Popular gambling addiction stories

Today it’s difficult to find a person who has not heard of ludomania or gambling addiction. This word became a kind of horror story for adults. Actually, all the things are not as clear as it may seem. There are many gambling horror stories, but are they really so horrible? Let’s open the veil of secrecy of the ludomania problem.

The nature of gambling addiction

Before discussing some real problem gambler stories, let’s dive into the nature of the addiction. It would be easier to understand the motivation of ludomans and the real reasons for their behavior.

Gambling addiction is a gambling passion, which leads to negative consequences for a player and the surrounding people. Often, the victims of the situation are friends and colleagues, not only members of the family.

The negative effect is shown, mostly, in financial equivalent. A person cannot control money spending, and an enormous sum of money goes to endless reels spinning. Aside from that it is often followed by psychological problems: depression, aggression, and insularity.

As a result, people struggling with this addiction cannot concentrate on anything else. Their thoughts are only about game anticipation, or the search of financial sources for it. Very often ludomans in the search for the money can make radical decisions. We will discuss such examples in bad gambling stories.

Gambling addiction is similar to drug addiction. The difference is that when you are playing, your body doesn’t get any drugs except released endorphins (the Happiness Hormones), which make you feel happy.

There are lots of alternative ways to produce blood endorphins. These are active sports, delicious food, communicating with interesting people, shopping, and many other ways. Each of them may cause addiction.

A junkie is looking for another dose; a smoker is waiting for the nicotine to come to the blood. A gambling player is expecting the game excitement.

It is important to remember that a simple interest in gambling does not mean addiction. A person can play roulette from time to time, try their luck in blackjack or spin the reels in slots – and that’s all right. After all, when you go shopping for interesting things, you don’t consider yourself a sick shopaholic, do you?

Sometimes it’s hard to understand why someone became addicted. It may happen unexpectedly, even for the player- there comes a moment when it’s impossible to stop. Luckily, every reliable casino offers different limitation tools that may be installed by any client.

But we will discuss this later, and now we offer you to consider gambling stories and try to understand the causes of this bad habit.

Since childhood, the lights of the casino beckoned: how young Chris became an addict

This is one of those gambler stories, when an immature youthful mind could not cope with the interest in gambling. Chris’ parents often visited seaside resorts and gambling establishments. Of course, no one let the child play, but Chris already wanted to get his first win.

In adult life, the attempts to get the winning bet failed. Chris had been passionate about betting for over 20 years and lost £350,000 in that time

The guy’s first steps towards gambling began at the age of 13. At that time he was betting on table football at school. It was a small amount, and the activity was more like a child’s play. However, it turned out to be something more for Chris.

At the age of 15, he went to a real bookmaker office to make a bet on horse racing. Employees were not particularly concerned about the age of the visitor, and Chris himself at the time had a job and had enough pocket money. Soon, the activity captivated the guy so much that he began to spend almost all his earnings on bets.

Gradually, an ordinary story from the life of a schoolboy turned into one of the horrible gambling problem stories. At 16 Chris was no longer studying, but working. Every Friday, after getting money, he spent everything on the fruit slots.

Because of this, problems with money began to appear. Friends helped Chris out as much as they could, but that didn’t change his attitude towards the games. The boy’s life began to gradually turn into “Groundhog Day”. During the day – work, at night – games. His body could not withstand such a rhythm, and he got many health problems.

Over time, Chris came to realize that “gambling ruined my life”. And that was enough to get a grip on himself and start solving the problem. Now the guy isn’t into anything like this anymore. Time has shown him that casinos are a way to have fun, but not to make any money. In order to get an income, you must work hard.

The reason for such slot machine addiction stories lies in the perception of games by the fragile child’s psyche. Chris dreamed of almost conquering the world by simply spinning the reels. If he had gotten acquainted with betting offices and slots in a more mature age, most likely, he would not have gotten this problem. By the way, that is why the law establishes an age restriction for gamblers from 18 and 21 years.

Other stories rooted in youth

A lot of gamblers like Chris get gambling addiction at a very young age. Here are another couple of sad stories of gambling addiction.

Read also: A Complete History of Dice

Graham is 46. He joined the gambling world at the age of 17. Then the young guy was betting on horses. Sometimes it even brought winnings, which, of course, pushed to make new bets.

At the age of 19, this hobby passed from the category of innocent amusement to a reason for crime. Graham was convicted of forging the balance of several bank cards.

When he realized that machinations are not the best way to solve financial problems, he turned to loans. From this moment on, what was happening can safely be called one of the gambling debt stories. The man borrowed money, lost, and borrowed again. And so in a circle.

In 2002 Graham lost 7000 dollars in 2 days. This was the last straw that made a man admit his addiction. After this, he started working on restoring his reputation.

Another example of the gambling stories losses tells about Matt, who lost control at the age of 18. Many years have passed, he got married, had two kids, but love to gambling never left him. He had to lie to keep his addiction a secret. But it did not help the family – it went so far that there was simply no money to pay the rent.

It is, of course, not one of the worst gambling stories, but a typical example of a problem of an adult person who is afraid to confess the addiction. As a result, life suffers, and relations with family and friends deteriorate. It is much worse than honestly admitting your problem and asking for help in finding a way out of it.

Killing gambling

Now how about one of the worst gambling addiction stories? For example, about Harry Kakavas. The man was in real estate and made millions. Why would he want to gamble?

Apparently, life seemed too boring, and Harry decided to do something risky. Hardly anyone would be surprised that he quickly lost a large amount of money, and even lost his millionaire status. It was all the fault of his addiction to baccarat card game, which was a man’s favorite pastime.

After that, he should have stopped and went back to normal life, but Harry did not do it. Instead, he went to Las Vegas and Macau hoping to regain what he had lost. As a result, the man not only could not return the money, but also set his own unfortunate record – he managed to lose 164 million dollars in just one session of the game in Vegas.

Unlike the previous characters, Harry did not accept the defeat. Instead, he began to sue various establishments in the hope of returning what he had lost. He never managed to get “justice”, which is not surprising, because he made all bets of his own free will.

Another one of gambling addiction stories full of horror tells about Jodie Nealley, who was addicted not only to gambling but to alcohol as well. As a result, the girl first got into debt because of the casino, and then went to jail.

A series of failures followed: first her husband left her, then Jody was fired from work. That was the last straw, because after prison the girl took up the problem and underwent rehabilitation, both from gambling addiction and alcohol. Today, Jodie’s mission is to help other people fight against their addiction.

There are also scarier compulsive gambling stories. For example, Curt could not deal with his losses so badly that he was thinking about suicide every time. Fortunately, it did not come to that.

And there are so many gambler anonymous stories. During the existence of gambling thousands of people were trapped in ludomania. At the same time, most of them, as a rule, also suffered from other addictions, alcohol or drugs.

How to protect yourself from failure: casino limits and other methods

Scared of such gambling addiction personal stories, many newcomers are quite rightly afraid to lose control and get gambling addiction. Therefore, for them there are gambling aware methods. Players can go to the casino and set limits on the total amount of bets, the sum of deposits or the sum of losses. Limits are set for different periods of time. With such a flexible system it is not difficult to adjust the gambling process to your personal characteristics.

User restriction service is a kind of breakthrough in the gambling industry. It helps the newcomers to play without fear and makes it possible to enjoy the game for those players, who already know about their predispositions.

If you are afraid that you can become one of the players to be added to gamblers anonymous stories list, check yourself by passing the gambling addiction test.

Answer the following questions:

• Did gambling affect your personal life?
• Have you ever experienced any remorse for spending time at slots/roulette/backjack?
• Did gambling affect your ambition or ability to work?
• Have you ever wanted to win back a lost bet as soon as possible?
• Do you play till you lose all the money?
• Have you borrowed money to make a bet?
• Have you ever spent more time than you planned on slots?

If you answered “yes” to most of the questions, this is an alarming signal. If only a few statements are true, then there is no reason for serious concern. However, it is worthwhile to pay more attention to your feelings. After all, it is always easier to prevent a disaster than to deal with its consequences.