I’ve Spent $600K On Gambling To Escape

[Music] brought to you by the every dollar app start budgeting for free today today's question comes from Brook in Kentucky Brooke writes I've spent close to $600,000 on gambling over the last N9 years I regret this habit and have become very depressed the worst part is I still gamble but much less and now it's controlled my married income is $300,000 per year and if not for my gambling we would have no mortgage and much less stress I use gambling as an escape and didn't realize the amounts of money I was going through I am deeply regretting my actions and feel terrible about all the money I wasted is there a way to put the stupidity behind me and not be angry with myself I mean this sort of pathological gambling and this continuing to gamble tells me Brooke has not fully metabolized the depths of all of this and so I I mean anything I wanted to add here would just you got to go you got to go to Gamblers Anonymous today and submit to a 12 step plan I mean this this is so much bigger than you um and there's it's just going to be tough um you can't just decide well I'm just going to put this stupidity stupidity behind me and not be angry you haven't fully absorb you haven't fully owned all the decisions here right in most cases John with these types of any kind of addiction really is full sobriety the the path is there away for someone to go well I still gamble but now it's controlled like is there a piece of you that is still out of control um I mean there's there's some actually been some movement there over the last few years in the addiction Community this idea that like once you admit it you have to be sober for the rest of your life the answer is no um and that's so individualized and it's so person Byers um and this is I mean this is in the alcoholic world this is the equivalent of drinking two or three bottles of Jack Daniels a day for 10 years right I mean probably not pro if you've burned through more than half a million dollars um then probably and you're still doing it probably you're going to have to end up at a place where you're sober right but again I I can't make that call from this from not even talking to this person just reading their note what I know from this note is or what I believe I know from this note is um there just hasn't been a full she didn't really deal with it ship and here's the other thing um healing here will come in community with other people it will not come from some Epiphany that you have in your head by yourself it has to happen I decided I'm going to try to be different it has to happen in community where somebody looks at you and says I see what you did and I still love you I see what you did I'm sad too I'm hurt too I'm angry too I'm pissed off too we're going to go build something new um and that has to happen in a group but um I I'd want to have a conversation with Brooke but the I think the most responsible thing I can tell Brooke is call a ga group right now G nymous group right now in Kentucky and go go see somebody like right now right now um and for the first time in 10 years be 100% honest yeah that's a m it's a mess thanks for the question Brooke wishing you the best create your free every dollar budget today the simplest way to budget for your life