My Addiction Is Just Fixation

I remember how social services got involved. My son was given a new school. Social services were involved, from August until December, social workers became a part of my life. They told me what needed to be done to get myself back on track, such as going to school meetings.

That was the consequence of me fighting off gambling which made me neglect my kids and the house. Yes, I was feeding them, and we always had food, but I was not being a mother or someone for them to look up to. I had once again failed them.

I had to push myself just to get up and do the household chores and become a mum again despite my mind screaming: “just quit”; my mind wanted me to give up. I was no longer caring for them; I no longer recognised their needs. The house was no longer a home; the children had no routine anymore. Everything had just blown up and I couldn’t do it again.

Again, I began listening to that Linkin Park song over and over through my earphones. I once again felt like I had destroyed my kids’ lives and had let them down. I again found comfort in their songs, but also Kesha, Praying. Songs seemed to somehow make me realise I was not alone, despite feeling like I was. That I was not the only one out there suffering.

Before my gambling addiction, I was never like this; I never even considered suicide or leaving my kids. I had also never suffered from bad anxiety. I did have depression though, but it was manageable, in the sense that I never felt like staying in bed and not moving all day. However, once my addiction started depression became a constant in my life.

It became a part of me. Now, past events of my life were replaying in my mind. I was continually thinking about a past event, not able to let it go.

Once social services and the school got involved, they were trying to encourage and motivate me to do more. I felt like I had support from people and slowly, the house looked like a home again.

Once again, I realised I needed to act and do something to stop myself from getting in such a bad state. Rather than letting myself fall all the way to the floor, I had to stop sabotaging my attempts to be able to keep going. By the way, just for the record, I hated having social workers involved. I know it was a good thing to have them around but I hated it. It just added to the feelings of failure, of me not being capable of looking after my own children.

It was really hard for me. I had to force myself some days into doing things because I didn’t feel mentally able. However, I remember how good it felt to see my kids every day. They were still alive and they had not watched anything damaging. Of course, I had never hit them; I was just mentally unstable at that time. I needed guidance because I had slipped and accepted gambling as a way to cope with life.

Every time the urge to gamble was at its worst but I refused to do it, I felt like everything around me was pushing me to join in. They had to huddle around and pull me down as well. I went back to feeling like I had failed and was a disappointment. I felt like I was dying again and just wanted to hide until someone called me to say: “it’s over; it’s safe, come out; you’re over it”. There was no way of hiding though. I realised I had to keep pushing myself forward for the kids.

Defeating the addiction

Gambling seemed to be at the forefront of my mind. It was like I got relaxed like my mind knew I had got to a point where I felt in control. “I had beaten it. I had overcome the addiction, and now there was nothing to stop me”. It felt like it had been ages since I had thoughts of gambling.

Most of the time, the thoughts come and go. I can actually think about something else, and the thoughts of gambling would disappear. I let myself believe that I had overcome it and that it was not coming back.

It was like my mind knew I felt that way. The more I smiled and acted like I was fine, like I was getting over it and it held no power on me, the more I annoyed my mind. It was probably one of the worst times after stopping gambling.

It felt almost worse than when I had just stopped. I do not know if this was because I had been trying to hide everything and went back to thinking I was okay or because I had so much happening in life that pushed me into that bad place.

I quickly realised though, that living in that illusion or “bubble of fake hope and fake happiness” was causing my downfall. I realised that I did not have to tell people I was not okay; I just had to accept it myself!

I had got so used to the fact that whenever things go wrong, when I have a bad day or when I feel like crap, I would just keep all of that to myself. I would hide it and not tell people. I would smile and act happy.

Actually, my social media profile at that time reflected this. It was flooded with jokes in the form of memes or quotes. Everyone was laughing; everyone was following me, waiting for the next laugh. It was a cover and this caused my downfall.

I had to get to the point where I accepted it, at least to myself. Trying to pretend I am okay does not help me or anyone to that matter. This was my biggest problem and the cause of a lot of my issues.

Thoughts about gambling would pop up in my mind but I would ignore them. Most of the time they go away. However, in times like this, they would not. I realise now, for some simply ignoring gambling's thoughts would work, for others, it won’t.

The thoughts screamed louder at me, but I screamed louder back to them: “I am okay!”. I laughed and tried carrying on like there were no thoughts. Those thoughts were warnings, and I had to learn to accept them. Ignoring them worked sometimes but others it did not. Hence, I needed a new plan and a way to deal with it so I would not keep falling.

So, I accepted the fact that if the thoughts were bad, I had to acknowledge them, as well as the fact that I was feeling weak and wanted to gamble.

Hence, I had to do things differently. No more pretending they were not real and no more acting like I was okay.

I realised I had to look deeper into myself. The thoughts had to be triggered from somewhere; they had to be linked to something. If I could find out what caused those bad thoughts, I would be able to avoid those causes next time.

Of course, there would be so many things but at least, I could slowly get a list of possible causes that I could avoid.

Now, there are things I definitely cannot avoid, such as feeling anxious or dealing with a bad day. I just cannot avoid that. Actually, there is no way I -or anybody else- could have a full life without being anxious or having bad days. However, I could determine the reasons behind me being anxious, or why I was having a bad day and try to ease the feeling by fixing some of those derived causes.

My anxiety seemed to have shifted. Being at home did not really bother me anymore as I had got comfortable. So, while I did not feel anxious at home or when answering the door, I noticed my anxiety came back in new different and inconvenient ways.

I had suffered anxiety while being out but was never bad. Hence, I signed up for a short university course. It was a sort, of course, to see what university was like. I wanted a change in my life so I decided I would do the taster classes and then sign up in 2019.

Things were starting to look up. In November 2018, the social workers discharged the kids and me. I was moving forward. I would still have my bad days and I would still have days where I felt like I couldn’t even get out of bed let alone clean. I had gone back to writing though, that helped me so much no matter what I was writing, it helped. I wrote so many short stories that I likely won’t ever publish but each word seemed to help.

Visits to the hospital

December 2018 and my daughter had been to the doctor for blood tests after constantly getting hives all over her body. Every day without fail these hives would show up and would soon go away after taking antihistamines. I remember being told that when the results came in, I would need to book an appointment to discuss them.

Luckily, I did not have to do that. I got a message saying I needed to call and speak to the doctor right away. I called through, and she rang me back. She asked me to take my daughter in there. Of course, I agreed and went over there, worried about what it could be.

Surely, an allergy would not be such a concern for doctors to get you in there the same day. We sat waiting and got called through. The doctor said nothing showed up on her bloodwork - allergy wise anyway-. She proceeded to check my daughter’s body for bruises and asked me if she had suffered any heavy bleeding.

I looked at her like she was crazy and shuck my head. Nodding, she sat down and explained how her iron levels and count were so low it was a cause for concern; she was being referred to the oncology and haematology department.

I was told the appointment would be within a week as it had been put through as “urgent”. I looked at her shocked. Oncology? I knew what oncology was.

I thought back. She was checking for bruises and asking if she had severe bleeding or anything else of that sort. She thought she had cancer.

I left, and as the doctor said, the next day the department called and booked her in. While I was waiting for that appointment to show, my eldest kid started showing these weird spots that were flat on his skin. I checked it and looked like meningitis. I called 111 and they told me to take him straight to A&E.

I thought to myself: “How can all this be possible?”. After all I have gone through in the last few years in which I had just got to a point where I was coping again, and then I had two children facing serious illnesses.

I spent hours in A&E as they checked him. Once they were done, they said it wasn’t meningitis, but he needed to be referred to the outpatient’s department for HSP and have his kidneys checked frequently.

They did not mention what HSP was to me, so that night, I found myself searching the causes of low iron levels without a cause in children and what HSP was.

I began to feel guilty for my daughter’s situation as she seemed to have all the medical issues. During her first few years, she was in and out of the hospital. She was put on a breathing machine and not moved from Resus on two occasions after her breathing got so bad, she was rushed to the hospital through an ambulance. She had suffered from collapsed lungs and broncholiths over and over. She was constantly in the hospital due to breathing issues.

By the time her lung issues and asthma were under control using medication, she started having trichotillomania. The school said she had regressed with her learning and had forgotten things. Then with all that going on, she kept having the rash and then of course the issue with her iron.

I felt like it was my fault; I felt like maybe these issues were caused by her birth. She was a twin, and her sister is perfectly healthy. I blamed myself again for everything that was going wrong with her. A child so young should not be on so much medication, yet it was just to keep her breathing under control.

In one week, I had taken my son to his HSP appointment -just after Christmas-, and my daughter to oncology. I remember what happened in both appointments well. In HSP, we were told he would have to go back in for updates once a month. He would have to check every two days for protein, blood and other things in his urine and keep a diary of the readings. If more spots showed up, he would have to take pictures and record them.

However, my daughter went in and had blood tests, then more blood tests; then, they wanted her back in two days. It was like every two days, we were at the hospital as they kept doing tests on her. They also gave her iron supplements to see if that helped her iron go up. First they gave her a liquid, I remember that first night, pretty soon after she had it, she projectile vomited everywhere, so she was taught to swallow large red iron tablets.

I remember the day I sat with the doctor. He explained how certain levels had dropped drastically. I remember reading about them. If they were low, it was a sign of leukaemia.

I had just got my head around them saying it was not cancer and quite possibly an iron deficiency.

I remember they had her do a full blood test, and it came back fine. I asked how was it possible that somehow, they messed up giving us a false reading. Of course, they had no idea. All they said was that there must have been a mix up with the results as her levels for that count were fine but to be sure they would continue testing her every two days.

After so long, the trips to oncology moved to once a month, then they became less frequent. In 2018, I found myself writing a lot, stuck between hospital trips, and just trying to focus on getting my daughter through it. She had been brave, though. Most adults cannot even stand to have blood taken even once and my daughter went through it every two days.

So, 2018 flew by but not without the thoughts of gambling though. They were always there, especially during the months of uncertainty, when I had no idea what was wrong with my daughter. Hearing the word “oncology” and watching the doctors checking her bruises pushed me to an anxious state.

As parents, we want to protect our kids, but how can we do it from things we cannot control? I just wanted to go home with her and pretend everything was okay.

She was seven! Just seven years old and she had already faced more hospital admissions, illnesses than most adults. She had already taken more prescribed drugs than most adults take in their entire life.

As for my son, he was discharged from his HSP in 2018. We were told that if it his condition reappeared, he will need to go back. However, my daughter was still under oncology’s observation during Christmas in 2018.

So, as always, we celebrated Christmas just like every year: we ignored the bad, the illnesses and the hospital visits even if she would be back in just a few days for yet more testing. While her iron had gone up with pills, they had stopped her taking them to see if her levels stayed up. So these final appointments would tell us if she would need more visit. I continued to just push forward.

2019 is here

2019 was a year I fell again; I fell so hard and fast that I nearly gambled and, by “nearly” I mean just a click of a button away. Luckily, the hospital eventually discharged my daughter once her irons levels went to a stable level and stayed there.

Consequently, I could start thinking about getting into university. Around March -if I remember correctly-, I had the taster sessions. However, I signed up on the last day of those sessions, I didn’t see the point in waiting any longer.

My plan was to sign up for the first-year foundation, a course called PHE – Preparation for Higher Education. Then after that, I would pick a course that would help me progress in life. I didn’t know at the time but I knew I wanted to do something.

I had not realised though but my anxiety was beginning to worsen. My anxiety had always been related to things like worrying about death and what my kids would do if I died. One of my biggest fears was house fires. I could swear that I would go and check the house for a fire that wasn’t there whenever I thought I could smelt smoke. Even to this day, I sometimes still do that. I still sometimes feel like I must check the house if I smell a fire.

In April 2019, my anxiety hit me so bad like never before. I remember going into town with my son for his birthday and getting to the bus stop and feeling uneasy. When I got on the bus, I started feeling worse and then, once I got off, I rushed to the toilet and found myself shaking, sweating, and stuck in the cubicle.

I had to call his dad to come to take him birthday shopping because I physically could not do it. As soon as I knew I could go home everything began to settle down, and the sickness went away.

I remember getting the bus home and everything felt better. By the time I walked in, I was exhausted, but I no longer felt sick or was shaking and sweating.

However, it then happened again later when I took my daughter for a final blood test. I remember trying to fight it. And push through the feeling. I was foolish that day and gave in. I could not miss that appointment, so I let the thought of gambling stay in my mind. I even had a conversation with myself about how I would find a site to play on later.

I spent that appointment focused on thinking about gambling scenarios and how I could gamble later to control my anxiety! It worked, I did not throw up and did not run away home.

My other daughter had an appointment at the hospital with the dentist, and my anxiety kicked in there. It kicked in so bad I had to tell the nurse I was not feeling well. I did not have to. She took one look at me and said: “you need to go home and rebook your daughter in, they cannot take her through and put her to sleep with the risk of you not being well”.

I was pale, sweating and shaking. Once I left, I began to feel better. I hated myself though, for letting my anxiety win. I had never had issues like that before. I had felt uneasy and ill going outside sometimes like when going to school some days while I was young. I managed to push through it though. Thinking back, I realised this can be traced to my childhood. When I was in primary school, I remember walking to school and feeling physically ill, shaking and like I was going to be sick. Once I got in class, it settled down. I also remember feeling the same way during dinner times and as I tried eating the sickness would grow, I would begin shaking.

At school, I would tell a teacher and get sat somewhere away from people. I would then calm down and stop feeling bad. I was too young to know it was anxiety. I only realised it as an adult.

My anxiety didn’t stop after primary school, it continued through high school, I remember getting the bus and feeling like I wanted to run home. I’d shake, sweat and feel physically ill again. However, I had no choice but to go with it. I couldn’t go home so when I got to school, it would eventually die down.

So, looking back, I realised I had anxiety in primary school but I couldn’t explain it at the time. I honestly thought I was sick, I would sometimes be physically sick. The schools never mentioned it. I guess even they didn’t think a child could have anxiety.

I discovered that when my anxiety was bad, the gambling thoughts were just as bad. I didn’t want it to win though, so in September 2019, I started my university classes. I started the main foundation year course, and I enjoyed it so much as it was something new for me: I was getting out of the house and talking to people.

I was going to class on those nights as it was a night class so I would not be home until past 10 p.m. I felt like I had succeeded in something and was finally moving forward with my life. Everything seemed to be going great. University was something that gave me more power to fight the addiction and get over my mental health. I was no longer sitting at home hiding away; I was no longer just sitting waiting for the something to happen.

However, despite all that, in December 2019, I learnt I could not ignore it or lie about it but I was still doing it. I was still having bad thoughts and just passing them off as nothing.

I remember sitting in the university library feeling like I had failed everyone; like going to university was a waste of time and putting more strain on everything. I thought going to university was the reason for so many issues in my life. I considered quitting university and just leaving. I remember fighting back the tears as I stared at my phone.

I found myself searching for a website that did not have me blocked. I found one and registered. I then sat and just looked, looked at the screen thinking: “now what?”

It had been nearly three years of no gambling, and no one accepted it. No one acknowledged me, and it felt once again like it was because of either me or people didn’t see gambling as a real addiction. My biggest issues were the thoughts and other peoples thoughts and comments.

I remember so many people saying to me. “So you cannot do the lottery?” Or “I did not realise it meant you could never gamble again” Or even “Do you want to play bingo. I have a voucher where you get a free game online.” I thought to myself: “What is the point?”

People would not turn around to a recovering alcoholic and say: “Oh, I thought you would be fine to drink wine as you only ever drank whiskey before. You only ever drank at home when you were addicted, I thought going to the pub would be okay? Or: “I didn’t realise you could never drink alcohol again” They do not and never would because drug and alcohol addictions are seen as …addictions.

On the other hand, gambling is seen by people as nothing more than us getting carried away. They believe that once we stop and give ourselves time to calm down, everything will be fine, and we can start again. It angered me, and I hated it.

I hated that I had that one addiction people saw as nothing, and an overreaction or fixation. I hated the world, and I hated myself. I remember clicking “deposit” and putting money onto it. I then sat there for an hour, just staring at the screen.

Maybe if I gambled again and lost everything people would realise gambling was real? Maybe I made it look too easy? I honestly thought that. I thought that maybe I made the addiction look too easy, so people did not believe I was addicted. Perhaps, I should have shown the world pictures of me I took on those days when I could not move; the days I was screaming internally telling myself not to gamble.

While I hated everyone, I also did not blame them. Society and the world make it seem like gambling addictions are nothing more than fixation. Those who suffered from the addiction themselves know the truth; some of the relatives of those who suffered know the truth.

Yet, there are still so many out there who are battling this addiction and not having support from their family because to them gambling is not an addiction or at least “not too bad”. I didn’t know what I was trying to prove anymore. I was at university and to me that felt huge, yet no one else seemed to really care.

I just sat feeling ready to cry and give up, staring at the screen thinking: “why the hell not? No one would give a shit!”

When I realised I was addicted, I was afraid everyone would be mad and that I would have let people down. However, I quickly realised no one even cared. Why would they? I was not affecting them or asking them for money. I was not at their door screaming and shouting, causing trouble.

That night, I realised I had to stop ignoring things. I had done it again and for some reason my mind was damn good at it. I would get a thought of gambling and just pretend it was not there. I would feel weak, worthless, or depressed and again just pretend I was happy and free of thoughts about gambling.

I shook my head and kind of shouted at myself. No one else will care if I gambled and lost all my money. I, however, would have been angry as hell I went through three years of shit to quit. I deleted the account and set off home.

I was almost in tears on the bus, constantly trying to wipe them away before they fell, fighting back trying not to cry. I just felt like it was useless; everything I was doing was useless.

I had to stop trying to ignore it though. I went home and vowed that from that moment on, if I had a bad thought, I would acknowledge it. No more pretending it was not real. I would acknowledge it and make sure I tried figuring out the cause.

If I could not know the cause, I would at least acknowledge and fight it; or tell my mind it was wrong. Ignoring and pretending it was not happening was not useful, so I nearly lost that night. I nearly gambled, and I knew I could have lost hundreds within an hour.

Seeing a counsellor

I went to see a counsellor; I was hopeful that would be my turn around. I had it explained, I would talk about everything from my childhood upwards in order to try and find the route of the issue. However, I would only have three sessions; the rest would be group counselling meetings.

I once again gave up. How would group counselling meetings help? I would not sit there with a group of people and tell them my life story; that was crazy. I saw the three counselling sessions as a way to set me up to fall. If it worked, then what? After three sessions, I would feel worse because I had to stop.

I remember looking into private counsellors but the prices of their services were so high I could not justify using money that could be spent on my kids or find the money. So, I made my own plan, which was to stop ignoring everything and try to find the issue or tell my mind it was wrong.

2019’s Christmas passed and the year 2020 began; it was a whole new year. I was hopeful as I would start my main course in September. I had been to the interview early in 2020 and felt hopeful that I would succeed. I also did the maths exam that was needed and passed.

I found myself taking on a role in my own life; a role where I ensured every day, I started it right. I would get up, and I would exercise, meditate, read, write, and just have two hours in the morning to get my mind ready. I would write about any urges I had with gambling, where I thought it came from and how to try preventing it next time.

COVID-19 hit, and I found myself no longer having that time and freedom to myself as well as my own life at university since I was now always at home. Months seemed to pass by as I lost myself in writing and home-schooling the kids. I lost myself in trying to get university work done and get everything else sorted.

I remember how the thoughts of gambling began to get worse; all they seemed to do were worsen. I started getting up early -by early, I mean 4:55 in the morning-. I would get up, dressed, sit, and enjoy ten minutes of silence, then go running! It was amazing to run and watch the sunrise. I was finding myself; I was finding the real me as I got myself in a place that felt right and no longer a struggle.

I would get up and immediately go running for at least one hour. Coming home, I would then spend twenty minutes weightlifting. Then, I would get cleaned up changed. I would later meditate and finally, have breakfast while reading a few pages of a book. I would write in my daily journal as well.

My mental health was in a whole new place during those months. It was a liveable place, in a good way. The thoughts of gambling seemed to die down; they were not gone forever but they were not as bad. Somehow, running just made everything better. I was enjoying my own time again and going out. It was so quiet.

Unfortunately, I got ill. I would wake up unable to breathe. Whenever I would try to breathe, it felt like my throat was closing and I would be forced to cough to try and clear it -but coughing just seemed to tighten up my throat more-. I ended up sleeping on the sofa for nearly a month, so I was upright. I began using my daughter’s inhaler. The doctors had told me it could probably be COVID-19.

I had once again lost the ability to run because of how bad my breathing was. It took months to get to a point where I could feel ready to run again, but once again, I did not feel safe.

My anxiety got so bad that I did not feel safe going running so early. I could not go during the day as the kids were at home, and I needed to help them with schoolwork. So, I lost the second thing that I was passionate about and helped me with my mental health and addiction. I tried on and off. Lockdown was a hard time for me. Being isolated made me want to gamble more. I found a video online, it was a comfort, once again it was music. Linkin Parks Crawling however it wasn’t them singing it, it was Tommy Vext who was the lead singer of the band Bad Wolves. I once again took comfort in his music, his songs were relatable, and made me push forward despite not being able to do things I wanted.

I was relieved when it was over, but I still could not get back to normal. My breathing was still bad, although not as bad as in the beginning. However, months later, I would still need an inhaler every now and then sometimes more than once a day.

While the university opened and people went in for the new course, I had to stay at home and do the classes online. I found a new enjoyment in it though. While I wasn’t physically at the university, I enjoyed being able to learn again. I found myself focusing on university more. Christmas 2020 was very unusual, especially with all the lockdowns. I then realised: what about other people?

I had noticed how some gambling adverts had started pointing out gambling sites were a good place to socialise. I cannot remember which company it was, but it shocked me.

Imagine advertising a gambling site as a way to socialise in lockdown! I then realised so much more. I realised how there were shows that mostly women watched that were sponsored by gambling websites.

I noticed how gambling adverts slots and bingo nearly all use women to attract customers -there are actually very few men in their adverts-. I realised that some of the women like me would pull through and not gamble. I also knew that some of them would give in during the lockdowns and gamble again.

The world seems to be driven by advertisements for gambling websites. Even if they are about horse racing and mostly focused on men, there is far too many. I remember reading that in April 2020, there was meant to be a ban on all gambling advertisements during lockdown to protect those with gambling addictions.

I remember laughing. These companies had until May the 6th or 7th to remove their ads from TV and radio… wait for it… until at least June the 5th! One month?! A ban for a month?! What the hell was the point in putting that out there? That isn’t all though, they could still advertise on social media and other ways, just not TV or radio. They could still send out as they said direct marketing such as letters and text messages.

I get how they were trying to make things better, but really… a month ban from advertising on TV only during lockdown? What about all the women who were going to be stuck at home? The ones who felt isolated with no support and no one to talk to? What about the men who were still going to work, feeling stressed out and worried they would get COVID-19 and take it home to his wife and baby? It is not just a thing of a lockdown! It is a life thing.

How can you ban cigarette advertising in all forms of media -that is online, TV, newspapers, etc.- to reduce children’s exposure to the fact that “smoking is a good thing” and to help those who are trying to stop, yet leave alcohol and gambling advertisements basically intact?

It is 2021 now, and yet another lockdown. I have reached out to a few women who I spoke to over the years who had addictions. Some have succeeded and not gambled but felt like they were pushed to it.

Since gambling advertisements are being shown more, I then spoke to a few who struggled so much that they ended up gambling. Everything was pushing them back to their addiction: the lack of meetings they used to go to; the lack of support from doctors when they felt mentally unstable

This book is not about me wanting people to read it and feel sorry for me, or to say: “wow, well done”, and congratulate me. I do not need that; we don’t need that. What we all need is the ability to sit and turn the TV on without our addiction been pushed on us in a way for them to try make money.

What I want is women to see this book, read it and speak out! We have no idea just how bad gambling addictions are for women, as so many don’t speak! I have never taken a survey about gambling addictions yet there have been so many journals and resources that say what proportion of problem gamblers are women.

No one will ever truly know, and I guess that is something that will take time. I am hoping those women who are struggling reach out, to me, to a company or to anyone! If only I had seen a post from a woman in 2016 about her and her gambling addiction that could have ended up what stopped me sooner. It could have been the thing to make me realise and reach out for help.

I also hope that people read this and see just how much gambling addictions are real. How much they can make someone ill, and how much they can push problem gamblers into a place where they try to commit suicide. I am hoping that people stop with the comments that make the addiction seem like nothing. For instance, just because someone gambled on horses does not mean they can gamble on slots because it was gambling on horses they were addicted to.

I guess there is a lot of changes I am hoping for by publishing this book, and I doubt half will happen. Just look around you. As I said, watch TV with open eyes, look at social media adverts, everything. Just watch and see how many adverts are about gambling.

There are daytime TV shows sponsored by gambling companies. Surely, they should be banned to protect kids as well. Kids have also been known to fall victim and become addicted to gambling.

I hope more gets done in the future. I felt alone on my journey for so long. I had no idea where to go or who to speak to. I could not go to the local meetings because they were late at night and two busses away. I also had no way of knowing what I was walking into. I was like many women: afraid that the group would be all made up of men. So, I did not even try to go.

More needs to be done, because what future do kids have if nothing changes and more women and mums begin gambling and become addicted? How many children will go hungry, become homeless and possibly lose their mum due to this?

Final thoughts

I have learnt a lot since starting to write this book. I have learnt that two different people with gambling addictions will overcome them in different ways. I was told that when I got the thoughts of gambling to try to distract myself by ignoring both my feelings and those thoughts, I was going towards my downfall. Trying to ignore them pushed me mentally and made the addictions scream louder.

I realised that I was so focused on trying to heal myself, heal who I was. However, it’s an impossible task. As I had never been full; I was never fully healed.

I was broken and have had issues my entire life. What would I gain by trying to heal who I was? That person was weak, abused, hurt, unfit, mentally unstable and just falling down time and time again! I realised healing the old me was just a way to set myself up to fall again.

Why the hell would I want to heal that person? Why would I want to heal and become the person who was weak and kept failing? I realised I needed to become someone new.

Everything from my past had broken me. All of it has given me fears I should never have had. I had witnessed things no one should ever witness. So, I needed to become a new person: a stronger person from all that crap, all the falls and all the abuse.

I have to change and become a person who hadn’t already failed and fallen, this isn’t easy, and a working progress. I keep telling myself I need to stop hating the past and stop the regrets.

I failed so much, and the first thirty-two years of my life were terrible and a constant stream of battles. However, they all taught me things; they all taught me that darkness keeps everything real. I also learnt that I am stronger than most people as they would’ve given up before the addiction. I kept getting up and fighting.

Every time I fell and something bad happened, I learnt lessons that I’d bring over to this new person I am becoming, so as to slowly trying to build up. I will fall, but when that happens, I will do it in a way that pushes me forward, not back to who I was; that person was too weak in some senses.

I do a lot now. I run most mornings, meditate, practice mindfulness, silence and write. I’m not talking about writing my books, but writing about what I am grateful for every day. I write in two journals. One about my day, then another one about what I am thankful for and what good came from that day.

I have just started writing parts of my life from the past; parts which I thought portrayed bad aspects of that life, and were a reflection on me.

Every few days I write about a part of my past life, and what I learnt from it., I will no longer let all of that push me down. It took over thirty years of my life already. I don’t have so many happy memories from those thirty years. At least ninety percent of them are painful, damaging or disastrous memories. Each one though, has given me lessons.

Mental health and gambling need to be looked at in a whole new way. Pills will not work for everyone, exercise will not work for everyone, online therapy and group sessions won’t do the trick either

Let’s be honest, if at one point all gambling addicts were men, and now they it appears they are equally split 50-50 into men and women, how long will it take until that proportion changes? How long until it is 60-40 in favour of women?

What shocked me the most though, was to read about a how a gambling website’s CEO has been are raking in money from those with gambling addictions. That, however, is not enough for them and their greed has pushed them.

I just learnt that they also have a counselling and support company that works very closely with gambling addictions. So while they are creating gambling addicts and taking their money, they are also earning from them as they try to recover. How is that morally, right? Imagine the CEO of a brewery also owning a counselling company that supports alcoholics while also getting money from them while they are being treated.

I feel hopeful that things will change, yet at the same time, I don’t. I just hope that women step up and say something. I hope they don’t hide away anymore. Too many people are blind and don’t realise that this is our reality.

As I said, any women, or even men who are struggling with gambling, or know someone who is, can reach out to me on Facebook. I won’t tell anyone, I won’t pass your details onto a company. I will simply listen and give advice if I can. My Facebook is something that will slowly build up to raise more awareness about this addiction. Most of my personal Facebook account is public, in the hopes someone sees my post and gets help.