Ive been gambling for years on and off.

The first bet i ever had was on the grand national (horse racing) and from then on i started betting on both horse racing and football.

I have very rarely won and spent thousands over the years.

I no longer bet on horse racing as i despise the whole industry with it's inbred corruption.

I am still betting on football on a weekly basis but have nearly spent all the money i have and cannot bring myself to spend my last few quid on it.

I am sure most people will say i only have myself to blame,which is correct.

A big part of the problem is i have a stubborn streak and there is an obvious aspect of desperation on my part due to chasing my losses and being on a low income.

I would appreciate your views on this subject and how i can change my mindset.

I don't even so much as buy lottery tickets.

TBH I dunno what to say, other than if you wanted to gamble then its probably preferable to do it when the odds are at least evens, you've probably more hope with roulette or blackjack than you have with horse racing etc. You have to bear in mind that the bookies almost always win overall, the odds are calculated to return a profit across the bid spectrum.

You could for example go out and buy some art deco at jumble sales and turn a profit on it, admittedly not much but its there and certainly a surer bet, theres lots to be had at auctions, ex police/forces stock, old cars for example etc. Again there's a gamble but you can always get 'some' money back from the gamble, if all else fails you can sell a car for scrap value, provided you didn't pay much more for it and stick to your guns with low prices then you can be fairly confident of returning a profit. Theres always a drawback though, storage space, problems with the law here and there. I've said it before but some of the best small biz startup ideas I've seen were the simple roadside butty box.
People are happy to stop and pay £1.60 or whatever for tea/coffee and its a massive profit margin if you consider the unit cost for tea or coffee its pennies. Ice cream vans are a good un as well, especially if you can pick an area thats not already visited by anyone else and especially if theres a fair few houses and its semi-rural.

I doubt its easy to let go of gambling but you might get away with changing it to something like the above as a way of 'hedging' so to speak (like the banks do lol!)

No, I don't you have merely yourself to blame.

I think you managed to quit the horses so there is a every sign that you are stronger than this.

If it is at all possible, you should talk to a few people who have been through this.

You have my sincerest best wishes.

I would recommend watching this film HS:

www.dailymotion.com/video/xakvwk_gamblin...-part-1-7-card_sport

That's just the first part, but you can follow the other parts on Dailymotion. I can't post the Youtube vid because the BBC has blocked it in the UK.

If you watch it, you will see that compulsive gambling is an illness, it's just not one that's often recognised. I don't know if you can accurately assess the extent to which gambling is addictive and compare it to drugs, but I don't believe that anyone could watch that and deny that it is addictive.

The only way to do it is to go cold turkey, take it day by day, and as Mikey suggested get in contact with some other people who have been in the same position.

And you shouldn't feel any guilt about what you've done. It is perhaps natural to feel regret, and perhaps natural to even feel guilt. But you shouldn't feel that way because you've just got the same human failings that we all do.

wake_up_bomb wrote:
iirc it all centres around dopamine release like many drugs. It stands to reason as humans associate money with reward and the ability to provide for oneself or family.
I know people who have survived extreme addictions & they will also tell you that talking to people who have had similar experiences will help to relieve what you may feel as guilt or shame, as well as to help come to the realisation that doing the same thing over and over again and it not working is not rational.
Many theorists suggest that drugs, alcohol & gambling are not addictive. Rather it is the propensity of the individual towards addiction. So you always need to bear in mind that if you did manage to avoid gambling there is a chance you would find something to replace it with.


You've taken the first step anyway by recognising that there is a problem & talking to people about it.
Hope you manage to get it sorted.

Thanks for your input guys.

I will watch the video tomorrow WUB.

I will just have to realise that the money has gone and to stop chasing it.

I would like to sell items on eBay or something similar as an interest instead but i just don't believe it's possible to turn a profit unless you get your products at a subsides rate like many big companies do.

Football rant time

Bloody juventus,when i want them to be in a match where there are 2.5 goals there are 2 goals and when i drop it to 1.5 there is 1 goal,Cunts! rant over.

A new start anyway from now.

P.S
The stress levels are quite extreme at times and that actually becomes addictive in some respects,the swings from high to low are terrible,it feels like your drowning in pit filling with water which i dug for my self.

If it well help, HS, there is a thread I started about music that is good to play, especially if you are trying to relax or get some sleep.
sanctumzone.co.uk/forum/health-nutrition...on.html?limitstart=0

A lot of us have habits that aren't in our own best interests, HS, so it'd be pretty hypocritical to be sanctimonious about yours. It shows bottle that you're facing it. So just best of luck to you in getting to grips with it.

I was curious to what your opinion is of bookmakers in general.

Do you think they should exist as an industry?

What is the anarchists point of view?

They are no use to society and leech off peoples desperation IMHO.

If they wouldn't have existed in the first place i wouldn't be wasting my money on the spongers.

As a smoker I can't lecture you about bad and potentially dangerous habits but I will wish you luck tackling it. As has been pointed out you've recognised the problem and want to do something about it - that's showing strength right there.

I knew a gambler a few years back who printed a poster of himself and took it to every bookie in his area asking them to bar him from betting on their premises, and it worked for him.
Of course, this was before online betting and dreaded in-game betting became fashionable.

I hope you manage to kick its arse

humanspirit wrote: I'm a libertarian, so I'm in favour of everything being legalised and decriminalised. All drugs, prostitution, everything. I would allow cigarette advertising the way that it used to be. But firstly all companies that want to engage in these things should have to be honest and open about the genuine risks. Not say "we support reponsible gambling". Actually openly tell people what the odds are very clearly so that they can make an informed decision. Same with alcohol, cigarettes, fast food, drugs, both prescription and recreational, etc. I watch loads of sport, and it's betting advert, beer advert, betting advert, beer advert...and at no stage is the danger of these things made remotely clear.

Secondly, instead of spending millions and billions of pounds running around trying to arrest people and crack down on drug dealers, when 'somehow' the drugs keep getting into the company anyway, aggressively enforcing debt and tax collection, and running highly dubious policies that allow Tesco, GM foods, oil companies and other multinational corporations to take over (even more) all of the money could be invested in counselling, support services, etc. Not just for alcoholism, drug dependence, addiction to gambling, etc, but other social progammes as well. There is absolutely no need for society and the economy to be run the way that it is and it could change quite easily if people demand it.

But I think adults should always be able to choose things like eating unhealthy food, drinking, taking drugs, paying for sex and any other consensual acts which the state might outlaw for some reason or other, but they should be able to make an informed decision and receive proper support if they become an addict rather than condemnation and possible criminal prosecution.

humanspirit wrote:
No money or property = no bookies!

I don't think I'm an anarchist, but I'm not for banning gambling, any more than I am for banning tobacco & alcohol. Lots of things can be misused or form addictions that are detrimental, but there are plenty who enjoy the occasional flutter without it being harmful, so I don't believe their activities should be impeded.

People can get addicted to absolutely anything. I used to have good mate (not seen her for a while due to moving) who was properly addicted to Beecham's Powders.

After quitting my addiction of over a packet a day of fags after over 40 years of smoking I am pretty liberal about addicition and will never be ANTI smoking.

My friend's daughter was a heroin addict for some years, she went on the methadone programme and has finished with that and now is totally addicted to fitness. She is now a personal trainer and has entered body figure competitions and trains women to enter. Maybe it's possible to change one addiction for a healthier option?

Just be thankful you don't live in Australia where they have whole rooms of poker machines (pokies aka one armed bandits) with prizes of thousands of dollars and betting on numbers and horses and anything that moves!! Gambling is a HUGE problem over there and my daughter has had to put her name on some kind of register to stop herself if she gets the urge. These pokies are everywhere you look and at one time they were going to be introduced at the airports but I believe that was stopped.

Thank God I have never had the urge to gamble and I wish you well in getting over this. Some people give up smoking because they can't bear the thought that they are giving the government even more money that is necessary (Allan Carr way). Maybe you could look at it the same way.

Wikipaedia:

The betting industry alone is reported to contribute £6 billion as of January 2010, 0.5% of GDP. Furthermore it employs over 100,000 people and generates £700 Million in tax revenue.[16]

Cheers folks again for your caring comments.

I will let you know how i get on,to be honest i am sick and tired of wasting the time,energy and fiat on football gambling when there are better things to do.

I will be making money by just not visiting the bookies anymore,that's how i am looking at it anyway.

I will probably start to enjoy football again for what it is,an unpredictable silly little game.

Nice one Bab's

humanspirit wrote:
The anarcho-capitalists pov is that deregulation lack of taxation and red tape would allow for alternative competition to exist not only in gambling itself but also in alternate forms of gambling such as micro-investments (tiny shareholdings) as lack of tax and red tape would allow even poor people to benefit from share returns.

Its doubtful that gambling as we see it today would exist in such a scenario as it would have no customers as returns would be much higher elsewhere, its all about risk vs reward. Banks for example take no risk whatsoever and reap huge rewards because they have created the situation to allow for this with govt collusion over regulation that only permits a small in-crowd to run banks and fractional reserve silliness.
Only if there is a level playing field would it be possible to have a stable economy, unfortunately that is now quite impossible short of robbing the rich of their money along with everyone else and wiping the slate completely clean.
Anarcho-capitalists are against forcefully taking peoples property so they have a bit of a dilemma to deal with there before their model can ever work.

Personally I'm with SB in the sense that I would rather see the entire monetary system abandoned altogether but thats probably even less likely than a robin hood crusade...

What you are left with is unilateral models of socialist co-operation making use of the system and playing it as best as possible, which again won't work as it requires great co-operation between a large number of people who would normally distrust each other.

Ofc there is the option of blowing your brains out or just getting pissed when you need to forget it all, which works just as well.

^
I will settle for the drink option andyh.

I bet you'll make it. Good luck dude. Fast cash is always a scam.

batou wrote:
Very true batou,i don't even know how i got myself so into it.

I was doing one bet a day which doesn't sound that much but i was putting around £25-£40 on each bet.

Years ago when i was betting on horses I did a bag of sand in one day.

It's an addiction

The first stop in giving up is recognising and admitting you have have an issue


Can you cut yourself off? Rip up your card and change your bank account number