Gambling Can Impact Marriage, Self-Esteem
“Jason insists he loves me and our three kids,” says Iris, 30, a tall, shy woman. “But his gambling has made our 10-year marriage miserable, and he seems hell-bent on continuing.”
Right now, Iris’ children, ages 2, 4 and 6, are living with her mother because the bank foreclosed on their home, and Iris and Jason are living in a rented studio apartment. To complicate matters, Jason’s once-prosperous auto supply business has been taken over by creditors and the two are head over heels in debt.
“Though I’ve tried to keep a careful watch on Jason - I’ve known for years that gambling was his weakness - bill collectors call constantly….”
The morning they were evicted from their house, Jason broke down and sobbed like a baby. Iris recalls, “He looked so pathetic, I put my arms around him and cried, too. I have never loved him more than I did at that moment.”
Though Iris is well aware that Jason needs professional help, she doesn’t know how to convince him that he does - and is not at all certain that, even if he gets help, he’ll have the strength and fortitude to change.
Jason, 32, knows he’s forfeited his wife’s trust along with his savings, not to mention his children’s futures.
“I’ve been gambling since I was in junior high school,” he admits.
“Win or lose, I got this incredible feeling of independence and freedom,” he concedes. In fact, Jason continued to gamble to find relief from a marriage that in some ways seemed all too similar to his childhood.
“I know Iris wants only the best for me, but she can be pretty domineering in her quiet way. She’d often come by the shop to pick up my pay check and deposit it in the bank. It was very embarrassing to have my wife check up on me like that.”
Jason wants to start over, but he’s convinced that Iris will never be able to trust him again.
Gambling Fever: Winner loses all.
“Compulsive gamblers like Jason are unable to tear themselves away from the game so long as they have a dollar in their pocket, a blank check in their checkbook,” notes Jane Greer, DSW, a psychotherapist in New York City.
Gamblers and their families can get help from professional counselors trained in treating addictive behavior as well as local chapters of national organizations such as Gamblers Anonymous and its allied group for families, Gam-Anon.
(For more information, contact Gam-Anon Family Groups, P.O. Box 157, Whitestone, N.Y. 11357.)
Unwittingly, Iris was in some ways supporting Jason’s gambling by assuming that he was untrustworthy and continuously checking up on him. What’s more, by making excuses for him over the years and taking him back and feeling sorry for him when he admitted he’d been gambling, Iris made it clear that this behavior was acceptable.
Lacking in self-confidence and self-worth, Iris feared that if her husband developed the strength to mend his ways, he might leave her.
Some therapists believe that people who live with an addicted person are often so consumed with a spouse’s problems that they ignore their own and the part they play in the marital dance.
Could this be happening to you?
Ask yourself the following questions:
Is my spouse doing something or behaving in a way that I absolutely cannot tolerate?
Have I ever discussed these problems with my spouse or have I buried, denied or ignored my true feelings about them?
What am I doing, or not doing, that allows this unacceptable behavior to continue?
If necessary, am I willing to leave this relationship if the behaviors continue?
Once she realized the subtle impact her actions had on his behavior, and the fact that she had sacrificed her life and independence for him, Iris started to change. She worked hard to master her worries and to show her husband that she trusted him to deposit his own paycheck.
Jason has been attending Gambler’s Anonymous meetings and, though the family is not out of debt yet, Jason has not gambled in more than a year. Recently, the couple moved into a two-bedroom apartment and Iris says they are “beginning to feel like a family again.”