It is not always easy to understand at the right time if someone in the family has a problem with gambling. The reasons can be different. Here are some of them.
• If he has a problem with gambling, he is not going to talk about it, and will not admit it, even in the face of the evidence. He will not tell you and he will not look for your help. The gambler tends to build a dense and thin web of subterfuge, tricks and strategies to avoid being discovered and to conceal economic losses. I know that. Secrecy is a central part of the gambling's disease. I have been doing this for 30 years. For this reason, I can help you recognize the small and big alarm bells, which allow you to understand in time if the person has a gambling problem.
• Gambling often starts quietly, slowly. At first it may seem like a pastime, a leisure to devote a few moments to unload the tension. How to know if and when to start worrying? How can the simple pastime gamble take on abnormal characteristics, such that it dramatically becomes the center of a person's life? Gambling is a progressive disease. That however can be stopped if recognized in time.
• The type of gambler has changed today. The vastness of the landscape makes its recognition more difficult. The pathological gambler is no longer just the one who frequents elegant casinos or spends the whole day in smoky and lugubrious racing rooms. The Internet, which most of us can access at home, scratch cards, videopoker, legal and illegal available in any bar, bingo halls, family traditions such as Christmas games or parties after social dinners increase the chance of people getting closer to gambling. And they make the pathology less clearly recognizable in time. Gambling can be serious even if it does not have outlandish characteristics.
• For family members, identifying the problem is made even more difficult by the stigma of pathological gambling in society. In spite of the fact that there is a consistent growth in the awareness that compulsive gambling is a serious disease, a form of addiction, an obsession in the same way as alcoholism, drug addiction and eating disorders (anorexia and bulimia) among others, it is still common that pathological gambling is equated with a moral vice of which the gambler has all the guilt and responsibility, a bad habit from which he could free himself if only he wanted to. This attitude makes family members uncertain about what to do and fearful of exposing themselves to social judgment. This can affect the possibility of having a clear view of what is happening in the family and initiate powerful denial mechanisms. It is preferable not to see, to ignore the problem for fear of the social consequences and the sense of shame that could result. And that also prevents you from seeking help in time. This "do not see" sometimes persists even in the face of the total destructiveness of gambling.
• Following the previous point, it can be essential to ask yourself what is really most important to you: the emotional, physical, spiritual and economic well-being of the family or its "good name"? This is a question that you will have to ask yourself often, because it is easy to give in to family pressure and keep everything hidden, to try to solve everything in the family. This attitude can be really harmful and destructive to the gambler and to you, because it prevents you from doing something to counteract in time the consequences of gambling.
• The gambler's attitude also often makes it more difficult to identify the problem, can create confusion and delay the possibility of starting a healing process. An addict or alcoholic is often an antisocial, can get to be brutal, violent, can steal openly. On the contrary, often, the gambler can be caring, intelligent, affectionate, brilliant, lovable, kind. It is hard to believe that such a person can be affected by such a serious illness or that he can voluntarily harm people whom he seems to love so much. In reality these attitudes are frequently dictated by the need to manipulate: in fact, the gambler has to ingratiate himself with people and be likable to have a better chance to get money. Perhaps, for all this set of reasons, it is hard to recognize that you have at home a person with a gambling problem.
But now you can change. I repeat. I know that admitting that someone in the house has a gambling problem is not easy, for all the reasons I have mentioned. But remember that ignoring the problem will not eliminate the problem! Denying, ignoring more or less clear signals of its possible existence can be extremely dangerous. It can make the situation chronic and prevent you from avoiding or limiting the damage. So, with all the pain that this entails, arm yourself with an adequate motivation to "see" the problem, aware that if the problem is there, the sooner you will intervene the sooner you will be able to help the gambler and your family.
Remember: gambling is a progressive disease Over time the gambler gets worse, never improves if he does not become aware of it. It automatically follows that the more time you allow to pass, the more damage you will face. It is appropriate to make another observation here: more often than you think the first people to realize that there is a problem of gambling are not the closest family members, but friends, acquaintances, work colleagues.
However, these people rarely have the courage to confront the gambler's family members to inform them of their suspicions or, if they wish to do so, do not know how. They will probably face the gambler, but in the face of his denial that the problem exists or his assurances that everything is under control, which is only a period of bad luck, they will prefer to avoid meddling even more in order not to "ruin" that relationship.
This is therefore an invitation to those people who believe that their friend or colleague has a gambling problem to consider the possibility of making their family aware. Believe me, it is not a betrayal. It may be that at first you will have to face resentment and anger from the gambler and possibly even from the family, but I assure you that you are actually doing them a favor and that sooner or later he too will realize it and be grateful. This book could be the tool to use to convey the message without suffering too much the consequences: try to give a copy of it to family members.
