We hate being cliché, but when it comes to a gambling addiction, honesty truly is the best policy. When you know that you’re going to need to reach out to other people, you can’t start lying to them. The act of gambling getting out of control in your life can be the greatest lie of all. After all, it says that you’re in control when you’re really not. You might be chasing that one last win, or you might hope that you’re going to finally dig yourself out of a lot of trouble. The reality is that you can’t let yourself get worked up or think that all of your options are going to be wasted. You have to think of the bigger, better, brighter picture. That’s the only way that you’re going to honestly handle anything that’s worth handling.
Gambling addiction is a serious matter — if you let it continue, you could lose your family, your home, your job, your friends, and even your health. When you’re so stressed from all of the money that you’ve wasted on the gambling tables, you feel like the world around you is closing. That’s not a good feeling to have, and it’s certainly not something that you want to stick with for the rest of your life. Getting help is the only way that you’re really going to be able to take care of anything.
When you reach out to people for the first time, be prepared for their reactions not be exactly what you were looking for. Sure, you might think that they’re going to support you. This is true in many cases. After all, mentioning that you have a serious addiction can be tricky. But you have to also make sure that you’re prepared for a lot of problems. Your family might feel very hurt that you’ve hid something this major from them for so long. This is why it’s important to tell someone as soon as you realize that you have a problem that’s out of control.
Being honest with everyone around you is going to be really hard. You’re going to be tempted to lie. Please don’t lie to your family anymore. Another step that you will have to take is to get out of the gambling world for a long time — if you ever come back. This is hard step to take because you have probably made a ton of friends in the world of gambling. Let your family help you unplug. If you’re single, you might want to get friends to help you cut things off. This also means that you can’t associate with people that get into a lot gambling. Even something as innocent as going to get scratch tickets might trigger a need for gambling.
You have to close the door on this part of your life for good. You can’t just go to some counseling sessions and declare yourself cured. That’s a good way to end up back in the same destructive pattern. Gambling addiction is something that can eat away at your confidence. You might feel that you just can’t make any friends unless they’re interested in gambling. That’s not the case at all. You just need to believe in yourself. There really is a life outside of gambling. You never know — you might rediscover a passion that you thought was lost to you forever. That would be a good thing, right? Absolutely!
