Hi Romana,
you may hate me or the other members in this forum may hate me for writing the below but this what I will advise my sister if she is in your place.
1: be selfish, you are the priority, take care of yourself don’t let anyone pull you down with him if someone is drowning and you need to help him, yes help him but in a way that will not lead you to drown with him. you are the most important person in your life then after that comes helping others.
2: addiction is something that we live with, it is like diabetes something that you need to take care of for the rest of your life. keep this in your mind. don’t think it is a year or two then everything will be normal no it is a life issue.
3: don’t give him your money, don’t give him any loan, don’t encourage him to take a loan even to consolidate some other higher-interest debts. more cash more risk of relapse.
4: you should check he is in which stage of recovery 🙁 pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance)
5: if you still at the shores, I mean you both are not married, or still don’t have kids, or were not together for a long time, then consider walking away as an option that you may need to take it. especially if he is not cooperating, you are signing in for a long life relationship with someone who has a long time illness, your life will be miserable if he continues in this behavior.
6: in the other hand you could live a normal happy life if he is convinced he has an issue and if he was open with you about everything, you can win but together.
7: if you are together don’t mix accounts, keep your account separated, and have control over his accounts because any money with him will be at risk, and he will have more urges to gamble, so keeping the money away will solve 80% of the issue.
8: you can play a big role in his recovery but he needs to allow you to play that role.
9: there is a lot of online meetings, some of them under GA some of them under smart recovery, attend one or two meetings for the family partners, and attend a meeting for the gamblers, you can get good help in these meetings.
below is the link for GA meeting
https://gamblersinrecovery.com/
and you can find smart recovery meetings in the below link
https://www.smartrecovery.org/
ps: I don’t like the GA meeting I prefer SMART but you can attend both and get as much information as you can. the more you know about addiction the more you can help yourself and others.