Thoughts

I have made it a conscience effort not to post daily and that maybe a mistake. First let me explain why I do not want to post daily and it may seem silly. When I was gambling I did it every day for the past 5 years, I think I missed a total of 20 days in those 5 years. Think about; over 1,825 I missed 20 days, that is sick!! I didn't want my blog to become my new obsession. However; even though I attended 3 GA meetings in 3 days (Wednesday night is usually an off night for GA in my area) I was still feeling down because I had not posted yesterday. All of the crazy thoughts were entering my mind none that pertained to placing a wager. How could I do this to my family? How could I lose everything? How could I turn my family's life upside down? I seemingly had everything yet that wasn't enough. Please notice there are a lot of "I's", the self-pity. The fact of the matter is "I" did this to myself and everyone that surrounds me. I have noone to blame except for myself but I have to get over the blaming because it is not productive. Sometimes, the thoughts are overwhelming and having this blog, talking to people helps me greatly. I will try not to become obsessed with my blog but if something is troubling me I will make it a point to post something.

I received an email from a lady that went through a very similar situation and she is on the other side. She had a terrifying experience the other night when the phone rang at 2:00 am (an no it wasn't a drunken ex co-worker it was a real life experience). Her 23 year old son had been involved in a very bad accident and when she arrived at the seen she saw his car had been totaled but the driver's side seemed to remain untouched. Her son walked away with two hairline fractures in his neck. Someone was watching over him. My children are now 7 and 4 years old and I want to be there for them so I can't imagine what was going through this lady's mind after she put down the phone and drove to the accident. Gambling is so insignificant to real life, only bad things can happen if I gamble and I chose not to gamble.

Here are some random thoughts and some questions. One of the sad things about my situation is the advice from my attorney "Money buys your way out of a lot of problems" but what he forgot to mention or maybe does not know money doesn't fix the REAL problem. I don't know what the intention of the court, judge and district attorney but from my "subjective" point of view in order to fix the REAL problem it must be dealt with properly. In drug and alcohol cases there are treatment programs offered not in gambling cases. Compulsive gambling has the highest suicide rate of any addiction. Do you know why there are only 200 beds available to treat the 15 million compulsive gamblers in the United States? MONEY!!! That is there is no money to be made in the treatment of compulsive gamblers. Most of the time the compulsive gambler has lost everything so there is no money to pay for the treatment and insurance doesn't cover it. The only time insurance will cover it if the compulsive gambler has a drug or alcohol problem. I would venture to guess that 80% of white collar crimes are committed by compulsive gamblers. I am not sure when this country will wake up. Only a few states have a fully funded treatment program for compulsive gamblers and no Nevada and California are not one of those states. If you have a chance go into a local casino between the hours of 6:00 am and 10:00 am Monday through Friday and I would say 90% of those people are compulsive gamblers because why else would they be there (or maybe they enjoy the smoky conditions!!).

I will end with something that was sent to me and it should sum up the addiction of compulsive gambling: A 10 year old girl was ask these questions? What does a drug addict look like? That is easy; you can see the track marks on their arms. What does an alcoholic look like? That is easy you can smell the alcohol on their breath. What does a compulsive gambler look like? My grandmother!!!!


By the way if anyone is interested in seeing me in my half marathon here is a link and I am the one in the blue shirt number 3684 http://www.partypics.com/ver2/eventimages.aspx?orderno=26065327&bib=3684