Hi Lianne
Your post tells me that you already have a fair understanding of what to do, so well done.
I will answer your questions in the order you have posed them.
1 CBT can be part of treatment, it can also, in some cases, be a complete treatment. GMA, for instance, offers a residential, holistic, treatment programme which includes CBT. Seeing a counsellor/therapist, once a week may just involve CBT as time is obviously more limited or it may include CBT as part of the sessions.
2 I have never understood why it is believed that relapses are inevitable. A determined gambler can learn to control his/her addiction without a relapse. A slip is not necessarily negative, in that it can re-enforce the need for the gambler to be more vigilant but even a slip is not inevitable.
3 I would never suggest that you leave or stay with your husband – all decisions must be yours. Knowledge of the addiction to gamble is readily available on this site and in Gam-anon, which is the sister group of GA. It will probably be easier for you to make an informed decision when you have gained knowledge of your husband’s problem. Rock bottom occurs only once, it is a mental state and nobody can determine when, or how, rock bottom is to be reached by another.
4 I think I have covered this with point 3.
5 It is unwise to give a compulsive gambler an ultimatum unless you are positive that you are ready and willing to carry out the threat. If your husband is a compulsive gambler then he will own an addiction that is the master of threats, which you are not and nor do you have to be. If an ultimatum is not carried through then an addicted gambler will see a weakness, that can be exploited.
6 I don’t understand why trying to establish if a loved one is addicted, or not, should be called ‘gathering evidence’ unless you are seeking to carry through a threat for legal reasons. In my opinion, gaining knowledge of the addiction to gamble will give a loved one power over the addiction but not power over the addict. An addict cannot be forced to control his addiction – you cannot save your husband but you can support him if he accepts he has a real problem and wants to live gamble-free.
I would not be writing to you if I did not know that your husband could control his gambling and live a wonderful life in control of his addiction – if, indeed, he owns such an addiction. I have known many compulsive gamblers who live in control of their addiction and they are very special people. Learning to control an addiction takes courage and determination, if that courage and determination are carried forward into a gamble-free life then the bad experience can be an amazing force for good.
It is good that your husband’s parents are no longer enabling, whether he is compulsive, or not. A problem that can easily be overcome can become an addiction when it is enabled.
You write about two major incidents over the past year but you say you have been miserable for two and a half years. Do you, therefore, have reason to believe he has been gambling for longer than a year?
I don’t know why you think that divorce is the only option unless you are saying that you no longer love your husband. Divorce is very final – but is it what you really want because only you can know what you really want?
Maybe you could download the 20-Questions from the Gambler Anonymous web site and ask your husband to look at them. If he is addicted it may well open his eyes to the fact that he is not alone but that there is a lot of support for him if he wants to change.
I hope you will post again. If you want to communicate one-to-one, then our Helpline is available and/or you may like to join a Friends and Family group, where we communicate in real time; nothing said in a group appears on the forum. The group is private and it is therefore possible to say things that you may not wish to say in a public forum.
Speak soon
Velvet
