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It is mainly men who cannot stop gambling, but many women also find themselves unable to quit gambling. In this article, we will call the gambler “he” but it could just as easily read “she.”

1. Preoccupied With Gambling

The gambler who cannot put a stop to gambling will walk, talk and breathe gambling. He will tell stories of previous big wins, often exaggerating the size of the jackpot. He will regularly corner others, telling anybody who will listen about his latest scheme, or his unbeatable strategy. He will usually use more than one form of gambling, being unable to stop gambling online, at the track, or on the pokies. Even bingo and the lottery hold him spell-bound. He loses interest in his normal activities and hobbies, instead becoming increasingly obsessed with gambling.

2. More And More

Just as a drug addict needs an ever increasing supply of drugs to achieve the same high, so a gambling addict finds himself betting more and more – not for greater winnings, but to obtain the same kick and level of excitement as before.

3. Can’t Stop

Even if he wanted to, the problem gambler is powerless to quit gambling. He becomes impatient and irritable when trying to even cut back. For the gambler, betting is a method of escaping problems or relieving stress.

4. The Cover-Up

The gambler lies to family and friends – and sometimes even to himself -about the amount being gambled in order to hide his dependency. At the same time, he brags and exaggerates the size of winnings. When confronted, he denies having a problem at all, and he becomes angry if the subject is pursued. The lies become a way of life. He withdraws from family and friends, and even lies about his whereabouts while gambling.

5. Dependent

The gambler will start relying on others to bail him out of financial crises. He regularly borrows from family and friends until their good will has been used up and they refuse to lend him any more money – at least until he repays what he already owes them. Then, mortgages and loans are refinanced. Bills remain unpaid. Life assurance is cashed in. The gambler may even start committing frauds and thefts to finance his gambling addiction.

6. Self Destructive

The gambler’s career is jeopardised, and relationships with family and friends becomes eroded as his obsession with gambling escalates. He feels a tremendous amount of shame and guilt after gambling the grocery money yet again and he will consider, or even attempt, suicide because he feels so helpless and useless.

7. Losing Control

The gambler’s personality gradually changes. He can become controlling of those around him because he himself is out of control. He can be bad-tempered, contrary, fault-finding and manipulative. He blames everyone else for his financial problems, refusing to take responsibility for his own actions.

8. No Sense Of Time

The problem gambler tends to gamble during times of celebration and special events. He spends his time gambling while on holiday to relax, and during times of crisis to make himself feel better. Inevitably, he spends more time gambling than he originally planned.

How Can We Help?

Friends and relatives must stop enabling him to keep gambling by refusing to give him more money, or to bail him out of any more crises. The gambler must come to the realisation that he has a problem before he can learn how to stop gambling. He must face the consequences of his gambling. Only then will counselling and a self-help course help.

Gambling problems arises when one tends to crave for more money by excessive gambling. Gambling when overdone leads to bankruptcy and dysfunction of relationships with your loved ones.

Gambling is very addictive and hence unless you are determined to risk it, you might end up in misery. Winning and losing is a part of gambling and it all depends on how much the individual is mentally stable to take the defeats in gambling.

Acknowledging the game of gambling is the first step to solve gambling problems. Gamblers Anonymous has posted the following questions to test you.

1. Did you ever avoid school or work for gambling?

2. Has gambling made your life at home unhappy?

3. Has your reputation been affected by gambling?

4. Has your life been remorse after a game of gambling?

5. Did you choose to gamble and pay your debts?

6. Has gambling brought your ambition and aspirations down?

7. Did you ever wanted to win back all the money you had lost in gambling?

8. Did you have the urge to win more after you tasted some success?

9. Have you ever gambled and emptied your pocket?

10. Did you borrow money and gambled any day?

11. Did you go to the extent of selling things just to gamble?

12. Were you hesitating to use ?gambling money? for your daily expenses?

13. Has gambling made you careless person?

14. Did you want to gamble for more hours than you wanted?

15. Have you ever resorted to gambling to forget your worries?

16. Did you want to commit an illegal act to finance gambling?

17. Have you lost on sleep because of gambling?

18. Does disappointment or argument spur you on to gamble more?

19. Did you want to celebrate success for a few hours after gambling?

20. Have you ever attempted suicide after failure?

A person having gambling problems would say a ‘yes’ to at least seven questions posted above.

These tips given below should help you out off gambling problems, if any:

1. It is advisable to take just the money needed to gamble than taking credit cards and ATM cards along.
2. Do not gamble for a long time.
3. There are always more chances of losing than winning in a game of gambling.
4. Make sure you don’t use the money you won again.
5. When you do not have any more money to gamble, drop the idea without borrowing.
6. Take help of people who are not addicted to the game and seek proper advice.

Gambling is all fun and games until you hit the point where you cease seeing the fun in it, or you become irredeemably addicted.

Admittedly, most people do not see it coming. They start gambling for very noble reasons including,

1. The need to take time away from work and family pressures
2. Escape route from depressing thoughts on other issues.
3. Hopes of winning a fortune and living lavishly ever after
4. To bring a tinge of excitement into their otherwise dull lives
5. A chance to go out there, socialize and make new friends.

As you can see from the above points, no one anticipates that gambling will grow into the Frankenstein that now threatens to push them off the sanity cliff. A lot of people are able to keep their gambling under rein. They do it for fun, to pass some time and to socialize. Others lose it completely. They become slaves to online and offline gambling. It throws their lives off-balance. They start putting more time and money into gambling, and they gradually neglect other aspects of their lives.

At this point, problem gamblers look back at their lives and get surprised at how and when it happened. For a lot of people, the problem starts with a shift in mentality. A big loss or a big win, and you are hooked. You start gambling more money than you had planned to spend on gambling, you invest a lot of time in the casinos and before you know it, you are a slave to gambling. You can’t eat, sleep nor breathe without thinking gambling.

To help you understand how gambling addiction works, I have analyzed some of the most common factors that pull people deeper and deeper into addiction.

1. Illusion that You Can be in command of Chance
No one can control chance. It doesn’t favor anyone, smart or otherwise. Unfortunately many problem gamblers think that they can manage to overturn their luck on the tables through sheer power of the mind. They have this skewed illusion that they can win if only they can learn the tricks of the game. They spent hours on end in the casinos trying to perfect their game. They fail to acknowledge the fact that gambling is 100% chance and not something to be learned. There are no tricks and knowledge that will all of a suddenly overturn the tables to your favor.

2. The Lure of the Jackpot
Winning a few hands on the tables can make you feel unconquerable. Everyone loves winning, and science has proved that people remember their victories more than they remember their losses. Fortunately, or probably unfortunately in this case, new gamblers have what is commonly referred as ‘beginner’s luck’. They begin their gambling hobbies on the right foot. They become obsessed with the idea of winning the jackpot.

3. Faith of Changing Luck
In life, we are encouraged to get up after every fall. We will make it in the end. We will accomplish our goals if we do not quit. After all, who wants to quit while the gold vein could be just a few inches away. There is only one place where this advice does not apply. If your quests are governed by pure luck, there is very little chance that you will ever make it. The statistics are open for anyone who wants to take a look. Gambling only ends up in massive losses, debts and frayed social relationships. There is no better time to quit than now. Lady Luck will not smile at you anytime soon.

How To Know If You Are Addicted To Gambling
Although there are clear pointers that indicate you are going down the addiction lane, it can be extremely difficult to identify them if you do not know what they are. This is probably the saddest thing about addiction. We never know we are addicted until we take a step back and look at ourselves in hindsight, at which time the damage has already been done.

In this section, we will discuss the 5 major red flags to watch out for.

1. You Just Can’t Stop
Remember the wise Gambler who Kenny Rogers sings about? Every wise gambler knows when to hold and when to fold. Compulsive gamblers on the other hand do not have limits. They will gamble everything they have thinking that they are having bouts of fun, when in actuality they are driven by compulsions beyond their control.

2. Gambling with Money Not Meant for Fun
Problem gamblers will gamble with money that they can’t stand to lose. They do not have a set gambling budget and will often risk money meant for important things such medical bills and other utility bills.

3. Gambling to Win or to Recover Losses
If you find yourself gambling more for the sole purpose of hitting the jackpot than for fun, you need to reevaluate yourself. Same case applies if the main driving force behind gambling is to recover losses that you had suffered earlier.

4. Obsessively Thinking about Gambling
If you eat, drink and sleep thinking about gambling, you might already be too deep in the trench.

5. Borrowing to Finance Gambling
Have you ever borrowed money to finance gambling? Chances are if you have, things are not looking so good.

What other key pointers do you think indicate a problem with gambling? I believe that you know them better. You know what triggers that red flag and siren at the back of your mind. A lot of gamblers realize the symptoms that point to problematic gambling in their lives, yet stopping becomes a quagmire.