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Hi Adele
The mere thought of Mr V singing in French is enough to scare the horses!
This is my first post on the new site and you are my guinea pig.
It’s been a while since you posted so I can’t really comment on your situation – how about an update.
Speak soon
V
Dear Ell
I am packing to go away tomorrow for 2 weeks but I had a quick look at the forum and there you were.
When the danger is coming from another then you have no control over it but if the danger is within you then you can conquer it. Trust yourself Ell, you are very wise.
When we live with the addiction all we want is for the addictive behaviour to cease – nothing else matters, we give no thought to ourselves, we are so ******* up in the addiction of another.
When a true recovery starts for the CG, why does that cause so much turmoil for the person who loves them? It is the fear to trust again after days, weeks, months and years being spent knotted up like a coiled spring. The non-CG is afraid to let that spring go, afraid of being out of control again and that fear is perfectly natural.
It is my firm belief that you and your husband will find a deeper relationship in time. The girl who gave me the greatest support when I started my recovery was married to her CG husband, who was 15 years clear of his last bet. They told me separately of their love for each other. Both of them said that everyday was better than the day before – it was and is, an incredibly deep, strong and loving relationship.
Your husband cannot give you a promise that he will never gamble again but equally none of us know what is round the corner for anybody however much we love them. When we are first married we do wear rose-tinted glasses but thank goodness we do eventually take them off because perfection is not reality. Mr V does not have an addiction but I can’t ‘know’ what our tomorrow will be – I can only trust that we will be happy but nobody can give a cast-iron guarantee for any relationship.
Today on Skype you called him ‘your love’, you haven’t said it for a long time – ‘I love you’ is just going to take a bit longer. Perhaps you could tell me how you feel about him and then see how the words look and feel. If you love him you will tell him when you are ready.
Don’t rush anything, he is waiting for you because he loves you. I cannot put a time on how long it will take you because we are all different. I would imagine it is your mind that is frozen and not your heart which I suspect is warm enough to thaw an ice-berg. When you are ready your mind will thaw but no amount of worrying will make it happen any faster.
I would be surprised if you were not grieving your old relationship – it was carefree. I think it is like becoming an adult and realising that childhood days are gone – there is sense of loss but it can be replaced by a sense of purpose, to make things better than they were before because you have a maturity that you did not have before.
I wish there was a magic wand but unfortunately there is only hard work and perseverance that will bring you what you want. I have told you before that I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t know for positive that good can come out of this evil.
It is easy to say that you know you must let it go but it is quite another thing to do it. Yes you are free but you want proof and that only comes with time but you are doing brilliantly. In time ‘what if’ becomes redundant as does ‘if only’.
Just keep going as you are Ell.
?e a??p? ?p?? p?t? ????te
V
Hi Shelly
If you could take it all on board so quickly Shelly I would be gobsmacked. It is difficult not to rush someone to the end of their book without allowing them to read all the chapters on the way to make sense of the end.
You have been married for 31 years and there is a possibility your husband has gambled all that time and you didn’t know he had an addiction, possibly didn’t know that such an addiction existed.
I took months to even believe the existence of this addiction and even longer to believe that it was the cause of my CG’s misery and destructive behaviour.
If you look at how long you have lived with your husband’s addictive behaviour, you cannot expect to get your head round it in a couple of days.
What is important is that you don’t feel as down as you did at the weekend. You have started on ‘your’ journey to recover the person that is you and to retake control of your life.
Velvet
Hi Pink
You have made an informed decision and you have done a lot of work on ‘you’ since you arrived in the forum – terrific – give yourself a gold star.
Physical abuse is not symptomatic of the addiction to gamble and from what you say I would consider that your partner is an abusive man. If a CG steals to feed their addiction and then changes their life and controls that addiction, they will no longer be a thief. If a thief becomes a CG and then controls the addiction, they will (probably) still be a thief. I suspect the same applies with a physically violent person. The addiction does worsen unless it is treated and if an abusive man’s addiction is thwarted then I suggest he resorts to his natural instincts. You are thwarting your partner’s addiction.
Do you feel relieved having made your decision?
As a site we deal with the addiction to gamble and not physical abuse so I am pleased that San has written to you with her knowledge.
I certainly don’t hear a cry-baby but tears are totally acceptable, understandable and natural.
I never do ‘what if’ or ‘if only’ but I have answered my own ‘why me’ with – ‘why not me? I am not hard Pink and I have always had a tendency to put the ***** of others before my own, being selfish will never come naturally to me nor do I want it to. I am not selfish when I say I will not let the addiction to gamble into my life again – I am protecting all those around me by doing so and yes, that includes me.
You are not being selfish retiring to a part of the house where you can be quiet and not abused. You are not being selfish getting a job that removes you from an unhealthy relationship. You are looking after you and ultimately that will be the right thing for everybody around you.
You believe you see narcissistic men stomping on others and treating people like garbage and for whom things magically seem to work out – but do you see a happy people? I think not. CGs are not happy. They neither asked for nor wanted their addiction – they want to be like others and gamble responsibly but they can’t.
I believe the way we change Pink is by being determined that life will not screw us up. It is by taking the bad experience and allowing it to educate us not hurt us any more. It is by being ‘calmly’ resolute.
I believe you are on a site of good people – in both forums. Our CGs are trying to change their lives, facing terrible demons and regretting the behaviour caused by their addiction, our F&F are trying to change their lives for the better by learning about what bought them here and trying to make a bit of sense out of the most senseless thing that has ever happened to them. Everybody ***** a little selfish time to come to terms with who they are and what they need to change if they want a better life and that is why you are here.
Keep posting, keep learning, you are doing well. You haven’t got your head stuck up your backside or you wouldn’t be seeing things as they are not as you wanted to believe they were. Tomorrow is not predictable and today is the only day you can live at one time – what you do today determines your tomorrow.
Accepting the things we cannot change is the hardest part but you doing that – well done.
Velvet
Dear Adele
I am running out of time today but I have to post to you because you are doing so well – not only are you ‘growing as a person’ but you are supporting others brilliantly. You deserve the nice accolades you have received so believe them – or else! I’m not sure who else is but she sounds a positive person.
Your husband has ‘done’ something positive instead of talking about it so tomorrow hopefully you can relax and have the wonderful silver wedding anniversary you wanted. Who ***** Hawaii when you can have a round of golf and a nice dinner anyway? No answer is required!
So just for ‘today’ Adele, which is of course the only day we need to concern ourselves with, you are feeling happier and more confident. My message is short and simple therefore ‘keep going and doing what you are doing because it is working’. Well done.
Congratulations to Mr and Mrs Adele on their Silver Wedding Anniversary. I will raise a cyber glass of glorious cyber champagne to you both.
V
Hi Dadda
Unfortunately the US divorce laws and courts are not part of the territory for me.
Twilight has experience of courts in the US and as she has written she had successfully represented herself. I do remember Twilight’s posts before these hearings and I think she was feeling as helpless as you are now but she came out fighting and as you can read – she succeeded.
You are trying to cope with so many different angles and I can only suggest that you take each problem separately and deal with just that one before moving on to the next. Taking one step at a time is a well-known expression on this site and it does make a difference.
I am not opting out Dadda. I hope that by bringing you back up to the top of the forum that maybe some of our US members might have some answers for you but your problems are legal and this site has to deal with what it knows and that is the addiction to gamble.
I wish you and your daughter well
Velvet
Hi Madge
I hope you got out of the bedroom – it’s not the best place to get the dinner.
We all hide in the metaphoric bedroom once in a while Madge and it is only when we accept that the bedroom removes our ability to move on and change things that we kick the supports away and set the wheels in motion.
Forget what all the rest of the world thinks. You want for the real ‘you’ to be recognised, for people to know that you are trapped but you are trying to break free. I know you Madge – I know the frightened woman who thinks she is falling apart and nobody cares, I know her fear and her bewilderment. I know she worries about her mental strength and her physical ability. I also know that deep in her is an untapped strength, a strength that will bring her out of the black hole she feels is engulfing her and she will know that her children care and need her to make their world secure. It’s a big ask but she can do it. I see a woman whose thoughts go round and round, faster and faster until she feels she is going down a plug-hole.
I know because I was the woman I describe and I did escape.
A massive coping tool I used was to write to myself, addressing my thoughts to my soul, typing all the painful incidents, committing each terrible memory to paper, in a file. I found that by putting those thoughts in a kind of external hard-drive I stopped that bad memory swirling round and round in my brain – the file held it – I didn’t need to. Whenever my thoughts were overwhelming me I would go and bash it out on my keyboard until I felt it had left me – usually once a day. I wrote angrily, aggressively, tearfully, whatever – I didn’t care about grammar, punctuation being politically correct or even making sense, I used capital letters, underlining, different colours and expletives I have never used in reality – I wrote smashing the words out to cleanse my brain before I thought it would explode. As each page was committed I said out loud that I was releasing myself from that particular pain and I remember being exhausted but relieved. I hid it all – it was never meant for anybody to see – it was private, it was mine – it was ‘my’ purge. The file was quite thick in the end. When I started my recovery I kept it. It was as though my innermost thoughts were locked away and no longer in my head. I couldn’t destroy it as I felt the memories would have returned to my head. A lot later when my CG turned his life around I gradually destroyed the pages without reading them BUT it was not his recovery that put those thoughts where they belonged – it was mine.
I don’t see the upstanding community member, I see the unhappy and addicted man who is afraid of what he has become. I hear his lies and I know he lies to cover for his feelings of failure. I know he is sick with lack of self-esteem and no confidence and all his life is an act. How similar the F&F feelings are to the CG but how far apart they are too, he has to seek his way out and you cannot do it for him – recoveries are on different paths.
CGs gamble to escape but his escape takes him round and round but it doesn’t bring him peace. I believe that the ‘running away escape’ you crave will only bring you back full circle because the only way forward and out of the cycle is to face the devil and tell it that you are going to take care of yourself. These are not idle words Madge, your husband is at present incapable of looking after you or his children responsibly but you are. I don’t include your husband in that because at present I don’t think you have the energy to keep looking after him – you need it all for you and your best intentions will not change him anyway. His addiction is totally selfish and only when he is selfish enough to change it for himself will he start on his road to reality. You have to be selfish too to find your way out. ‘Your’ life is important, ‘your’ future is important, ‘you’ matter, I care and I know who you are.
I cannot tell you what to do. I can tell you what I did and how I found my way out. F&F are not usually selfish – we are normally trusting, loving, giving but to find your way out of the abyss, into which you have unwittingly fallen, you have to put yourself first. It does work – if it didn’t I wouldn’t be writing to you now. If my CG hadn’t determined on his own future, realising that he help his own future in his own hands then he would not be living the happy, contented life that he is – I could not do it for him.
Stop living for other people – live for you and your children will have a mother who is strong. Live for you, learn to like and love yourself. You don’t like your life because you don’t feel in control. Start today, start now – retake control of the one person you can control – she is capable of great things and she is wonderful and unique and the world has yet to meet her.
Keep posting Madge. I am off on holiday in a few days but I will look for you on my return and I hope to see the seeds of your recovery being fed and watered.
Velvet
Dear B
You have taken another big step and this time it is completely for you – well done.
You ask “why should I always be the patient one?” I suspect from our chats you know the answer deep down but the answer just gets up your nose sometimes! There are many people in life B who demand our patience and whether we give it or not is really down to us. He really isn’t finding it easy – his brain just doesn’t compute like yours, possibly never will – but it will develop – he is a work in progress and sometimes that ‘work’ seems particularly difficult.
You say you have a lot to be thankful for and I know the expression well – it makes you feel ungrateful that you are not expressing more thanks – well forget it! You have had a rotten time and ‘today’ has not come easily to you. It is costing you energy to cope with your husband struggling with ‘his’ recovery while seemingly unaware that you have had a battle too and I think you are entitled to feel a tiny bit sorry for yourself. Overall things are going well for you – but all of us, I’m sure, have days when we could do with a special bit of tender loving care – unfortunately just for now you are the only person who can give it to you, so apart from seeing the psychologist I hope that today you do something just for you – a ‘pamper B’ time.
I think all F&F long for is for their loved one to stop gambling and it is a shock that recovery for both takes longer than expected but it is a recovery and although slow it is not a further drop into the abyss. Glance back for a second and see how far you both have climbed out of that hole but don’t keep looking back – today is what matters and today you are seeking help for you.
You child will grow up and never know the man controlled by an addiction because he determined to change his life but also (and every bit as important) because his mother is a really strong and wonderful person who wouldn’t give in to her husband’s addiction.
You have possibly seen the following but somehow I think it adds up what I am trying to say to you today
One day a farmer’s donkey fell down into a well.
The animal cried piteously for hours as the farmer tried to figure out what to do.
Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the well needed to be covered up anyway
It just wasn’t worth it to retrieve the donkey.
He invited all his neighbours to come over and help him.
They all grabbed a shovel and began to shovel dirt into the well.
At first, the donkey realized what was happening and cried horribly.
Then, to everyone’s amazement he quieted down
A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally looked down the well.
He was astonished at what he saw.
With each shovel of dirt that hit his back,
the donkey was doing something amazing.
He would shake it off and take a step up.
As the farmer’s neighbors continued to shovel dirt on top of the animal,
he would shake it off and take a step up.
Pretty soon, everyone was amazed as the donkey
stepped up over the edge of the well and happily trotted off!
Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds of dirt.
The trick to getting out of the well is to shake it off and take a step up.
Each of our troubles is a stepping stone.
We can get out of the deepest wells just by not stopping,
never giving up! Shake it off and take a step up.
As Ever
V
Hi Shelly
I have seen the rep***s you have had and I hope you are feeling more positive as a result. Kathryn is an inspiration on this site – her thread ‘Be***ve’ is in our CG forum ‘My Journal’. You have asked Kathryn a question but I know she is getting on and living her gamble-free life and might not see it so I suggest that you write to her on her thread.
I see that Adele has pointed you towards my thread ‘F&F cycle’ which I hope helps you see the loop that unfortunately it is deceptively easy to get into.
You cannot stop your husband gambling Shelly, accepting that fact will take you forward. It is often said on this site that if what you have been doing hasn’t worked, then maybe it is time to try something new – reacting differently confuses an addiction that has been in control for a long time.
I don’t know whether you have read the following on other threads but I will write it here anyway because although not recognised professionally, I and many others, be***ve it to be an invaluable coping mechanism – I see that Kathryn has touched on it as a coping mechanism for herself.
Imagine your husband’s addiction as a slavering beast in the corner of the room. As long as you keep your cool and don’t threaten that addiction it stays quiet, although it never sleeps and is always ready to ward off potential threats.
Your husband is controlled by that addiction but you are not. When you threaten that addiction, it comes between you and controls the conversation or argument. It is the master of threats and manipulation and you are not. Once it is between you, you will only hear the addiction speak and because it only knows ***s and deceit, it will seek to make you feel blame and demoralize you. When you speak the addiction distorts your words and your husband cannot comprehend your meaning.
My CG explained it to me by saying that when I told him (for instance) that if he didn’t *** but lived honestly he would be happy, his addiction was distorting his mind convincing him that I was ***** because he truly be***ved that he was unlovable, worthless and a failure – he was a lost soul and fought back because he didn’t have any other coping mechanism. The addiction to gamble only offers failure to those that own it. However much your husband convinces you that he is in control – he is not unless you allow it.
As you have been married for 31 years your husband’s addiction will have caused a lot of wreckage and by no means, just financially. My CG was active for 25 years but turned his life around 7 years ago and lives a healthy, happy gamble-free, so my message to your husband would be that he has plenty life ahead of him to enjoy if he changes his life. However he will probably not listen to me – his recovery will start when he accepts he is a compulsive gambler and wants to change his life and he ***** the right support to do that.
Looking after yourself seems too easy an answer but strangely enough it is one of the finest ways to break out of the addiction cycle and can make a massive difference to the person you love, who owns the addiction. Your husband will not have deliberately hurt you – he didn’t ask for or want his addiction any more than you did. By changing the one person you can change – which is ‘you’; you will be supporting him in a different way.
Your mind will probably have been full of what your husband’s addiction is thinking and doing for 24 hours a day – days of ‘your’ life wasted on his addiction. It will have caused your self-esteem to crumble and your confidence to fade. Take some time for you every day and do something that perhaps the addiction has prevented you from doing. Think of you and your pleasure – think what makes you happy and does not involve gambling. Build up this time each day. The addiction to gamble is totally selfish – to enter recovery your husband will have to be selfish and likewise to trigger your recovery you need to think of self first.
Your husband will learn when he starts his recovery that he cannot gamble responsibly but it is a daunting thought for him before he takes the leap of faith. He will feel he is giving up everything he trusts in. Other CGs and dedicated counsellors can help him move forward and accept that he cannot gamble in the future – it is too big, probably, I think, for you to cope with suggesting to him. Just as F&F gain from the support of those who understand them – CGs gain support from other CGs. We cannot save a CG loved one – only the CG can do that.
You feel emotionally and physically drained but you have started looking after yourself by joining this forum. It is hard to take the journey one day at a time but on this site the method has proved itself to work over and over again. I am off on holiday for 2 weeks in a few days but I will look for you on my return.
Keep posting Shelly. You are doing well
Velvet
Hi RTWA
I am glad that you knew you could return and find a welcome and understanding.
You have something that most CGs do not have when they find themselves up the creek without a paddle – you already have a paddle and you know how to row for shore.
In ‘My Journal’ (which is our CG forum), Kathryn’s thread entitled ‘Believe’ has expressed her concern about her husband’s gambling in recent months. She is gamble-free and has been so for a few years and her thread is inspirational to many. I think it would be good for you to read and I know she would reply to you if you posted on her thread.
Please do not think I am judgemental when I say that I will never gamble in any way again as a result of the addiction to gamble being in my life. My CG who is gamble-free has told me that he has no problem with me gambling but he knows he cannot. The choice I have made is mine and because of this I have avoided the ‘possibility’ of being caught.
Before anybody jumps on me and says this couldn’t happen to me, my answer is that I don’t know why it happened to my CG and I don’t know why it didn’t happen to me – but it is a fact that the addiction was there for him but not for me.
I am aware having talked to many CGs over the years about the attraction of lights, noise and energy. As a non-CG I don’t fully understand but what I do know is that all these ‘tricks’ to entice are designed by clever corporations to entice people to part with their money and the potential CG is an unfortunate pawn.
Gambling is as old as the hills – it will not go away. You are completely correct when you recognise that it is you that has to walk away and more importantly, stay away. In this forum we come to realise that the addiction to gamble is not just about loss of money – in fact that becomes the least part. It is what it does to the mind of a loved one that hurts – it is the lack of empathy and the lies which stem from guilt and misery.
This addiction has taken your marriage away from you and I think that is quite enough. I believe that F&F and CGs are not on different sides but are the other half of the same addiction because without enablement it starves. Like all CGs you have found out the hard way that gambling is not something that you can do recreationally – it is poison to you. In my opinion there is no responsible gambling for a CG – this site believes in abstention being the way forward.
I think your username is now sadly more apt than it was before. I urge you to walk away, to join GA, to read Kathryn’s thread, to join our community groups where you can talk to other CGs. Have you said out loud yet ‘I am RTWA and I am a compulsive gambler’ – sometimes it shocks to hear it even when you know.
You were never going to change your ex-husband by threatening him; you are never going to make a scrap of difference to him by joining him in his addiction. Turning your life around and living gamble-free, I believe, is the finest way you can show him how to live and it sure as **** is the finest way for you to live. You do deserve better. Get off the roller-coaster now for both your sakes.
Well done on coming back – I wish you well and I hope for an update soon that you are living in control of your life again. You are able to see this addiction from both halves – use that knowledge to help others and make something good come out of the horrendous experience you have had.
Velvet
Hi C
Your husband obviously has got a problem and his symptoms all point to you coming to the right place for support.
At the top of this page click on to ‘Resources’ and in ‘Location’ scroll down to ‘world’. Click ‘Gambling help’ and then ‘Search’. Scroll down to ‘Gamblers anonymous – Twenty Questions’. Most compulsive gamblers will answer yes to at least seven of these questions. In my opinion most members who have lived with the compulsion to gamble will also be able to answer yes to at leave seven of those questions which hopefully will help you ‘know’ that what you are dealing with is a recognised addiction.
I cannot tell you what to do but if it was me I would print them off and then clearly tick the questions I would answer yes to and leave them where my CG (compulsive gambler) could not fail to see them. I don’t recommend putting them into his hand because it will probably spark an argument designed to demoralise you further. I think it is good to stand back a bit and listen to what he is saying rather than trying to change him, it becomes easier not get caught up in an argument that has no point apart from making you feel less in control. Once you begin to try and put your side the addiction has something to get its teeth into.
Although it is not recognized professionally the following is a coping method that many of us have used at the beginning of our recovery to help us cope.
Imagine your husband’s addiction as a slavering beast in the corner of the room. As long as you keep your cool and don’t threaten that addiction it stays quiet, although it never sleeps.
Your husband is controlled by that addiction but you are not. When you threaten that addiction, it comes between you and controls the conversation or argument. It is the master of threats and manipulation and you are not. Once it is between you, you will only hear the addiction speak and because it only knows ***s and deceit, it will seek to make you feel blame and demoralize you. When you speak the addiction distorts your words and your husband cannot comprehend your meaning.
My CG explained it to me by saying that when I told him (for instance) that if he didn’t *** but lived honestly he would be happy, his addiction was distorting his mind convincing him that I was ***** because he truly be***ved that he was unlovable, worthless and a failure – he was lost and fought back because he didn’t have any other coping mechanism. However much your husband convinces you that he is in control – he is not.
The addiction to gamble only offers failure to those who own it. We, who do not own it, try and make sense of it but we cannot. In my opinion it is a waste of energy to try – energy that is far better spent on ourselves.
There is much to say to you but I know that too much too soon is hard to take on board – it took me months to be***ve any of it.
In view of your description of your husband’s behaviour I have brought up to the top my thread entitled ‘The F&F Cycle’ – I think, hopefully, it will show you that the ups and downs you have been living with are understood here.
You have painted a horrible picture of you standing at the bus stop in the rain waiting for him and I hope that you will get the strength not to allow this to happen again. Do you have a car?
Knowledge of this addiction helps us cope. I would not be writing on here if didn’t know that the addiction to gamble can be controlled and wonderful, positive lives lived as a result. It takes courage for a CG to admit they are addicted – your husband does not want to take responsibility for his behaviour.
You cannot make your husband stop gambling but you can help the person that matters most to him and your children and that is you. Your husband puts his addiction first and the way to cope is for you to put you first. You do matter – your husband doesn’t deliberately hurt you or want you to be wrecked by his behaviour but that won’t stop him doing it – only you can do that.
Your husband’s addiction will have been filling your head 24 hours a day and as a result it will have taken away your self-esteem and confidence. Stick with this forum, pop into groups, contact the helpline, share with those who understand and learn to regain your self-be***f – it works.
Nothing you have done is pathetic – you have been fighting an enemy you cannot see. I be***ve this site can help you see that enemy and in so doing you can learn to confuse it. Looking after you is the most important step towards that confusion.
Well done on writing this first post – I know how difficult the first one is.
Speak soon and know that as long as you want me to I will hold your hand in cyber space.
Velvet