want to keep close to you at all times. And stopping will absolutely lead to an improvement in your life longer term. But that time may just not be here yet.    Having been hooked on gambling means the brain has by now become dependent on frequent and powerful ‘rewards’ (not that rewards here is referring to the brain’s perception of reward; which at times could be a feeling of buzz but other times might be just feeling less miserable or low) and as such when you stop; for a period of time things might on many levels feel worse than when you were still gambling. 

In summary; you feel great about giving up the gambling. But…. You are now dealing with:

• Day to day problems in life; with the added impact  of dealing with everyone’s disappointment and distrust towards you

• The ‘trail of crap’ your gambling has created for you yourself and people around you- these may include loss of relationships, house, jobs and lifestyle that you once enjoyed    

• The emotional pain that might have been there even before the gambling started; essentially the difficult feelings that made it easier for the gambling to get a foothold in your life to begin with 

 …and likely many other unpleasant feelings such as anxiety, shame, regret, guilt etc.  

Rather than panicking, please accept that overcoming the difficulty in managing feelings is what long term recovery really is all about; so that you will be able to live fully and without constant fear of lapsing. There are no short-cuts, recovery will inevitably need to involve the learning of new emotional coping strategies. These aren’t acquired overnight and will require both practice and patience- two qualities that are rare for addicted people to exhibit.

Last week in my group for homeless problem gamblers we had a session on self-love, and the questions that was being asked was; How to start loving oneself after all the damage inflicted by their addiction?  Several group members frowned upon hearing the word self-love and one said ‘but seriously – how can I love this (pointing at self) – look at what has become of me’.      What followed was a really good discussion about this ultra-important feeling for ourselves, that in its absence underlies pretty much all things bad in this world.    Without loving ourselves we end up with a perforated filter for negative influences in our life, poor boundaries, and as if that was not enough we can use our lack of self-love to justify more disgraceful behaviours towards ourselves and others with the justification of ‘not being worthy anyway’.  We can become habituated to situations and behaviours from others that are less than ideal; since we don’t value ourselves enough to see that we need to have better boundaries and say no. Last but not least, it also paves the way for feelings of fear, threat, and negative self-comparisons that trigger envy and in certain cases even hatred of self and others.    This is a vicious cycle, and one that can end us up in a really bad place where we don’t have even a shred of respect left for our self.   Needless to say, the ideal solution is just to start loving yourself; but what if all you have genuinely done a lot of damage?  And if the things we have done have actually been so bad that we find it hard to even accept that it happened? How then is it possible to take such a step and start seeing oneself as an individual worthy of those things that are seemingly there for others to have.  How can we allow ourselves to go against our own intuition and treat us well when everything and everyone suggests we should engage in self-punishment and deprivation?

Here are some of the great ideas we came up with in the group this week:

# self excluding and taking other proactive steps to limit the gambling from causing further damage in ones life. Depending on the country you live and what sort of gambling you have been known to engage in, the steps you take here might vary greatly. If you live in the UK there are a few good apps that will make it impossible for you to gamble online. You can also ensure that you take proactive steps and visit the bookmakers that you have been frequenting requesting to complete the paperwork for self-exclusion. Yes, this is not airtight, and I know there are millions of shops around but this step can actually feel empowering even if there are always going to be ways to gamble if you really set your mind to do it.  Buy time, empower yourself by acting with assertiveness and take this step anyway. Blocking your access to gambling is the most fundamental and important step any gambler can take and a huge display of recognising that you deserve better than being able to continue to sabotage your life by further betting.

# Start to Treat yourself well in small ways daily  Ok agreed-  this one sounds so cliché and obvious. But simultaneously please recognise how difficult it actually is to follow this seemingly simple formula.  Of course it sounds great to start treating yourself to a decent lunch, going to bed at a time that allows adequate sleep, allowing yourself a new hair cut or whatever it is.  Most people I speak to would be able to easily generate a nice long list of things that they would think constitute self-caring behaviours but so few in comparison will actually do any of them for themselves. It is not uncommon for people in general to have a bit of disconnect between what people know they should do and and what they actually do – but there should not be an entire canyon between the two. Start bridging that gap by highlighting just one or two small things that you can insert into your life starting today: do those until they become natural and habitual and then add another one. Building up slowly will always make it more likely for the behaviours to stick longer term since you repeat those small changes until they are no longer requiring of the same level conscious processing. Try and renovate yourself in a day and you will tire out and end up feeling like it is ‘hard work’ to treat yourself well.

# Stop tormenting yourself with what has already happened and focus on future action instead

This step is a lot harder than it sounds. We all know behaviours can end up becoming ingrained, repetitive habits – most people have some habit they have tried to get rid of either successfully or unsuccessfully – think nail biting, thumb sucking, spot-picking or whatever you have have been ‘stuck on’ yourself. It takes effort to stop doing something. It is going to take effort in giving up the gambling. But when you begin to break free it gets easier. You feel freer. On many levels it can feel like being ‘unshackled’ from routines and rituals you knew were just damaging for you. And you can use that energy to continue breaking free and living a fuller life.  What many people don’t seem to realise is that our thinking get into the same rigid patterns. The brain starts sounding like a broken record quite easily when we feed it the same experience again and again. Remember ; our emotional mind does not understand any better as it is busy looking out for our survival hence absorbs only the short-term aftermaths. Any constructed scenario that is followed out again and again and generates nice feelings, even if ever so temporary, will be memorised. The thoughts will take on whichever flavour we feed it – meaning if you teach it that going gambling makes you feel high and excited (short term) we need to recall that this is all that part of our brain cares about. Before we know it our brain will have picked up that the it will get to experience a nice ‘lift’ in mood ( or a reduction in a low) – simply by giving incessant prompts to the person to be engaging in the gambling. It basically becomes a mental habit. The mind starts thinking in particular ways more and more often, maybe even obsessively.  On the flipside it can also get hooked on extensive rumination about past negative experience, failures and wrong doings. Or rehash obsessively over a past or future agony in a failed attempt to gain closure and aqcuire learning. The reason I explain it in this slightly childish and basic way is so that you can start treating that part of your mind with some detachment yet some understanding and compassion. Yes it will keep firing away with the same broken-record-spiel any chance it gets. But do you need to listen in so hard?  Keep moving to better tunes and learn to feed the brain with new fresh info from which it can create new thinking habits.  Your mind should be focused on the present moment for you to experience the greatest relief and enjoyment. That does not mean there are no problems to sort; but it means that you keep your mind clear enough to actually be able to sort them while enjoying life a little.

Doomed if you have …doomed if you don’t have…. The impossible role of Money for addicted gamblers and how to think about it

One of the topics that often preoccupies early day interventions for problem gamblers is that of Money. Each month of the year presents its own challenges relating to money and I thought it would be worth taking a look at the very complex role of money in the life of a problem gambler; and how having better awareness of your relationship with money can help you remain abstinent in the longer term. It can be tempting to think that paying attention to money is counterproductive to abstinence as it could ‘feed an obsession’ at a time when you are busy trying to cut your losses and move on. Not addressing your attachment to money can however have the reverse effect that you are looking for and hence I have put together a small list of points to  consider as you are now entering your recovery.

Some of the complicated contradictions with money in problem gambling….

# Having money can often lead to an urge to want to gamble

# Having NO money can often lead to an urge to go gambling (you quickly want to make some more)

# Being in debt can be depressing; and the prospect of long-term repayment plans can make a gambler feel tempted to have ‘a quick win’ instead

# Living ‘hand-to-mouth’ often leads to a very short-term focus (and those living hand to mouth will usually adapt a short term focus depending on what caused what) – one where no long term plan for money exist. This state often makes people more likely to justify a little bet; in the end of the day it does not feel like there is that much to loose ..   (but of course it makes it impossible to get out of the hole that gambling has created).

# Having no access to money over long periods of time often makes people feel infantilised, less achieved and sometimes a bit bored; all of which can lead to urges to want to gamble

# having outgoings monitored by a loved one often feels intrusive and difficult; and can sometimes add further strain to already strained relationships

#having nobody monitoring accounts and outgoings represents a huge risk for the gambler as they can then convince themselves that they are just ‘using a bit’ to increase the money they have, something that will result in more chasing and more losses.

It would be fair to say that most people would like to have a bit more money. This is not isolated to gamblers at all – however unlike for people suffering with other addictions-  gamblers are the only ones who think (from time to time at least) that their addiction is going to make them rich and, if all goes to plan, also possibly help put the addiction to rest. This is of course far from the truth. But it does not take away from the fact that you still might want and need some more money in your life. 

 So how is one supposed to relate to money when it has become a curse both in its presence and in its absence? Money constitutes the absolute biggest trigger for any problem gambler! It is the very means required to fulfil your gambling addiction and as such can be equated to 'the bottle' for an alcoholic or direct drug access to a person addicted to drugs.  The difference is that we still need money to live hence why significant efforts need to go into blocking access to money, and ensuring that these restrictions are not suddenly taken out or reduced for reasons that tend to be driven by ego needs and strange justifications for why life will never be the same with these restrictions in place.

 The role of money is highly complicated and it will be worth it for you to spend some time reflecting over the following points. I have written them in ‘I’ format so that you can really pretend like you are thinking it to aid you in reality checking some of the distortions that can easily occur.. .

Rules of thumb for money relating & 3 things I can do right now...

# Although I keep thinking I need money – the fact is I don’t have any due to gambling anyway  (and I have gambled a long time) – so is it possible that I actually need money less than I realise?