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GAMBLING SHOULD BE FUN

For most people, gambling’s attraction reveals the intense emotions linked to the idea of instant and unexpected profit. However research shows that for a small minority of people, gambling ceases to be a pleasure and becomes a real problem when the idea of playing again to continue winning or to recuperate their losses becomes an obsession.

PLAYING / GAMING / GAMBLING

Games of chance are among the oldest forms of entertainment. Most people play for pleasure, for fun and do so from time to time, betting a controlled amount of money and can stop gambling whenever they want.

For other people, gambling is a way of life, a professional activity betting their money deliberately on those games where they feel they can control, based more on the calculations of probability than on passion or sudden impulse.

And there is another group of people (between 0.5% and 1.5% of the adult population) for whom gambling changes when they lack the capacity or ability to stop playing and it turns into a necessity. These people are or can become addicted to problem gambling.

WHEN ENTERTAINMENT/PLEASURE TURNS INTO ADDICTION
Normally addiction does not happen overnight. Before gambling becomes a real problem, the player goes through stages of different length and intensity:

1st STAGE: THE WINNING
The player obtains genuine fun from gambling and experiments the excitement of winning and losing by chance; it means unpredictable pleasure from game to game. Gambling is also synonymous with social contact and allows an individual self-esteem to grow, especially if he has a feeling of dominating "chance".
Spurred by success, the player takes higher risks and the excitement might take him to borrow money from others to maintain or even increase his bets. This stage can last months or even years.

2nd STAGE: LOSING CONTROL
At the start of this phase, some players are still able to control their losses. Others are quickly taken over by an incontrollable urge to compensate their losses, although these losses get bigger and bigger as the players take on risks they cannot afford. The money lost is very often borrowed money – from family, friends or financial institutions – or the player turns to deceit or fraud to obtain more funds.
Socially, the player now feels isolated and loses contact with people, family affection and the trust of best friends. In a short time, the positive reinforcement which gambling supplied turns negative, as gambling has become a dominating obsession, a paradoxical attempt to escape from growing problems and concerns.

3rd STAGE: DESPAIR
A player reaching this stage becomes agitated, irritable, hyperactive and unable to sleep. The player suffers loss of appetite and the desire to live, often accompanied with alcohol and tobacco abuses. Mental and physical exhaustion sets in, followed by despair and feelings of helplessness.
If the player accepts not being able to stop playing, even recognising he can’t win, he will finally be confronted with his own contradiction which he finds difficult to solve.

4th STAGE: ABANDONMENT. AUTO-CONFRONTATION. POSSIBLE RECUPERATION.
When he reaches this situation, the player has various options: to continue indefinitely with this attitude, try to find solutions on his own or find help by confronting the problem with the family’s support and professional help. In any case, the player needs to admit voluntarily his problem and confront it with all the consequences.

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