The curtain fell on the Real Santander versus Cucuta match in the Colombian Division 2 fixture. The home side fell to a 0-2 loss with the clinching goal coming just nine minutes from time. With it, though, some 5000 miles away there was a lost soul whose heart fell with the final whistle of a seemingly insignificant game of football somewhere in a South American minor league.
As midnight approached on that Wednesday evening of 9th October 2024 the inability of either Colombian team to score in the final nine minutes signalled the end of a 24 year addiction which had previously shown no signs of stopping. That last £200 was the culmination of an £800 loss that day and the final act on what was a gambling juggernaut.
It was time. Enough was enough. I had to stop.
The thing I realised about gambling every single day was that no matter whether i won or lost i would never ever get what I want in life. If I had a win, life was great, but that was always always followed closely by a loss. I’d never be able to save money or buy nice things or live any kind of life. I just had to stop.
When did it all begin?
It was a magical experience. My first ever bet was on an English League Cup match between Birmingham City and Newcastle United in November 2000. I’d never placed a bet before but thought it would be fun to try it. A work colleague was a City fan so I was going to the pub to watch it anyway with him. Let’s be clear, I had zero knowledge of betting, odds or what anything meant. I didn’t know how much to bet or what I could potentially win if I did. I also was a little cavalier in my approach. A £50 stake on my first ever bet threw people especially as I had no idea what I was doing. I had never set foot in a bookies before and that remained the case as I used their telephone betting service to place the fifty quid on Birmingham City – the lower league side – to beat Premier League Newcastle United. An adventurous bid. As a new customer of this particular bookmaker they offered me a free £20 bet on a ‘correct score’ wager. Again I had no clue. I figured as I was putting Birmingham to win I may as well guess the score in their favour so I took a chance on 2-1 to City. Those odds I remember very clearly were 9/1.
So, what happened? That night I watched intently with my friend who naturally wanted his team to win but he was as astounded as anyone when City fired in a 92 minute winner to make the score 2-1 and I went absolutely mental. Not only had I won the bet but also the free bet. A total of around £320 I won that night.
I was buzzing. Couldn’t believe it. I excitedly told everyone why I was so happy. They struggled to believe I’d placed such a hefty first ever bet. I had, though, and I’d won.
In hindsight it was the worst thing that could have happened. Such a positive experience fuelled the endorphins in my brain and my addiction had begun. It was slow at first but once the major – and very problematic – change in the Gambling Act (2005) – my addiction grew at a rate of knots.
What was the problem with The Gambling Act (2005)?
The Act came into force in 2007 and primarily made legal gambling advertising. It had previously been banned in the UK but this change opened the floodgates for what we see today; wall-to-wall advertising on sports, on TV, in-between games, football stadia, everywhere. The advertising was so powerful that I still remember one of the first ever adverts that I saw and it stuck with me for years as a reminder why it was ‘good’ to gamble. The strapline read “It matters more when there’s money on it”. That voice in my head from that advert truly annoyed me for years.
The current overload of advertising of gambling companies is out of control and I have first hand experience of how it can and will affect those who are subjected to it. My addiction wasn’t an accident. Yes I had begun some years before but I wasn’t fully immersed in the world until around 2007. i placed a few very low stake bets each week on the football and that was it. 2007 hit and I too was out of control. The juggernaut was gathering pace.
Quite how gambling is acceptable to be advertised at all is beyond me. They banned cigarette adverts as it is dangerous and unhealthy but gambling is arguably worse. Gambling destroys lives. Gambling kills. And yet, not only do they not ban it, they encourage it on all platforms everywhere. Imagine trying desperately to quit and being subjected to adverts everywhere you go. That was one of my main concerns before quitting. How would I escape the constant reminders?
How did gambling effect me?
I gambled almost every single day. It was a torturous experience. I would wake up in the morning and literally the first thing on my mind would be what games were on that day to bet on. It started out solely as a football-based activity but gradually I bet on everything and anything. The thing with online betting was there was always a game on somewhere. Mornings were good for Australian football and evenings I’d tune in to English games. I watched every single game that was on TV with a view of a gambler. What could i bet on? How could I get money for the game that day? Sometimes I lost and lost big. In the early days It would affect me so much and I’d go to bed to sleep off the upset. Sometimes I won though and those wins were what kept me going. However, wins were few compared to the losses incurred. The wins were regular enough to keep me interested though. However, those wins were always re-betted. With online gaming, the danger is and always will be that you use your winnings on more and more bets which you would always eventually lose. Even if you withdrew your winnings, you’d always end up re-depositing them and losing it all. It’s a lose-lose situation and always will be.
It got so bad that I was placing bets on Christmas Day – not everybody celebrates Christmas, right? Arabic nations were good for that. During Covid I became very very – some might say too – acquainted with Belarusian football. Every single nation’s football closed down for a while during Covid. Belarus didn’t. If you’re a gambler, you know this. It was a desperate time, the summer of 2020. Few options.
Inevitably though, football wasn’t enough. I became obsessed with random sports i’d never previously paid any attention. Basketball, cricket, ice hockey, baseball.. even bloody bandy and floorball! Heard of them? nope neither had I!
Towards the end though, I was betting larger and larger amounts to get the same buzz. £100 stakes were regular or more if i could afford it. Things became so bad that I became numb to losses. I was idly just throwing hundreds on a bet that I didn’t even care about winning. Losing did not affect me anymore. I had become numb as a coping mechanism to losing.
On that last Wednesday evening I threw my very last £200 on that Colombian match to score a goal in the final nine minutes. I didn’t even think they would achieve it. I didn’t care. I lost. I cared.
What did I do that was shameful?
There was a few times where I would do whatever I could to get my hands on money to fritter away. The worst of these was when I stole about £800 from my friend. I took his bank card out of his wallet and noted down his card number. I used the card to pay for my habit. I will forever be ashamed of this. I have since paid the friend back every penny. The interesting thing is I informed the gambling website concerned that I had used a card without permission. Not only did they not act upon it, they actually let me keep my account open and continue to bet!
How much have I lost to gambling?
Financially, a lot. In the past two years alone I have deposited a mammoth £67,000 and lost a staggering £21,000. The total bet amounts don’t bare thinking about. If you factor in the 15 years previous since the Gambling Act came into force, I have no doubt at all that I have lost in excess of £100,000.
The thought of that is horrendous.
How and why did I quit?
I needed to quit in the end. I could have carried on. I could have just kept betting and re-betting for the rest of my life, but where would I end up? Would I ever achieve anything? I’ve spent so many years being a slave to this horrible addiction, lining the pockets of so many betting companies. Why? What’s the end goal? Is it to win money? Not really. You lose. No chance of winning.
I had already been thinking of quitting as I was already getting fed up of it all but on that Wednesday night i said “i’m done” – and I was. I started getting all the blocks in placed to get started.
Which tools are available to quit gambling?
There’s some really good tools which will help you. The two I did immediately were signing up for
- GamStop; A self exclusion scheme. When you sign up here they take your details and exclude you from every single gambling-based website on your behalf. Now I haven’t checked if this has worked but I have received emails from quite a few sites telling me i’m self-excluded. So I take that as a positive.
- GamBan; Blocking software. This service will block all gambling-based websites on your devices. Best of all, it’s free. It’s a fantastic service. Years ago, I purchased a similar software for actual money which never did the job as I always found a way round it. I think there may be a way round this one too but I haven’t tried it. I think the fact it provides an immediate block prevents you if you have an urge to gamble. They also have a number of excellent features such as tracking how long you’ve been gamble-free for.
- GamCare; Support to quit. This is an excellent service who provide a telephone helpline for those in desperate need. There is also a supportive peer-to-peer community for you to get help from others or post your diary of quitting.
How is my quitting journey going so far?
To date, I am currently two months 23 days gamble-free. That may not sound a lot to some but trust me I genuinely did not think I would ever quit. For two decades I never seriously considered quitting. The process of quitting was not as difficult as I thought. It’s not been easy but my main concern was how would I enjoy watching the football without placing a bet. The simple answer to that is I haven’t. For the first few weeks I paid no attention to football at all, not even my own team. Now, i don’t find the same enjoyment as I did and only watch when my own team are playing. Even then, i’m not as into it as I’d like, but it is what it is.
I told one close friend about my addiction. They knew of it before I decided to quit. They didn’t push me to quit or make me feel bad for it. They were there to listen and support me when I eventually made the decision to quit myself. I think that’s the biggest thing when you quit any addiction. You need to want it yourself. There’s no way you will do so if you’re being pressured from others. Having also quit smoking in the same way, I know it can be done.
This journey is a journey and I will always be in recovery. I need to stay vigilant and not let my guard down. The biggest thing i’ve noticed since quitting is the spare finance i have available. I have money to do with whatever i want. I can pay for things, buy things, do things. It is so liberating. I can’t even describe. While gambling, I never had any money, ever. Always down to my last pennies. Every last penny went on those stupid websites.
I feel free right now.
