I've never fully explained my problem, even in GA meetings (esp. in GA meetings?) so I thought, since I've gone for broke tonight (unfortunately) I'd go for broke here, and write about my peculiar gambling problem. Perhaps someone will recognize her/himself in it. Or perhaps it will be a cautionary tale.
I'm a scratcher. I'm addicted to scratch-off games. It started innocently enough, but grew into a monstrous habit. It sounds so silly, but it has cost me lots.
I've been to GA meetings. I think they really saved my skin at a very important point, but I also had some alienating moments. Here's one reason: In our meeting, we'd have to go around and say what our "action" was. Once a drop-in commented on his problem, and there was this weird macho subtext in which he made some comment about lottery players and little old ladies playing bingo and how he guesses they "can develop the problem too" and he shouldn't judge, blah blah blah, but clearly he was. Patronizing. And ignorant. (For the record, I'm in my forties.)
We also didn't mention dollar amounts in our meetings, and rightly so, because, as our very able moderator said, money means different things to different people. But people like the guy above seemed to make assumptions. He mentioned "$2 or $3 lotto tickets." I guess he hasn't seen the latest in scratchers offered by our state governments? $20, $30, I've even heard of (but never played) $50 scratchers. I'd like to state here that I was regularly losing hundreds (about 500-800) every weekend for a very long time. ( I had worked my ASS off for that money, and when I got it in my hands, I just started scratching it away. I literally couldn't stop.) I wanted to blurt out my "macho" losses but I couldn't. I think if I had been going to a casino, I might have lost less! The ubiquity of places to buy these things makes it pretty hard.
I tried hypnosis, didn't work. I tried calling one very highly recommended hypnotist, and when I told him I had a problem with gambling -- didn't want to give up entirely, just wanted to get it under control -- he said, "hmm. haven't much luck with gamblers unless they give it up completely," so I hobbled along for a while. It was at my final hypnotist's office that I just stopped and realized: I need to go to GA. And that's when I went. And boy, did it help. But I stopped going. A lot of reasons -- not all I can go into here, including moving a bit farther away -- but I did.
I tried going to a different meeting near me, but it was overwhelmingly guys -- I mean, by 10-1 -- which is fine, but the guy sitting next to me couldn't get over that he was sitting next to a woman at a GA meeting. (!). His comments made me feel uncomfortable, so I didn't go back.
I've been able to play every so often, but I made sure I kept my ATM at a daily limit so I couldn't bankrupt myself in a night of crazy scratching. I make all sorts of rules for myself about when/how I could play (no more tickets over $10), but I found myself breaking these rules lately. I'm not sure why. And tonight, off I went. Nothing triggered it. I just started playing, and when I lost more than I wanted to, I became angry at the Gambling Gods and kept playing and playing. Chasing my losses like a scratchin' greyhound! I never fully recovered my losses, and each time I got near to getting SOMETHING back I made idiotic choices and lost all that too. So I'm down a few hundred that could've made a nice Xmas present for someone and I'm disgusted with myself. But I'm not sure what to do! So that's my story. I'm not on the brink of bankruptcy, I'm not stealing to feed my habit, but I'm making myself miserable. And I'm not sure where to turn to stop it. I want to say, though, that coming to this site (which I don't get to do too often, but I try) has helped me a lot. So thank you.