Here I am
I grew up in an alcoholic home. My mother drank and my father was a perfect co-dependent. He stood by all her antics for more than 40 years. He was in the Military and we moved around a lot. Hard to keep friends, and feel safe. When my sisters and I were teens my dad bought a house in Northern California. 100 miles from Reno and Tahoe. My parents took many trips without us. And there were times I remember us waiting in the car while they were in Casinos. Bad enough, if we needed to use the bathroom and waited for someone to come check on us. Well, today I do not want to tell everything, not yet. So fast forward to me.
I am 56 and will be 57 next year. I married a man to get out of my life at home. I found pretty early he was a womanizer and alcoholic/gambling,sex addict.
I found within a few years and two children that I started suffering a terrible depression. I looked forward to sleeping than life.
And keeping a job, taking care of my alcoholic and kids and neglecting me.
I had no support system and there was that invisible barrier that I could not get through to leave him. I started getting help. I broke down at work and first time I ever spoke to a counselor. But this counselor was crap. basically I was told they could give me vallum. I did not take it.
Next counselor was a friend of someone's at work and I had been suffering for several years with terrible cramping stomach pains, so bad at times it would double me over. Nothing helped.
So this friend of a friend let me spill everything.....and I did. All that pain disappeared. I was shocked. He was a alcohol counselor at the Military base I worked at.
Ok, so pain gone, but started seeing other counselors and getting on antidepressents. Horrible side effects and work place was helping with accomodations.
I went through 20 differ trials including celexa? I had no idea it was medical speed. I never had tried speed, but this was doing wonders in my life. I could do everything!!
Then a year later, I get a letter from the makers of the med and they explain that it is not recommended for me to continue. So my doctor wanted me to try something else.
Everything I tried was poop compared to Celexa. But eventually wellbutrin worked for me. But I had to counter with ambien so I could sleep.
I eventually was forced into a disability retirement and I finally got the guts to leave the terrible husband. so, I took my now teen kids... and we moved.
It was not easy but we were now facing my kids having kids and me and grandkids (smile).
I went gambling on my own to Reno and won some good money. I went back several times and then Native Gaming came into play in our state and we lived pretty close to one.
I went alone or with family and I won more than 50k in one year. It helped me buy a car, pay bills, etc. I felt like the world was mine.
But my mother (who was always gambling) into me to penny slots. I had played dollars and quarters before. these were the new digital slots.
Looking like video games than the old reels. Although I hated them at first, the reels were disappearing and Cleopatra and Tiki torch became my fav machines.
Wow winning 27k on penny slot? Those years I was not loosing. But it did not last and there were times I lost a great deal of money.
When I was married, my ex got paid every week and I was paid every two weeks, so if we were broke, we only had another week for more money to come in.
That happened too often, if not gambling, then he was drinking. We went through an eviction and he owed too much at pay day advance places.
I too later got caught in how I could hit 3 or 4 pay day advance places and when I got paid, was paying back and taking more loans out. Cycle was never ending.
I was gambling maybe once or twice a month. And I could go months without going. I went through 2 other evictions and at least one was because of gambling losses.
I remember one night I was driving home from loosing my rear end and feeling this terrible guilt and remorse and I really wanted to drive off the road or something.
then I thought about climbing up a tall neon sign and standing on top and jumping. I could not find a counselor that dealt with gambling at all. I found G.A. and it helped a bit. But this group was actively gambling and I heard the most horrible stories...
I had to move back to Northern Ca and with that, I went back to gambling and also going to G.A. I found a good way to not gamble - if your broke....you can't gamble.
But, my mom was still gambling and she wanted company and feed me 5 dollar bills to play...if I had my own money - then I played that. She had no care how broke I would be. But, I kept going cause we were spending time together.
fast forward.
When my mom passed in 2012, she died of small cell lung cancer. And we (my sisters and I) finally found out how much my mom gambled. She did two reverse mortgages and had two ssa numbers. She took out loans on the house and sold all her Native land. She was spending at least 20k a year at the Casino.
When this woman died, she did not even have decent underwear. She never bought herself clothes, everything came from a clothes closet near by.
The local Casino had added a huge hotel and we sadly joked that she helped build that hotel.
When we found out she had small cell cancer, it was about 5 months before she died. I stopped going to gamble and did not gamble for a year.
About a month before my mom died, I met this wonderful man. And he filled the confused feeling of missing my mom, and her death.
He treated me better than my ex and better than my parents ever did. Then, he took me Carson city with him and I lost a few hundred bucks .
We talked about it and his idea was this was ok, he would just not take me anywhere near a Casino.
But, Here and there I would go to the local casino and sometimes win, sometimes loose. (will cont)
I am 56 and will be 57 next year. I married a man to get out of my life at home. I found pretty early he was a womanizer and alcoholic/gambling,sex addict.
I found within a few years and two children that I started suffering a terrible depression. I looked forward to sleeping than life.
And keeping a job, taking care of my alcoholic and kids and neglecting me.
I had no support system and there was that invisible barrier that I could not get through to leave him. I started getting help. I broke down at work and first time I ever spoke to a counselor. But this counselor was crap. basically I was told they could give me vallum. I did not take it.
Next counselor was a friend of someone's at work and I had been suffering for several years with terrible cramping stomach pains, so bad at times it would double me over. Nothing helped.
So this friend of a friend let me spill everything.....and I did. All that pain disappeared. I was shocked. He was a alcohol counselor at the Military base I worked at.
Ok, so pain gone, but started seeing other counselors and getting on antidepressents. Horrible side effects and work place was helping with accomodations.
I went through 20 differ trials including celexa? I had no idea it was medical speed. I never had tried speed, but this was doing wonders in my life. I could do everything!!
Then a year later, I get a letter from the makers of the med and they explain that it is not recommended for me to continue. So my doctor wanted me to try something else.
Everything I tried was poop compared to Celexa. But eventually wellbutrin worked for me. But I had to counter with ambien so I could sleep.
I eventually was forced into a disability retirement and I finally got the guts to leave the terrible husband. so, I took my now teen kids... and we moved.
It was not easy but we were now facing my kids having kids and me and grandkids (smile).
I went gambling on my own to Reno and won some good money. I went back several times and then Native Gaming came into play in our state and we lived pretty close to one.
I went alone or with family and I won more than 50k in one year. It helped me buy a car, pay bills, etc. I felt like the world was mine.
But my mother (who was always gambling) into me to penny slots. I had played dollars and quarters before. these were the new digital slots.
Looking like video games than the old reels. Although I hated them at first, the reels were disappearing and Cleopatra and Tiki torch became my fav machines.
Wow winning 27k on penny slot? Those years I was not loosing. But it did not last and there were times I lost a great deal of money.
When I was married, my ex got paid every week and I was paid every two weeks, so if we were broke, we only had another week for more money to come in.
That happened too often, if not gambling, then he was drinking. We went through an eviction and he owed too much at pay day advance places.
I too later got caught in how I could hit 3 or 4 pay day advance places and when I got paid, was paying back and taking more loans out. Cycle was never ending.
I was gambling maybe once or twice a month. And I could go months without going. I went through 2 other evictions and at least one was because of gambling losses.
I remember one night I was driving home from loosing my rear end and feeling this terrible guilt and remorse and I really wanted to drive off the road or something.
then I thought about climbing up a tall neon sign and standing on top and jumping. I could not find a counselor that dealt with gambling at all. I found G.A. and it helped a bit. But this group was actively gambling and I heard the most horrible stories...
I had to move back to Northern Ca and with that, I went back to gambling and also going to G.A. I found a good way to not gamble - if your broke....you can't gamble.
But, my mom was still gambling and she wanted company and feed me 5 dollar bills to play...if I had my own money - then I played that. She had no care how broke I would be. But, I kept going cause we were spending time together.
fast forward.
When my mom passed in 2012, she died of small cell lung cancer. And we (my sisters and I) finally found out how much my mom gambled. She did two reverse mortgages and had two ssa numbers. She took out loans on the house and sold all her Native land. She was spending at least 20k a year at the Casino.
When this woman died, she did not even have decent underwear. She never bought herself clothes, everything came from a clothes closet near by.
The local Casino had added a huge hotel and we sadly joked that she helped build that hotel.
When we found out she had small cell cancer, it was about 5 months before she died. I stopped going to gamble and did not gamble for a year.
About a month before my mom died, I met this wonderful man. And he filled the confused feeling of missing my mom, and her death.
He treated me better than my ex and better than my parents ever did. Then, he took me Carson city with him and I lost a few hundred bucks .
We talked about it and his idea was this was ok, he would just not take me anywhere near a Casino.
But, Here and there I would go to the local casino and sometimes win, sometimes loose. (will cont)
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