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Lilac lady

Having just bailed my son out of debt through gambling on line a month later he now owes four times as much and I cannot keep bailing him out. He is very depressed, has no focus in life, lost touch with family and friends because his hours of working are unsociable, he has lost all self respect, sleeps in his cloths, sleeps on his only day off. He is bored with his life. My greatest fear is that when he gets very low he may do something stupid. I have taken away his cards, his laptop, intercept his post, I am helping him write to the bank to freeze his accounts and close his credit cards but I don't know where to start to help him. He is 25 single, a predator girlfriend who inflicts finanical burden, he has been depressed for 2 maybe 3 years but would never admit it. He has no money having lost all his savings ( he was saving to take a trip round the world) and run up his first debt 2 months ago and now after trying to help him he has broken my trust by getting into the same mess he was in then. What do I do, Where do I start?

Guest

Lilac Lady,

First of all can I just say that these are my personal opinions based on everything I have heard and experienced since joining GA. I am a compulsive gambler, but have not had a bet since Sep 26th 2009.

I do not believe you are helping your son by bailing him out all the time. Unless he realises in his heart that he is an addict, a compulsive gambler, who is powerless over his addiction he will never willingly of his own accord want help and want to give up gambling for the rest of his life. All the time he has this lifeline he will use it, and use it, and use you and use anyone else who will give him enough money to gamble again. It is an insidious disease and when in its grip he will not treat anyone with enough respect to want to stay around him. Most of us ended up alienating ourselves from friends family and anyone else except other gamblers.

My advice is to stop treating the symptoms, and treat the disease. Only when he has reached the point where he actively wants and seeks help will he be able to accept it.

When he does this we can help. Gamblers Anonymous has helped so many people. The most important and powerful tool is to attend meetings regularly. On the home page under the meetings tab is a map of all the meetings and the times and days. If he goes to one or more a week he has every chance of turning his life from what it is now into something positive.

These are just my opinions. I hope they help.

My name is Chris, and I am a compulsive gambler.

Guest

Halo! I just joined today. Our son is a gambler. 26 years male. Just broken out engagement as the fiancé can't or doesn't want to cope with him still gambling. What do we do? We agreed with the fiancé that he is Bad news but we feel we have to support him. Bailing him out all the time is wrong but if we didn't he would borrow money from friends. Worried that he will steal or getting involved in black or dirty business to fund gambling if we didn't support him. How do we make him go to GA meetings? We live in different city and feel hopeless.