This set of cards was created as a publication tohighlight how gambling addiction changes lives. The cards are sequenced in order to tell the tales. In order to navigate the publication you’ll need to have the deck facing up, then take the top card, flip it over and place it on the left. You’ll see that the cards correlate with eachother and the set works like pages from a book.

How Broke was I? http://www.gamblersanonymous.ie/stories/personal_stories.php

Lotto Meltdown http://www.thefix.com/content/scratch-card-gambling-addiction7901?page=all

Right Direction http://www.gamblersanonymous.ie/stories/personal_stories.php

Poker Problems http://www.themorningnews.org/article/the-high-is-always-the-pain-and-the-pain-is-always-the-high

This publication was created to inform those who are unaware of the severe effects gambling addiction can have on a persons life. If you feel that somebody you know may be addicted to gambling, or you’re becoming aware of your own addiction, please do not hesitate to contact Gamblers Anonymous through their website:http://www.gamblersanonymous.org.uk/

Hello, my name is John and I am a compulsive gambler.

The only gambling in my house growing up was Cheltenham once a year. We would put all the names of the horses running in a hat and each of use would pull out the name of a horse and my Dad would put down a bet for us. All through my early 20’s I did occasionally go into bookies and bet on the odd horse/but to be honest gambling didn’t really interest me at that stage of my life.

My first serious bet was the world cup I would have been about 26 at the time. I had placed this bet online with my credit card. I bet on a correct score and it won. I and two of my friends started to gamble on football every weekend from then on. I wanted to feel part of the crowd. In the beginning between my share dealing and my online football betting I did very well for the first six weeks , however the amounts started to get larger and I was finding that all my savings was going to paying off credit card debt. I was also starting to take out loans to finance my gambling.

I can remember the first time I went into a Casino; I was with Don and my girlfriend at the time Debs. I remember the feeling of being alive and the rush of Blackjack. Even 30 seconds there would be a rush of adrenaline and I was placing larger and larger bets on each hand. I am addicted to everything about Casinos but especially the buzz of winning. Blackjack for me is a very hard and fast game custom designed for an addict like me. Winning in a Casino give me a feel of self worth, when I won I feel I was of value to the world. This is something I did not feel in life or growing up. I remember thinking at the time “where have you been all my life?” From the first moment I walked in a Casino I was totally addicted. It fed into every insecurity I had as a person. Here was a place I did not feel lonely and it made me feel good inside. Here was a place that took away my worries. Here was a place that I did not need to feel.

During my weekend online football gambling sessions with my friends in Meath I used to go into the Casino on the Sunday on the way home. I can often remember losing large amounts and not going near a Casino for months at a time. At that stage of my life ever spare bit of cash wasbeing used to finance my gambling. I never went away for any weekends with any of my girlfriends. I had a problem with gambling but I did not recognize it at the time.

I remember meeting Susan in one of the local bars and falling hopelessly in love with her. She was my world and I would have done anything for her. When she walked out my life my gambling totally took over. I hit the casinos very hard.

I remember sitting at a blackjack table hating myself and the world around me. How could there be a god? I would run back and fore to the cash desk taking more out on my Laser card. If it was not the Casinos in Dublin it would be the ones in London or Bolton. I often went down a large amount within a very short period of time. I also started gambling on the online Casino websites. I would often gamble on the online Casinos all night long and lose large amounts of money.

I was totally out of control. I continued to gamble and my rock bottom started to get lower and lower.I lost respect for myself and would often gambleright down to my last Euro. I was finding it impossible to stay out of Casinos. I couldn’t go into town for a drink without ending up in a Casino. I remember waking one morning after a serious gambling binge at a Casino and thinking “this is not normal - you have a serious problem.” I made a call to Gamblers Anonymous and had my first meeting.

From the first moment I walked into a GA room and starting hearing everybody’s stories I did not feel alone for the first time in my life. I could relate to everybody in the room. I remember saying to myself in my mind as I heard each story - “that’s me”. I had to make a real effort to stop gambling. I got rid of my laser and credit cards. I have an ATM card with a very low limit on it. I never carry large amounts of cash. I don’t look at any gambling on television or go near any gambling establishment. I go to as many meetings per week as I can (at least 3). My gambling was 100% so my recover needs to be the same if I am to arrest this addiction. Each morning as I wake I say the same thing to myself: “No matter what happens today I will not gamble.”

I speak to GA members every day on the phone. I also now have a sponsor who as times drives me up the walls! He keeps telling me “that’s my job!”,but is a huge support and keeps me on the straight and narrow.

Things took a downward turn in Boston when I discovered scratch tickets. Just the mention of them has “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” lumbering through my head. More than 150 million of these toxic enticements are sold every day in the United States—that’s one for every other citizen. That’s how I assimilated. You’d see me on the buses, nicking away at an Instant Millions, or in the barrooms, my nose pressed into a Set for Life. One card at a time, it drained my bank account.

I wrecked my marriage and alienated my friends. I had landlords frothing on my doorstep, bosses asking where the hell I’d been all afternoon, when the truth was too humiliating to relate: I was sitting on a stoop, or at a cafe, scratching at rolls of cards for hours at a time. So I’d stop playing. I was always stopping. There were times when I’d spend entire weeks forgoing the opportunity to become a wealthy man.

Things improved when I moved to Dubai, in 2004. Here, gambling is prohibited, and for six years I only ever played when I went abroad, mostly in casinos. I had some great nights and some horrible nights, but they were only nights. For the most part, I’d learned to live without the tingle of possibility. It was boring. Then, in 2010, I moved to Spain, and discovered the fruit machines all over again. A year later I was back in England, living with my sister, scrabbling to make a living, mainlining Rainbow Riches and Reel King.

A dopamine junkie. Chemical infusions aside, I still cling to the idea that has to be some level of reasoning in all this, and here, once again, I return to the principle that led me to invest in Lucky Bags. It goes something like this: You have a little cash in your pocket, enough to buy a pack of smokes, a sandwich, and a beer. This is your immediate future, and it is fixed. Put that money into a fruit machine, and instantly new horizons open. Invest in a top-of-the-line scratchie, and there’s a blossoming of possibility houses, cars, holidays.

To complicate matters, I have a problem distinguishing chance from luck. Every time I miss the bus, I suspect that the cosmos is involved. This metaphysical grudge, I think, just feeds the gambling bug. As Dostoyevsky’s Gambler put it, in the midst of a horrible losing streak: “A strange sensation rose up in me, a sort of defiance of fate, a desire to challenge it, to put out my tongue at it.” And fate responded by bopping the guy in the face: “I walked away from the table as though I were stunned. I couldn’t even grasp what had happened to me.”

So the Gambler plays the role of tragic hero, brought down by his willingness to butt heads with fortune. What courage! What folly! It’s not quite the same, is it, when you’re debating whether your last two dollars should be spent on a carton of milk or a couple of spins on Cops ‘N’ Robbers. I wish I could go to Monte Carlo and bet the farm on an ill-fated straight flush. But, the truth is,

So I’m reduced to bankrupting myself bit by bit. It’s embarrassing.When you think about stopping for good, you imagine a watershed, the judge banging his gavel; the straight-backed chair teetering beneath your feet. This is harder to achieve when ruin comes in increments, when you stumble-bump your way to the bottom.

I had a run-in with an editor and former friend the other day, a guy who had promised work and then failed to deliver. “Did we owe you something?” he wrote after I bemoaned his lack of consideration. “Was it us sitting on our arses all day playing fruities?”That’s low, but is it low enough? What about the lying? The begging and bartering? What about going into your local shop to ask for a pack of smokes on spec and being turned away? Or watching your three-year-old daughter eat the last of the fish fingers and hoping she leaves a little for you? Every indignity and deprivation leads to a promise: This is the end! You will stop. You’ll get better. You will get back on your feet again.

I had the chance to head to London to work at 17, the boss who’d I’d been working for his pub went into receivership and he asked me and another chap would we go and work in a pub he was going to open so off we went. This was to be a good chance of doing well we were to live in everything was paid and we got a wage in sterling on top of this. I hadn’t seen a poker machine over there, but what was there was fruit machines every pub had one and our place had one also.

It wasn’t long for me until my same behaviour started up again putting my wages into these machines. Nudges lights spinning wheels buttons everywhere, I would play them in all the different pubs on my breaks and on my days off. I started borrowing again, taking loans from the till with the intention of putting it back on pay day. I got into the cycle of borrowing on my pay day this was the way I fed the addiction and covering up the money I had started taking from the till. Not ringing up the money for drinks and pocketing the amounts. I always had a way of making things balance I had to become clever and devious to keep me able to gamble. The pub wasn’t working out for the boss he gave it back to the Brewery and headed back to Ireland, My friend and I stayed and got work in various pubs. By this time the lying started to escalate.

I went to the police and tried to convince them I had been mugged by a couple of black guys, I thought this would sound more convincing for my friend who I was ashamed to face because the real story was I was after losing money that was for him. He had previously mentioned about my gambling, and how he seen it affecting me. He had got me a job and was after looking after me with money. The girl I was with at the time had lived in London for quite a few years she had enough of the place, I am sure she had enough of the sometimes fights and arguments.

My name is Paul, I am a compulsive gambler, and I am in recovery from my addiction for over two years. My last bet was in December 2009. I never liked sports; I never had an interest in sport not evening when I was growing up. I liked playing cards, I remember watching the bigger lads play them, so as I got older I was very much attracted to playing poker with the lads I went around it we played on the street, small stakes but there was something very exciting in it for me, having the better hand and the thrill of pulling in the pot, the whole sitting on the ground using someone’s jacket as the table for the coins. I got a thrill from pulling in the better hand, and reaching over and pulling in the winnings. I was 15 and started playing poker machines; I would go in to the snooker hall next door to where I worked.

At first I was playing them for small amounts of time, going in the odd half hour and trying my luck. The lads I worked with would be playing snooker or pool on their breaks but I seemed to be getting more and more attracted to the machines. They were in a dark corner of the hall 4 or 5 of them lighting up, making noises that came with having to go high or low on the outcome of the card it would give after getting a winning hand, and trying to keep this going across the screen. It soon went from the odd time to every day and came to a stage pretty quickly if I hadn’t the money to play I would find myself sitting there looking at others playing the machines, it was the nearest thing to playing myself I suppose. So looking back at this now as I am writing, I can see the addiction taking hold.

The mates I had would be heading off at the weekends down to Tipperary for a laugh and camping, I seemed not to be able to go with them on some of these trips, and I would have to tell them I had no money, which was mostly true after been playing the machines. My wages and tips would have been gone and I was starting to let people feel sorry for me, letting them chip in for me so I could go. I was starting to put on the poor face quite a lot. I had started taking amounts of money from the job, convincing the barman I’d giving him a twenty instead of a ten, not having the full money for my gran who’d I lived with, borrowing from other mates not paying them back when I promised, playing one off against, I will fix you up next week, all that sort of thing. This became a normal way of behaviour for me.

stomach.

We were on the boat on our way to starting ournew life, my girlfriend had fell asleep and when she woke I had to turn around and tell her I had lost the money on the pontoon table on the boat I felt disgusted with myself and cried and she let me have it what she thought of me for doing this. I never even fully thought of the consequence doing this on her and having to arrive home at her parents stone broke, and to have to make up lies to her parents about having nothing returning home. I got a job with a builder and she got work as well, we had got a little flat together and things were going just about ok. I never really settled in, Clare, she was meeting old friends she grew up with and I was out socializing with her mother more.

I started to get jealous of her meeting her old mates and became insecure in the relationship, I would pick fights with her blazing arguments, which in the middle of I would head out to gamble, and later when I got home I would make her feel she was at fault for starting the fights, and for making me leave London to come to this stupid place.

I broke up the relationship and ran off back to Dublin and ended up back playing the same

poker machines. I started a job fixing tyres for month or so then got in with a builder who’d came into get a wheel barrow punter fixed I went to work for him and settled back in with the gran I’d lived with years previous. I had started getting involved with bookie shops and was betting on horses and greyhounds. It was the same excuses when it came to handing a few bob up to the gran, didn’t get a full weeks wage, or one of the lads was in a bit of trouble, I will give you double next week, it was always some excuse. I was spending more time in the bookies and the gambling got faster and the bets got larger, mixing horses with dogs, and doubles with golfers and football teams.

If I went out for a drink with mates I couldn’t sit and have a chat or a laugh, my mind would be on a bet I had going or my full attention was taken to looking up at the television where I’d have a horse in a race. If I’d say I am just heading down to do a horse back in a minute I’d truly believe at that time I would be only gone for a moment. An hour or two could pass with no regard for the person whose company you are supposed to be in leaving them sitting there. I am sure people could see how it was affecting me; I could but didn’t want to see it or do anything about it.

If I got big wins which I did often I would feel all powerful and pretend I had this thing under control, I would lead people to believe I was doing great, all smiles and happy on the outside a great guy. When inside I was all over the place in my head the addiction was dominating my thinking, and I would be plotting hours of gambling even how I’d gamble the next day orcouldn’t wait to get out of people’s company so I could sneak off, I was not having much contact with members of my family. Gambling seemed to be taking over my whole life, and I became less interested in people and all energy seemed to be directed at the gambling.

I started in a permanent job, which I am still in today. I got on well in it working with many other lads, had met a new girl and things were going well enough I really enjoyed the work and was managing to keep the gambling under control for the moment, maybe it was the feeling of happiness with the new girlfriend and the fact we were going to have a child together. I wasn’t isolating as much and was starting to go out after work with some of the lads in the job, It seemed I was only going to the bookies at the weekend, a lot of new work had started in the job and it meant I had to go working all over Ireland, some of the lads were playing cards at lunch times and after work in the hotel we were staying in.

I quickly got involved in the poker, and 7 card stud games, I had always fancied myself as a card player as I loved it when I was younger, Everyone seemed to have money, we were getting well paid for the job we weredoing, and expense money for staying away. The card games started to get into hugestakes pretty quickly and I often lost big but there was always enough money floating to touch someone up until pay day. I’d started getting credit cards and pretty soon was using two of them at the same time.

I had no regard for money it was easy to come by and I was after joining the credit union in the previous year and was after been in and out a couple of times for loans for different things which mostly were really gambling related. I was spending more time away even when I didn’t have to, making excuses to the girlfriend that they needed me to be there, or other lads were on holidays this gave me ample time and the freedom for getting stuck into the betting shops and the large and lavish lifestyle that I was being accustomed to while working away. Playing cards most nights, gambling in the betting shops during the day, drinking and totally losing the run of myself. I had started fighting with the girlfriend when she was down visiting, I was trying to keep the life I was living secret and pretending to her I was in bed most nights early, these fights did carry on when I was back home I didn’t like been questioned about what I was doing or been challenged or accused I just couldn’t be truthful to her.

I had intended to marry his mammy we were in love but through all the fighting and blaming, me been away and the controlling nature that I held over her along with the jealousy and bitterness that had grown on both sides we grew apart. We finished working away and Icontinued to gamble more and more back home I was becoming more devious and self centred not showing concern for the way my behaviour was affecting my family, coming in and out of their lives only when I needed something from them, clothes washed, money for food or a loan. I couldn’t show interest in them or truly give of myself as a brother, I had become more irresponsible missing out with payments on the cards, and other loans I had accumulated with other institutions, not opening the bills, what was the point I wasn’t going to pay them, the gambling always came first. I was playing 3 card brag, but the roulette was the fastest and biggest thrill that’s what I done most of the gambling coming towards the later stage of the addiction. I had been living alone the gran had

died, I was starting to lose total control gambling every day, all the borrowing and juggling and constant tension was getting too much to handle all the plotting and scheming I had a lot of people in my head, who I’d pay this week, leave him till next week, if I give him half I’d a lot of people on the go borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. It became a chore to take my son out I’d promise him the park or the pictures, a lot of the time he got neither as it was the bookies always first. I remember being delighted when he’d ring and say his football was called off, that would mean I could spend the day gambling I had became so selfish he used to say dad are we getting out of here I’d let him write out bets and put them on for him. Give him money in the bookies to keep him from wanting to leave. Try to convince him that it was ok and letting him get to look at races depriving him from things he would have liked to do for his time with me. I started getting very sick in my head constantly obsessing uncontrollably about gambling. Changing the outcome of races I would have lost on that day, rerunning them over in my head, placing bets while I was in bed body asleep but the mind was racing. My work was suffering I wasn’t doing what I was supposed to, letting others carry the load my concentration was a thing of the past. I was feeling so hopeless and empty inside the addiction had total control of me. My appearance had changed I was living with this constant tension and pressure. I was so deluded this thing was much more powerful than I was and it was destroying me. It had brought me to my knees very near death or one step away from insanity. This was the

first time I ever really wanted help with this progressive illness. I picked up the phone and asked for help. I started going to gamblers anonymous. My first meeting I went to I was all over the place, I was worn out couldn’t really lift my head felt very afraid and mixed up. I had spoke with a member beforehand he was very nice and assured me I would be ok. I took a seat in the room and the meeting started there was a man speaking about his gambling and he spoke with calmness and seemed confident and was able to speak about where gambling brought him in his past, and about how much his life had improved since attending GA meetings. Other members all spoke and could all identify with each other they all seemed calm and happy, I left it last to speak and when I did I don’t know what words came out of my mouth.But I am so glad I did, people came up to me after the meeting and were so friendly and called me by name and said things will start getting better from now on and well done you in the right place.

Pain in poker comes in many forms. There is the loss you feel about living off of the dregs of a societal illness. There is the gambler’s moment of clarity when you realize you have become just like the old, sad men that you ridiculed in your younger, luckier days. There is the tedium of sitting at a filthy felt table for hours, sometimes days, feigning a studied intensity. over explaining to a loved one exactly how you lost $30,000 in the course of a weekend. There is searing unease that comes from watching that same loved one twist uncomfortably whenever you give them a gift bought with the spoils of gambling. But none of poker’s daily pains are deadly or instructive, really. What’s more, all of guilt’s iterations can be cleansed by one monster score. Hit a set of 6s on a J-6-2 rainbow flop against the Donkey at the table, the one who is wearing a fake Versace rayon shirt whose outrageous

patterning is the only thing taking attention away from his Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses and the poor, doting, usually underage girlfriend who sits behind his right shoulder, awash in the illusion that her boyfriend is Paul Newman from The Hustler—well, win $5,000 off a guy like that and you stop worrying about ethics and your misspent youth.The real pain of poker, the only chronic, threatening pain, comes from the daily loss of livelihood—how a player views himself in the face of losing. Pain tolerance, then, is not measured in how well the player can take a bad beat or how long he can sit at a table without questioning what the fuck has happened. Rather, it is how the player handles an inevitable losing streak and the extent to which he will allow losing to affect his idea of himself. After a month straight of losses, a player can become convinced that losing is his role. Going broke becomes his thing to do, his inevitable outcome. The fog of losing, which feels like a seething, dirty steam in the veins, seeps into everything.That is the pain of poker that must be endured and held at arm’s length: the pain that causes you to turn your vision of doom into a fate-bound story, as tragic as fiction.Six months after that morning in the Mercedes-Benz, I was sitting in the driver’s seat of my Subaru Outback, in a massive parking lot in Commerce, Calif., a suburb of Los Angeles known for the blasts of dust that terrorize its inhabitants. Twelve thousand dollars lay wadded up in the glove compartment. I was trying to decide if I had what it took to drive home. To help delay a decision, I remember turning the radio to a Dodgers game. I don’t know how long I sat there listening to Vin Scully sing his nasally song of balls and strikes, which, even in the age of digital radio, still sounds as if it is being transmitted through a tin of victory cabbage. I remember thinking some nostalgic, self-pitying thoughts about my younger days. I forced myself to say out loud, “You are a degenerate gambler,”.