Treatment for Gambling Addiction
Posted on 13. Oct, 2009 by Problem Gambling in Treatment
When you want to overcome your gambling addiction, it’s more than just making a decision to cut down or quit gambling. If only it were that easy! The simple truth is that gambling addiction, like any other addiction (illicit or prescription drugs, alcohol, sex, eating disorders), is a type of impulse-control disorder. There may be other factors at work as well, such as co-occurring addictions, family history of gambling, social milieu and more. Trying to overcome an addiction to gambling is rarely successful if attempted on your own.
What can you do, then, to overcome a gambling addiction?
Go into treatment.
What’s Involved in Treatment for Gambling Addiction
The primary goal of treatment for gambling addiction is to prevent relapse or resumption of gambling once treatment is completed. As with any addiction, however, this doesn’t occur overnight. It took time for the gambling addiction to take hold, and it will take time to overcome it.
It will be tough to successfully beat an addiction to gambling. That’s why it’s so important for you to obtain treatment that focuses on your specific needs. The best way to do that is to go into a residential treatment program at a licensed addiction treatment facility that specializes in successfully treating gambling addiction.
Of course, there are other ways to seek treatment, but they aren’t as effective as going to a facility where you can receive specialized care in a one-stop-shop location. Outpatient facilities, Gamblers Anonymous, state and local addiction help referral hotlines and programs are all good, ancillary treatment options.
But, let’s focus on what’s really required in order to quit your gambling addiction. When you enter a residential treatment program for gambling addiction, you first undergo an assessment by the staff in order to prepare a personally tailored treatment plan. Gambling addiction treatment differs among various facilities, but generally addresses both the psychological and physiological aspects of the patient’s addiction.
Many gambling addiction treatment plans include the following:
• Primary Therapist – Each patient or client is assigned a primary therapist or counselor who remains constant throughout the course of the treatment program. This ensures individual attention to each client’s needs and requirements.
• Personalized Treatment Plan – What works for another may not work for you. Information shared during your initial assessment helps the counselors and therapists design a treatment program that will address your specific needs, history and any other pertinent factors in your gambling addiction.
• Individual and Group Therapy – You will participate in both individual and group therapy sessions with licensed and certified counselors. These should be counselors trained in the various facets of addiction, including, ideally, nationally certified gambling counselors.
• Gambling Specific Groups – In some cases, you will attend gambling specific groups, in order to practice and learn vital skills and coping mechanisms that will help you to deal with the unique nature of your gambling addiction.
• Pressure Relief Groups – Other facilities offer pressure relief groups – which may address other specific topics relative to the intense emotional urges to gamble.
• Family Counseling – A big part of successfully overcoming a gambling addiction involves family counseling. This aspect of the gambling addiction treatment program helps the compulsive gambler and his or her family to understand the problem of gambling addiction and how everyone can contribute to the gambler’s treatment.
• 12-Step Program – No treatment for gambling addiction would throw the recovering gambler back into everyday life without an introduction to the principles and support of a network specifically dedicated to helping gamblers through the tough times in recovery. Gamblers Anonymous, a nationwide 12-step support network in existence for more than 50 years, helps recovering gambling addicts to prevent relapse and to help others overcome a problem with gambling. The patient is introduced to Gamblers Anonymous during treatment, and regular meetings may be part of the treatment program. Upon completion of treatment, the client is encouraged to continue attendance and participation in regular Gamblers Anonymous meetings.
• Aftercare and Continuing Support – Once you’re done with treatment and go back to your regular lives – with new coping skills and a much greater understanding of the problem gambling has created in your life – the best treatment facilities will offer some form of ongoing support or aftercare.
Intensive therapy coupled with structured living at the residential treatment care facility facilitates healing by giving the gambling addict adequate time to examine his or her behavior compulsions and causes of gambling. It’s this interdisciplinary approach that has been proven to speed recovery in individuals who fully commit to the program.
Other Activities and Facilities
Just as not all gambling addiction treatment centers offer the same treatment programs, the number and type of additional activities and facilities available for clients vary widely. Some residential addiction treatment centers include swimming pools, saunas, fishing, horseback riding, gym, tennis, health club, personal trainer and other recreational facilities. Additional amenities may include acupuncture, yoga, massage, meditation and aestheticians. There may be attention given to spiritual development, the mind-body-spirit connection.
Residential gambling addiction treatment centers also range in style, location and cost. There are addiction treatment centers that accommodate every kind of addiction and those that specialize in only certain addictions. It is important to choose a facility that specializes in treatment of gambling addiction. The gambling addiction track, so to speak, should concentrate on the behaviors and problems unique to a gambling addiction. If you have a dual diagnosis, however, such as addiction to alcohol and/or drugs in addition to a gambling addiction, a treatment center with expertise in all these will be more beneficial.
Resort-like Treatment Centers
Some residential treatment facilities are like luxury hotels, situated in lush and isolated surroundings, on the ocean, in the mountains or private enclave. Attention to detail is maximized, with literally no expense spared. After all, clientele at these top-echelon centers demand exclusivity – and the very best in accommodations.
Resort-class amenities may include:
• Oceanfront or mountainvew rooms
• Beachfront access, as appropriate
• Sun deck, heated lap pool
• Plasma TVs and fireplaces in luxuriously-appointed rooms
• Personal chef
• Gourmet meals
Can You Ever Gamble Again?
If you are a pathological or compulsive gambler, otherwise called a gambling addiction, every reputable treatment facility or center or support group will tell you that you cannot return to gambling. There’s no such thing as just social gambling for you anymore. You’ve long been past that stage. How could you hope to put yourself in the situation where you’d be exposed to rampant gambling – such as a casino, sports betting, or the racetrack – and not think it would have an adverse effect?
According to Gamblers Anonymous, “the first bet to a problem gambler is like the first small drink to an alcoholic.” Bottom line: once you cross the line, the same patterns emerge again, leading you deeper and deeper back into your addiction. You have two choices. Abstain from gambling and move on to a better life, or resume gambling and self-destruct.
Can’t I Just Give It A Try?
If your objective is to learn how to control your gambling, then going into treatment will probably not work for you. You don’t have your heart into it. If you’re going to satisfy someone else’s demands, it’s also most likely not going to work. You can’t, for example, just go into treatment because your spouse threatens to leave you if you don’t. That’s not a commitment.
If, however, you sincerely want to overcome your addiction, but aren’t sure whether you’ll be able to handle the stresses once you complete treatment, by all means go into treatment. You’ll learn all about gambling addiction, what it does to your life and the lives of those who love and care about you, how to control urges and cravings to gamble, how to avoid the triggers that cause you to gamble, and more.
The best candidate for gambling addiction treatment is the individual who wholeheartedly commits to quitting gambling for good. This individual will do whatever it takes to put his or her life back in order, to learn effective behavior and coping skills to be able to handle life’s stresses and triggers once back in the real world. Envisioning a new life free from gambling – and all the negative consequences that a gambling addiction entailed – is a great motivator for someone who truly wants to make this life change.
You will be supported every step of the way by trained counselors, therapists and staff. You will interact with and learn from others who have overcome the same type of addiction as yours. Some of these individuals you may meet during treatment, or during Gamblers Anonymous meetings both during and following treatment. The point is that you will never be alone again. You will always have someone to turn to and talk with during the tough times that will inevitably occur in recovery – someone who knows what you’re going through and is genuinely there to offer support.
Treatment for gambling addiction should not be considered a sentence or something to get through. Look at this as an opportunity to create the kind of future for yourself that you’ve always dreamed of – without the artificial and self-deluding ephemeral hope of instant riches. In the real world, free of gambling’s addictive lure, you will be once again whole, and feel a renewed sell of purpose, well-being and responsibility.
