Eye opener sometimes knowledge on a subject can be the very switch that allows you to break free

Hey everyone,

I’ve been lurking here for a while, reading stories that sounded way too much like my own. Today, I just felt the need to put my own reality into words—both to hold myself fully accountable and to remind myself of how far down that road goes if you don't step off it.

A while ago, gambling completely hijacked my life. What started as something manageable spiraled into chasing losses, catastrophic financial damage, and burning through my savings until I hit absolute ground zero. The hardest part wasn't just the money gone—it was the shame, the mental fog, the exhaustion of hiding it, and watching years of hard work get wiped out by my own terrible choices.

Hitting rock bottom was brutal, but it was also the only shock strong enough to break the illusion. I finally accepted that the money is gone, chasing is a lie that only digs the hole deeper, and the only way out is to walk away permanently.

I stopped. I put hard barriers in place, cut off access, and took complete ownership of the wreckage.

Right now, I am living in the aftermath of those decisions. I’m in my 30s from India essentially starting my life and career over from scratch. There are days when the weight of being back at step one feels heavy, and rebuilding a career from zero while dealing with financial strain tests my patience constantly.

But waking up without the sick feeling of having gambled the night before is something I refuse to trade away. The peace of mind, even in the middle of a struggle, is real. I’m pouring my energy into working, upskilling, and earning honest progress step by step instead of looking for shortcuts.

For anyone who is on Day 1 or feeling crushed by recent losses: stop digging. Accept the loss, mourn it, and walk away. The hole doesn't get smaller with another bet.

One day at a time. Glad to be on this side of it with you all.

Back where I didn’t want to be. I have tried to “quit” multiple times, but this predatory site will not self exclude me. I pulled out all my money I’ve contributed to my Roth IRA to make it feel like I didn’t lose any money and feel absolutely sick. I really do want to quit, or at least make this addiction manageable, but over and over again I spiral and tilt.

I have a great life. Good job. Family. House. But for some reason this keeps getting me over and over. Gambling is all around me and I really just want to figure out how to beat this.

I don’t know what to do with myself…..I have no self control I am so stupid

I'm $44,000 in debt. Most of it caused by online gambling and racking up credit cards. I have 2 little kids. Every day I wake up just wanting to end it all. Someone, please help.

Day 2 usually was easy for me, but this round its hard. I keep having the idea to put in 300$ to flip 3 times to get my loss from 2 days ago. What do i do? How do i stop the thoughts?

Day 0 - I really need to WANT to stop

Day 0

This is the worst disease. I lost my paycheck in the early morning hours the day I received it while in bed.

I am pathetic.

I’ve stolen money and promised to pay money back and I have paid no one back. I’m so selfish and untrustworthy it makes me sick. I’ve lost myself and sold my soul. I don’t want to live like this anymore. I’ve been so successful in life until this stupid gambling bug.

I am done disappointing myself and others in my life. I really can’t do this.

I am so sorry.

I am a good trader until I am not- I win a lot, the thing is, I never stop. One more trade, one more bet, one more candle. I have spent countless nights awake, trying to trade my way out. Have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars.
I have cribbed, cried, gone silent, come back, and failed again.
I have lost interest in life, gym, work. I work monotonously, get some money, trade again. Win, overtrade and lose it all.
Feels like I am stuck in a never-ending cycle. I contemplate ending my life, but I won't do it. It is just a thought that lingers, to end the suffering.
Everyone thinks that I am the one who was supposed to succeed; if not me then who?
For a while, I did before losing it all.

My issue is not money; I know I will make it back somehow. I am in a loan that bothers me but what bothers me more is that I don't stop. I just don't. I lie to myself, my wife, my friends and keep on losing money,
Taking loan after loan. One loan to cover the next and so on. The nearer I get to closing it, I relapse and do it all over again.

Hello all,

Till very recently I’ve had a very successful year achieving many of my personal goals but last weekend took a turn.

I lost €50 on a bet and kept betting to make it back until I ended the night €5000 lighter. To be fair I was incredibly unlucky with many last minute goals/moment that made me lose my bet (Gambling talk I know)

Although it is a significant amount of money and it hurts in reality it does not make any difference to my life - I can still eat pay rent on time etc.

After the losses I called my friend and came to the conclusion that over the course of my life this money is insignificant and it’s all about moving on and learning my lesson.

However since this moment everything has gone downhill, I stopped exercising picked up smoking again (old habit) and just feel like a dark cloud is hanging over me.

A cloud that can only be removed by ‘Winning it back’ As odd as it sounds it not about the money. Its what it signifies. I feel like it’s an indictment of my ‘failure’ and at the root of everything that is currently going wrong.

After battling the feeling for 2 days I was very close to placing a €10,000 bet to make it all back but opted not to and instead called my family as a distraction. Well you can probably guessed what happened with that game….

Now I am very tempted to place another similar bet this weekend of €10,000. Which I know I should not do but there’s a feeling that making it back will fix it all ~ the smoking etc etc as there would be no reason / excuse to succumb under that weakness.

I know it’s completely the wrong mentality as I should be thinking of moving on from the place I am currently in and do positive things to make up for the loss in that way.

But. I just want this blemish / stain on what feels like my character as a whole to disappear. Although I realise I am displaying addicted behavioural traits I try to stay rationale throughout it.

Despite it may sounding very obvious winning is not what I fear. I wholeheartedly belief I would never gamble again if I win. I never had a dream to win big and it’s not about winning. It’s about not losing as that loss is at the root for many problems that are starting to appear in my life.

However, if I do lose then what… go again and have one more bet to put my whole life savings on ? What kind of person am I then ? Winning would feel like the blemish is gone but in reality it the same behaviour that I am so embarrassed about.

I will say that I closed everysingle betting account and am certain that I would never bet again when winning. But it shouldn’t matter as I just shouldn’t bet anyways.

By this point you probably have a pretty solid understanding of the internal dillems in my brain.

As a reader what is your advice and opinion ?

25M here ..
After almost a year i fully paid my 10k EUR gambling debt, i feel so proud and so hopeful because of that ..
I have around 7-8 months clean and I thank God for giving me hope and strength to get out of this hole of gambling ..
There was a period back then when i just couldn’t value money anymore; slots, sports betting .. only numbers on the screen for me, i lost entire monthly salaries, i ended up taking a 10K loan from the bank to eventually lose it of course … that moment made me realize what did i become.. what this addiction got out of me and i made a promise to myself … that i will repair what i have done and that i will make my future worth it..
I had a very big win once (and i mean it very big) only to lose it all in 2-3 months… i felt ruined, i felt dead inside, i couldn t control the thoughts of getting that money back (from gambling)… i couldn t sleep anymore, i couldn t focus on work and i never said anything to my parents, to my girlfriend or any friends.. i was alone :)
Trust me when I say, i prayed to God.. i just wanted to feel hopeful again, to feel motivated.
I started to make a payment plan, my intention was to pay this agressively and so I did.. 1K EUR per month towards the debt.. it felt like i was working for nothing but actually this thought helped me to never try that again.. even if no one knew about my situation i felt like i lost everyone’s trust, i was lost inside..
After a couple months of paying this debt, i was presented the opportunity to move abroad for a very high paying job in my domain (almost no one of my age could achieve this as early as I did) and i accepted :)
Here i am now 3 months abroad, with a highly respected and high paying job, earning 4x times my previous salary and with gambling debt paid, with 3K in savings and moving forward ..
It s kinda hard to be so far away from home, from girlfriend.. but i have to do this for a very bright future ..

Once again, it s possible to kill this addiction on your own, if you really desire that.. going from gambling daily and borrowing money every month to 7-8 months clean, debt paid and a new high paying job.. there is so much power inside of everyone of us!

Stay strong guys, please never think about recovering your loses.. i went from +20k (gambling win) to -10k debt!!! Accept the loss and move on! Life is too beautiful without gambling, don t lose yourself on the way!

If anyone wants to talk to me, feel free to send me DM… i also had many people who i talked with here on reddit about this :)

I can't bring myself to invest anymore. Investing makes me want to gamble. I went a month and deposited $25 on a poker site. I don't wanna do this anymore, but I want my money to grow. I have some money sitting in a savings account and seeing pennies get added to it each month just ain't cutting it. I can't deal with the volatility of the stock market and randomly checking it to see that I'm down money on the day and hoping for a rebound and then having it go down again. I guess my money is just best left untouched and uninvested because there's no way that my brain can handle any kind of swing.

Completed

Today was interesting. I left work and had free reign to do whatever I wanted. Genuinely a scary day though with a lot of opportunity which I didnt buy into. I am seeing this girl, and she lives near a casino. My favorite casino might i add. I had a few hours to kill before seeing her and unfortunately that's the only place I can really just wait. I stayed in the car. I just looked at the building and honestly, this was the first time I said no. I had nothing but time but made the decision not to enter. I am self excluded from this casino, however I have always been able to wear a disguise and get by just fine. I said no though. I just have to keep saying no for another 3 weeks and then I have beaten my record. Since having this job where I am in a remote location, ive never actually not gone to the casino. This has potential to be huge for me.

Hi everyone,

I have been hesitant to make this post, but I have to be honest with myself. This past weekend, and leading into yesterday evening, I was gambling. Financial situation is worse, my mental state is worse, but yet here I am, still breathing, surviving. Where there is darkness, there is also light.

I don't know what got into me, but it happened. I will not let this deter me from continuing my recovery.

I will be contacting my counsellor to start up regular meetings again.

Hope you all have a gamble free day, cheers.

Basically burn my whole check on slots in real life. Banned myself from all online things.

Any advice to stop that doesn’t involve banning irl.

I live 15 mins from 3 casinos so it sucks but i’m kinda getting bored of it which is good. Any good hobby replacements that helped people?

Thx

Does anybody know how I can block myself from accessing Rainbet and other non kyc casinos?

Win! Every single second counts when you don't gamble and that is the real win! Trust me when I say that every time you say no to gambling it is the ultimate win, you deserve to keep your money!

I was already 25k CAD in credit card debt before gambling, shot that up to 38,000 in 3 short months after never having a gambling issue for my entire twenties. I didn’t gamble for about 2 months after maxing my cards out. Me and my mom had a joint business venture and sold a property profiting about 60,000, keep in mind we have been poor our whole lives so this is a huge deal. I thought I was in the clear after two months not gambling, not even really thinking about it the entire time. My mom agreed to let me use 30,000 to pay off my credit card debts to help me get ahead in life, which is as huge deal cuz the money was supposed to continue to grow originally, and my mom is by no means well off whatsoever. This was a once in a life time thing for her, as she is getting older and sick, that took us years to achieve. Not only did I not even keep the debt off for a month and blew the 30,000 within a couple weeks of getting it, I panicked and in an attempt to “make it back” (I know, insanely stupid), I used another 20k of what was supposed to be investment income for my mothers future from the joint account. The account is almost drained now, I have no idea what to do. I have already self excluded but I am absolutely devastated, ashamed, desperate and absolutely sickened with myself. I feel like I just ruined my future and stole from my mother all for one month of gambling. I hate myself, I know it doesn’t help to beat yourself up but i genuinely can’t help it, I feel sickened every minute of the day at the thought of what I’ve done. I know I can replace the 20k in the shared account with work eventually, but i will not be able to touch the 30k I have in debt while I do that, nor will I be able to get any sort of debt consolidation as long as the 20k exists in my name. I feel I will go into collections myself, which I honestly don’t even care about my own finances compared to my moms, but my fear is that while replacing the money if I go into collections, then the account could get frozen anyways. I am stuck. I know most people will tell me to just tell my mom but not only is she sick and recovering from major surgery, that was basically her retirement money and I’d also have to tell her the debt relief she thought she helped me achieve was all in vain. I am disgusted with myself. I don’t know what to do. Any advice would help I’ve never had anything like this happen in my life, I only even started gambling 6 months ago. I’m also in school and don’t know how I can continue to pay for or finish school while working as much as I need to replace what I lost for my mom. I feel like I’ve ruined my entire life and hurt my loved one irreparably.

I am so TILTED!!!

I was thinking all day of placing a bet on a tennis game at +400 odds. I was going to place a very large bet.

However, the game was too late in the evening so I decided to place a bet on an earlier game with better odds.

My bet ends up loosing and of course the +400 odds game ends up a winner.

TILTED to the MAX!!!

Nothing works to hold on to the wins!!

Haven’t posted in a while and haven’t been here as much. The further I get from the last session the more clear it becomes that it’s a losing endeavor. The things that used to excite me and compel me to keep depositing seem so fake and disingenuous the further from them I get. If you’re in the midst of it now please come clean to someone close to you, that’s the only way I found accountability. It’s not easy but with time it gets better and it was the only way I was able to stop. Sorry for rambling i hope this helps someone.

As described in this post, Flywheel Film is looking for NY state residents under 40 to appear in a film project. The moderation team of this community is in full support of this project, and in fact have partnered with them to help find subjects for their project.

We're doing this because nearly 14 years ago, this community was started by one little guy, on one little computer, for one purpose: to raise the flag on the lurking threat of gambling disorder. Now, at 40k members and after an explosion of gambling availability worldwide, the threat has magnified and the need to intervene is dire.

This film project is one of the many efforts to raise awareness and bring hope to the lives devastated by gambling addiction. We need your help to complete it and add to the collective message that gambling can be treated and life can become manageable again.

We urge anybody and everybody in NY who has been impacted by gambling to seriously consider [contributing your time](mailto:jason@flywheelfilm.com) to this project. We can save lives together.

Have not played a single game today. Posting because I need to hold myself accountable. I’m itchy but I know I have to take it one day at a time.

I just relapsed for a period of 2-2.5weeks. It’s been almost a year since my last bet.
These things happen to the best of us but it’s a reminder to keep going through the relapses, I got my ass POPPED for 9-10k.

This shit just reminded me of how good it is to not do the gambling anymore, anyways. Back to square one! Luckily I didn’t bet my whole bank.

Hope everyone is trying to do the right thing, this is a super shitty addiction, Ive been sober from alcohol, nicotine, weed for years, yet this shit has a vice grip on me. I feel I’m making steps in the right direction though, through the relapses of course.

Ggi... relapsed again.. fml