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Nick #2

Nick manages a café. He started gambling after accompanying his brother to greyhound races, where he was struck by the vibrancy and atmosphere of the bookmaker stands. His addiction grew when he was working in the financial sector, and he spent much of his free time at the bookmakers. It was easy for him to apply for loans, which led to larger debts.

Gambling severely impacted his mental health and relationships. Nick credits the support he received from his church during his recovery. Nick says that since he has stopped gambling, he has seen a lot of areas of his life be transformed and coming back together. He wants other people experiencing difficulties to know that there is hope.

Contributions

If this person’s betting 30, 40 times a day, and this where it can go to another authority for an authority to contact them and to say, “Are you in a good place? Is this affecting you?” I know the industry’s doing as much as it can, and I know the Gambling Commission do fine these big bookmakers, casinos, and what have you, millions of pounds due to actually exploiting people really. They don’t know the story behind any gambler, whether it’s a woman or a man. They don’t know whether they’ve got a family, whether they’ve got a good job, a bad job, whether they’re in thousands in debt, it’s all about taking the money.

Gambling Companies
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I just say, reach out, help, there is help out there, speak to somebody, be honest. Don’t just go and pay lip service. Don’t say you’re okay. Don’t say nobody understands because there are people that understand. You know, you can pick up the phone. I know it’s more difficult probably to go to meetings. I don’t know what the meetings situation is. It’s probably improved in the last few months, but you know, there are meetings out there that you can go sit in a room where people with shared experiences can encourage you. You know, this doesn’t have to be the end. You know, there is a life out there. I have got my life back and there is hope, there is hope.

Nick #2
Recovery
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My football club has the betting firm advertising on their tops and up until then, for the last five years, I used to sponsor a player’s shirt. And when the betting company… I’d already said yes to the club that I would do them this year, but before they announced the firm that were going to sponsor the shirt, this was last season. And I’d actually paid my money, not a huge sum of money. It was just a home shirt for a particular player. And while we were on holiday, they announced he was going to sponsor the shirts. So, I phoned the club up and said look, I’m not bothered about getting the £100 back, but I need you to remove my name from the programmes because your name goes in the programme. I don’t want my name attached.

Nick #2
Change
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I won the top end of 90 odd thousand pounds in an afternoon, and I thought I’d landed the big time. I thought if I can make half a million instead of that, that would have sorted all my debt out at the time, it would have bought me a van for the business. We could have gone away on a nice holiday, but my first thought was let’s try and make it half a million, and then I’d have really landed. That would never have done me any good because I would’ve just spiralled. Spiralled out and gone for the million or whatever, so I lost all that money in four days and then [inaudible]. That’s when the business started to really… to try and win back the 90,000 that I’d lost, I started lumping money out the business. And then it only like three and a half months later I’m homeless.

Nick #2
Harm
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For her, there is lots of issues around finance. I wasn’t in control of that because I wasn’t working, but she had to juggle the books. She had to speak to people we owed money to because I’d fraudulently taken money out of her account as well as my own, and this, that and the other, or emptied bank accounts or not paid bills and done the same sorts of things, all the deception, all the lies, all those things. So, I’d done all that. So, she needed support. She, you know, people prayed for her, prayed for us as a couple. And generally held her up, I suppose. She’s probably thinking “oh no, not again” or “why is this happening to me?” All those sorts of questions and just the pressure of debt, the pressure of phone calls, having to deal with banks. Having to deal with CAB – Citizens Advice Bureau, the credit card companies, the council, council tax, all those sorts of things. They were all in serious freefall. So, lots of people supporting her or close people supporting her. And as I say, there was some people that said get rid of him. But she never felt that at that time.

Nick #2
Harm
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You always think it’s never going to happen to you. And I had so many people speak to me over the years that this will happen, that will happen. And you just dismiss it, and you think you’re invincible. I had some huge wins. I won… March 98 or 99, March 99, I won the top end of 90 odd thousand pounds in an afternoon, and I thought I’d landed the big time. I thought if I can make half a million instead of that, that would have sorted all my debt out at the time, it would have bought me van for the business. We could have gone away on a nice holiday, but my first thought was let’s try and make it half a million, and then I’d have really landed. That would never have done me any good because I would’ve just spiralled. Spiralled out and gone for the million or whatever, so I lost all that money in four days and then lumps of it. And that’s when the business started to really… to try and win back the 90,000 that I’d lost, I started lumping money out the business. And then it only like three and a half months later I’m homeless. So, all that sort of thing.

Nick #2
Gambling Experiences
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And then my brother, he started to attend the greyhound stadium, and he had had some long-term health issues as a child. And my parents encouraged me to go with him and support him. That if he got ill, I knew what to do. So that was quite a responsibility on me as a 16, 17-year-old boy or young man. And I used to go and support him and go to the greyhounds with him. I wasn’t particularly madly interested at the beginning, but the first time I went outside where the board’s bookmakers stand, you know, along the rail of the actual track itself, it was like sticking a needle into me. That whole atmosphere and the noise and the vibrancy of the gambling arena really sort of heightened my sense of elation, really, and I got very, very interested in that.

Nick #2
Gambling Experiences
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I suppose probably within five years of stopping gambling I was in the town where I lived in the halfway house and also worked one day and a former betting shop manager bumped into me, a lady and she said, “Oh Nick you look really well. We haven’t seen you for a long time”. I said, “No, I’ve not gambled for X amount”. I can’t remember the period at the time. And she said, “Oh, I’m so happy. She said, I’m really happy for you because we knew you got a problem, but we couldn’t say anything to you. And you look so much better”. And that was in the days before the gamble responsibly… All the advertising came out. There was none of that. Absolutely none of that. They were just happy to take your money. And they knew if I had a big win, they would get that money back fairly quickly and more with interest.

Nick #2
Gambling Companies

I would emphasise that when you bury something, it’s not in the light. When you bring it into the light, it can be dealt with. You know, it can be dealt with. But when you bury it, it just manifests and manifests and the danger from that, the shame, you know, it’s what it does to your mental health, really and your relationships. You know, I’ve done things to people that, you know, as a 14-year-old boy, my mother would have said to me no, that’s impossible. You know, I’ve done things to people that, you know, are shameful, shameful, shameful things

Stigma

And money was quite easy to get hold of. I could take loans out at work with the company I was working for. I just used to roll one loan into another, into another, so I’d part pay it off and create a bigger debt, credit cards, all that sort of thing on top of that. And it just manifested, and I became more secretive with my gambling, lying, cheating, stealing all those, all those patterns of behaviour, more angry, more frustrated.

Gambling Experiences

The pressure from the debt and all that sort of stuff. When I had my shop, it was a catering company and shop, there was a period of time where less and less stuff was going on the shelves. Or I was pulling stuff forward to make it look like the shelves were full, but there wasn’t a lot behind it. So, the stock was running down. You always think it’s never going to happen to you.

Harm

I have got my life back. You know and there is hope, there is hope. I never thought I’d run a business again. I didn’t want to. I never thought I’d get married again. I never thought I’d see my kids again. I never thought I’d be credit worthy. I never thought anybody would trust with me with money. And we’re a cash business because we’re so small that we’ve only just the week before got a card machine. We don’t take lumps of money in the business, but so I never thought those things were possible. But, you know, there is hope out there.

Recovery

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