And in today’s society, it is heightened and worsened because of the almost bombardment of advertising and availability to gamble and the fact that, you know, when I was a when I was, you know, between 20 and 30, there was no mobile phones. You could only gamble for six hours a day. Now, if you’ve got a mobile phone, you can gamble 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. So that that is the if you like the major contributor to it becoming the almost pandemic that it’s become. And that is why one in 15 people in Britain today are affected by somebody’s gambling disorder

The first thing I tell people is that instead of being closed and, you know, putting a barrier around yourself, you need to be accepting that you’ve got an illness. A lot of people don’t accept that it’s an illness. And so consequently, they think it’s a life choice which are, you know, it’s chicken and the egg. Yes, it was a life choice to gamble. However, they didn’t choose to move into the problematic pathological aspect of gambling that that is, you know, that comes about because of complex issues that are all contributing factors for somebody moving into that area.

But the other major player in this game are the finance industries, the banks and the lending societies and those sorts of people who inevitably are the first people to see when somebody has a gambling problem or potentially has a gambling problem, they’re not obviously skilled to be able to state that. However, you know that they are tied, if you like, or restricted in what friction they can apply to the individuals other than when that individual wants a service from them. For example, a mortgage or a loan and that sort of thing. Where rather than challenge them saying, “Well we’ve looked at your last six months accounts and all these outgoings to Betfred and Bet365 etc etc. would suggest that you couldn’t maintain the payments with your current outgoings.” That should be the conversation. But the bottom line is at the moment they just say, “Computer says no”. So, you know, in other words, they’re just passing the buck.

So, from when I left school and throughout my working life, I’ve lost eight relationships through gambling. And it reached rock bottom 22 years ago. I stole money from a patient, and so I ended up being sacked by the NHS.

And the other thing is that when I was gambling quite often, I’d arranged to socialize with people but by the time it actually came round to going on the event, I’d have no money to go. So, I would either cancel or make some form of excuse or try and borrow money, the money to go which again just puts you in a shameful place. So, you know, it was a cyclic behaviour which was just continuous.

I’m now living in sheltered housing. I’ve never owned my own home. I can’t afford a car. I’m living from hand to mouth, basically. And it’s, you know, it took me to some very dark places. I should have gone to prison. I have been on the streets twice. And you know, I have attempted suicide twice. And so, you know, it’s ruined my life, you know?

This dates me, my first wage I came out with £57 for the month and I was rich. I bought everybody presents. You know, that was an unbelievable amount of money to me in those days. So, then what would happen would be that I’d give my mum some money, supposedly for rent, which were very nominal. But within a week I’d be borrowing it back and borrowing more money for the train. And basically, that set off a horrendous cycle that carried on, you know, with gaps in between until I was in my sixties