Relationships can be very damaged by gambling difficulties. Relationships are crucial for happiness, health and practical support.
Gambling can damage relationships in many ways. The financial difficulties put stress on relationships. The person who gambles may become secretive and dishonest, eroding trust. Gambling can consume time and attention from relationships and closeness is lost. There may be conflict and arguments and abuse.
Children in families affected by gambling can suffer greatly due to the stress on parents and emotional or physical absence or abusive behaviour of a parent due to gambling. The energy of parents can be absorbed coping with the addiction of a child and other siblings may feel neglected.
The result is affected others can feel deep hurt. The combination of dishonesty, financial strain, and emotional distress can erode the foundation of relationships.
Repairing these relationships can be a long and challenging process. Trust, once lost, is difficult to regain, and in some cases, relationships may not recover at all, leading to divorce, separation, or estrangement. These broken relationships can have long-lasting and serious consequences for the emotional and material well-being of those involved and can even affect future generations.
It’s so multifaceted. It was the hurt of the lies. The hurt of all the money was painful, but I can deal with that. It’s not his fault, it’s an addiction. It’s the lies. They’re the hardest thing to recover from. Being that the man you love is capable of lying to you so frequently, so easily, so constant… I’m 5’3″, and I feel like this gambling monster is 10 feet tall and it wants my husband, and it’s not having him.
During
Affected others say the damage to relationships during gambling difficulties is frequently linked to the financial harm from gambling. There is strain and conflict as partners and families struggle to cope with the financial instability. Gambling often involves secrecy, leading to repeated breaches of trust. This can make partners or family members feel betrayed and deceived, as if they have been living under false pretences.
The impact of gambling often stems from the amount of time and attention it diverts away from relationships, causing feelings of neglect and emotional distance. The perception that the person who gambles is choosing gambling over their relationships or failing to keep promises further erodes relationships. Sometime affected others become afraid of the person gambling as they become angry and abusive.
Partners
Gambling can alter the dynamics of relationships between partners. The behaviour of the person gambling changes. Partners of someone who gambles frequently feel like they are not a priority in the gambler’s life. Partners say they notice that the person they care about becomes more secretive, withdrawn, deceptive or aggressive, trying to hide their gambling and financial situation. They may downplay the seriousness of the situation or be untruthful about where money is going. When lies and deceit about gambling come to light, it can shatter trust. Arguments may become more frequent and intense.
Things like your trust is so broken in that process I talked about where you learn, here’s one step or thing that he’ll do to be able to keep this problem going or to be able to gamble. Then that gets found out and you have a conversation like, we’re not going to do that anymore, or we can put things in place to make sure that doesn’t happen. Then there’s the next thing and the next thing, and the next thing. Your trust is systematically broken over and over again.
I felt like the past sort of two years of our whole relationship with everything that we’d gone through and everything that we’d planned for the future was just a lie because it became apparent quite quickly how much he’d lied and to what extent he lied to cover up his gambling.
Although he attended GA meetings my feelings for him especially trust were apparent. An array of emotions overwhelmed me.
Partners often experience a range of emotions, including frustration, anger, sadness, and hurt. Knowing that they are being lied to, yet often feeling powerless to change the situation, can lead to significant emotional distress. When one partner is struggling with gambling difficulties, it often leads to an imbalance in the relationship, in terms of emotional and practical support. Partners of a person with gambling difficulties may feel disconnected, unsupported, and isolated. In some cases, this leads to contemplation or separation from the person who gambled.
I think what probably hurt most about it as much as everything else was that he felt that he had to hide things…When it came to not being able to give his contribution because it had been spent on whatever else, then that became an issue because that was a sort of stability that I was looking for. Well, if you’re here and you’re staying here, I’m not looking for dependent, and that sort of stuff. It all had an impact, to the point where I had to remove myself from it. Not because I lack love, or understanding or empathy or connection or anything else, but just purely because it’s no good for me.
He became insular, spending time that I expected to be ours in his office, obviously now gambling. I began to analyse things he did and asking questions. He disliked this interrogation as he called it and changed the subject to avoid confrontation. I would persevere but always ended up apologising. It was apparent his gambling was taking over his life and preventing us from having a shared relationship and I decided to end it.
There is also harm to relationships across the family network. Some partners felt seen as the “bad person” by other family members who did not understand gambling difficulties, or because they ended the relationship. When relationships end people lose connections with the people they care about. There are also disagreements around co-parenting arrangements. For others, they become isolated from other family members in order to protect the person who gambled, or because of feeling stigma and shame.
My mum’s one of these that she sometimes says things that she shouldn’t say. She’ll vent or she’ll put a status on Facebook or something, that’ll be aimed at him or whatever. It’d be very difficult because it doesn’t just affect his relationship with them, it affects mine as well. I’m stuck in the middle of that. I want to talk to my mum, but I don’t want her to say something she shouldn’t say] to cause issues with [partner], but then I don’t want [partner] to avoid them, because I don’t want him to not be able to go to events, especially we’ve got our son now. I want [son] to be happy and comfortable and not feel like there’s an atmosphere just because we’re going round for a brew or whatever.
It’s difficult having to let go of something that you don’t really have any closure. I’m the bad guy in the situation because I ended it but it’s hard being the bad guy. I used to have a good relationship with his family and actually, that’s hard. It’s almost through his actions that I don’t keep in contact with his family.
There were some disagreements then over contact with his two children with his ex because she was quite, I think she was hurt by everything because she’d been there before. I think his mum felt like he was better off at home, and maybe not with me. I didn’t understand why. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I think there was just a lot of tension, a lot of upset, a lot of anger from everyone, I guess. And just a lot of hurt. But I did choose to stay, and I have stayed and now we’re married.
One person describes being seen as controlling by other family members because they had to take over management of finances. Family members saw a change in the person’s behaviour, such as withdrawing from the relationship, and because they were unaware of the gambling difficulties, they blamed it on the partner. The affected other describes how this is distressing for them.
He told [his family] that everything was okay when it wasn’t okay. Then all of a sudden, he was angry all the time, he was kicking off all the time. The only thing that they could think of is me because he’s changed since he’s been with me, but he hadn’t for years, he was still the same [partner]. It was literally when this gambling started and they don’t understand it. I think they think that because I’m looking after the finances, I’m controlling him and they seem to think that I’m controlling him, but if it was easy to control him, he wouldn’t gamble. I wouldn’t be in this situation, I wouldn’t be the one that’s always upset and hurting because I’m the one that does everything for him, but they don’t see that.
One person describes being called “lazy” when they reached out to extended family for support.
Children
Children can be deeply affected when a parent is consumed by gambling. They may feel overlooked or unimportant. Even when the individual who gambles is physically present, their preoccupation with gambling can make them emotionally unavailable. There can be serious concerns about their welfare, especially if they are neglected. Children may experience abuse or the abuse within their parent’s relationship due to a parent’s gambling. Concerns about the impact of gambling on their children was often a deep concern of partners.
When he was of his good mind and he didn’t gamble and everything was fine, he absolutely loved and adored his kids like crazily, probably too much actually. But the more his mental health and the gambling took his mental health, the more you knew he wasn’t the same person because his kids… There was no point in me saying, “Well, what about the kids?” or “What about this?” because nothing– He got to a point where nothing mattered anymore.
I would feel angry, probably the most angry because he would miss out on things with the children…. I found it unforgivable that he couldn’t put his [children] first and that they were having to monitor his phone use or they were not warm enough or not this or not that. Then they were missing out on things with him because of the gambling. I could never understand that. That’s because I didn’t have an addiction. I get all of that, but I think that’s probably the thing I found the hardest of all because I just think why would they not matter enough? It’s not that easy. I know that.
Even throughout primary school and secondary school, I would come home and if I didn’t have the keys, I think I’d started to get the keys to the house when I was in year 8 or year 7. But up until that point I would just sit on the wall outside of the house and wait for my dad to come home and often I’d need the toilet after the end of school, and I would just be stuck there. I remember the neighbours saying do you want to come in? And I just felt too shy or anxious to say yes.
Parents and siblings
Parents can also be impacted by the changed behaviour, withdrawal or anger and aggression of their child due to gambling difficulties. They can feel especially responsible as it is their child. This can make it very difficult to say no when they need to look after themselves.
When one a child is experiencing gambling difficulties it can affect the entire family dynamics, as this can absorb time and emotional resources of parents.
It then has the impact with my younger son. He’s absolutely amazing, but the attention is always on the addict. [Younger son] almost got lost in [son]’s addiction as well, by way of parental support and us being present with [younger son], because [son]’s addiction is so demanding.
Siblings said they sometimes felt resentment that had to provide help for the other person. This caused a distortion to the relationship roles.
It just takes the enjoyment out of the relationship because you either end up, I don’t know, say you go out for a meal or a drink, maybe it’s payday, and [my brother] might say, “Well, I’ll buy a round.” Then in the back of your mind, the whole time you’re thinking, “Well, what will that round…?” I know it sounds awful but there’s that aspect of it, just you’re permanently waiting, and that whole idea that every time the phone rings and their number comes up, and it’s somebody that you really love, and was one of the most important people in my life. That kind of relationship where you can argue like cat and dog one minute, then it’s that brother relationship… I suppose it undermines that trust you have in somebody.
The parents of someone whose partner has gambling difficulties can also be drawn in, showing the way relationship demands can extend through family networks.
It’s more my family that it’s affected. Obviously, they’ve seen me breakdown. I had a point where I stayed at mum’s for the week, which is something you don’t expect to do when you are older and it strained that relationship a little… but his family should be getting involved as well. It shouldn’t always be them picking up the pieces, but his family are very much oblivious to it and they’re not really bothered unless they’re getting something out of it.
Legacy
The destruction of relationships undermines emotional and material welfare and can have long term consequences for affected others.
The damage to relationships often remains after the gambling has stopped. The damage to the foundation of trust and security is hard to repair.
My husband could not understand the consequences of his compulsive gambling and we resumed the confrontations that increased marriage problems. He obviously thought going to GA and abstaining from gambling was enough to satisfy my requirements as he would say. I continued to say I was proud of him, but rarely did he support me in my distress and offered me very little empathy. He used to say he couldn’t understand why I had these feelings now he was gamble free.
Affected others highlight the persistent demands on their relationship even after the gambling had stopped, such as monitoring mobile devices and overseeing family finances.
You have to get really strong really quick, and you feel like you’re in a Generation Game spinning all the plates, although I have to keep checking his phones because it doesn’t come naturally to do that. It’s a really horrible position to be in. I have to keep having to tell myself, “You’re not doing it to him, I’m doing it for him.” Everything I’ve asked of him is a two-way street, and you just have to keep going and putting one foot in front of the other, and it is hard. It’s hard, and you have to keep finding that strength even when you feel like you’ve got no strength too. You have to keep telling yourself why you’re doing this.
There could be fall-out and long term damage to relationships across family networks.
It has a big effect, and with me and his family, I don’t have anything to do with them because I resent them for not being there and causing the issues we have with him over the years, that has strained his relationship with his mum, which was the only person he ever really spoke to. He’s got all these brothers and a sister and not one of them has made the effort with him. Then they’ve painted me as a bad person over the years, and that means I have next to no relationship with them, and he doesn’t really know. We just speak to his mum a couple of times a week.
And we’ve really tried hard to change our change habits in our children, too, so we don’t let them go to the amusements anymore… But still, that can be tension too because [partners] ex-partner will allow his two children to go to the amusements when they’re with her. But when they’re with those, they don’t. Also, she took the eldest to the races recently, and we were very unhappy about that as you can imagine.
Relationships with children can be impacted long after the person has stopped gambling.
It did impact his kids. There’s no doubt about that and it’s had long-reaching consequences on his kids. They are all grown up now. They’re all over 30. But, they’ve all got their own little things and even today, it still affects his relationship with his children, and this is years down the line.