AG 027: Joe Shares His Struggles with The Beast

Full Episode Transcript

Episode 27 of the After Gambling Podcast

Jamie: Hey there, and welcome to the After Gambling Podcast. My name is Jamie. I’m a compulsive gambler, and I’m also the host of this show. The last time I gambled was July 15th of 2010.

Today we have an awesome show for you. A guy named Joe reached out to me on Instagram, and he messaged me and said, “Hey, I really like what you’re doing with the podcast. I would love to come on and share my story.” And we got together, we had a chat, and I’m really fortunate to have a new friend. He’s an awesome guy, and I think you’re going to love our conversation. So, without further ado, here’s my chat with Joe.

Jamie: I guess, Joe, thanks for coming on. It’s awesome to have you. You’re one of the first people to jump out and say, “Hey, yeah, I want to come on and share my story.” So, it’s nice to finally get to chat.

Joe: Yeah, I saw you on Instagram. I thought it was a great thing you were doing, and I just want to help you in any way I can.

Jamie: Yeah, that’s awesome. So, I guess, if you could, start us off. I like to kind of give people an idea of who you are just as a person today, normal life. So, if you could just kind of share some of those things like background, what you do, what you do for fun, any of that type of stuff you want to share.

Joe: Oh, by all means. My name’s Joe, and I’m an average Joe. That’s how I would describe myself. So, no different than anybody else. You would see me on the bus, you’d pass me in the mall, you’d say hello to me at your local health center—just a regular guy. I was doing it all just regularly. I was working a full-time job for a telecommunications company, you know, just got married. I was just doing the status quo. And I got bored. I got completely bored, because I was like, “Is this all there is?” And then I got my paycheck, and I was thinking to myself, “Hmm, this is good, but I wonder if I bet this much money on a fight if I could get that same money back in return.”

And I started looking at gambling as a way to fast forward, to kind of, instead of walking a straight line, cut corners here and there. And that’s when I got into the allure of gambling, I’ll say. The addiction of gambling and the allure of gambling to me are two different things. But I would just describe myself as just a regular guy—just no different than anybody else. Just somebody else you would see on the street, just the same guy, just blending in in the crowd.

Jamie: Yeah. So, I guess one question I have for you. Was that the first time you started gambling? Was it kind of after you got married? Like what age were you first exposed to gambling, or did you have kind of earlier experiences?

Joe: Oh yeah, my first experience with gambling was probably in grade 12 in high school, and my family went to Las Vegas. I was going to go to the arcade, and I saw these slot machines. So I just walked by, and at that time, it wasn’t on a paper system—you would actually put in actual quarters into the machine, and then they would produce quarters back in return. So I put a quarter in, and all of a sudden, I heard it go off, and a bunch of quarters came out. So I was like, “Well, put in, I don’t know, I forget what it was, maybe 25, 75 cents—probably 25 cents—and I got 70 bucks back.” And I’m like, “Wow. Just like that?” And that alerted me to—that kind of got me exposed. So I took my big thing of quarters, I took the bucket of quarters, brought it to the cashier, she gave me my money, and I’m like, “Just like that? That’s how easy it is to get that money?” I was like, “That’s pretty easy. Why isn’t everybody doing this?”

So that was my first experience with gambling. And then from there, I got into just ProLine, which is up here in Canada. So you’d bet on six games, and I would get five out of six, and then I’d be like, “Oh, if I only got that sixth game, I could have got this, this, and this, and this.” So I would say from 17 years old is when I started gambling. And it was always just that, “If this just happened, or if that just happened, oh, I’d be so much closer, and I would have got what I wanted.” And it was always feeling like I was just close to hitting this breakthrough. But as time went on, I realized that was just a giant illusion.

Jamie: Yeah, definitely. And I mean, that early first win for all of us—I mean, the sooner I think that we have it, it seems like, when I hear more and more stories from other people, the sooner you have it, obviously, that allure starts to move towards that addiction pretty quickly.

Joe: It does, because it’s what I’ve heard called the kiss of death, because you start thinking that this can become a consistent thing. And it just seemed easy at the time. Like, why would I work for 40 hours a week when I can just do this that takes me, you know, a minute? Because a bet can happen in a minute—less than a minute. It’s just this either goes this way or that way. So you either win or you lose, but you’re going to get a result. And in the gambler’s mind, especially in my mind, I never saw myself losing. I just thought I would win. I would win this fight, I would win this bet on this fight, I would win this hand on blackjack, I would gamble this much money on slots and win this and then be able to walk away. So everything in my mind when I was a gambler was all based on winning. I couldn’t even foresee losing, and I couldn’t even foresee the consequences of losing. It was strictly win.

Jamie: Yeah, it’s funny how we do—we focus on all the winnings. When you were saying that, it took me back to my first wins with poker. And I was like, “Oh, I turned $100 into $4,000 in a month.” And like you said, I was in college—I’m like, “Why would I go get a job as an accountant when I can sit in my room and do this, which is more fun on a limited basis?”

Joe: Yeah.

Jamie: And it’s definitely that allure. So take us through more of that allure. I mean, obviously, you have this early win, and then you kind of dabble some more, and you dabble some more. Do you start to feel that it’s progressing? Is it progressing?

Joe: Yes, of course. The threshold started to progress for me. So when you’re betting $1 and you’re winning $40, that’s okay. But what happens if you bet $10 now? Well, I can probably win $400. And you just mentioned accounting there, Jamie—well, what happens if I bet $100? Maybe I could win $4,000 like you just suggested. So now all of a sudden, if I increase my threshold, I can increase my ability to win more money.

And then as I continued on that progress, I got desensitized towards the minimum bet. It became comfortable for me to bet—I got up to, with slot machines, I got up to $150 a hand on slot machines because I became comfortable with it. And $10 was just boring at that point—I wanted to bet $100. So I would go in there with $10,000 in my pocket, and I’m putting the $10,000 in the slot machine, and, part of my language here, but fuck it, we’re just going to roll the dice and see what happens. And sometimes that $10,000 would go down to—you’d start losing, losing, losing, losing, losing, and you’re like, “What am I doing?” But I knew, “Okay, I’m just going to keep riding this thing out because if this thing is either going to go all the way to zero, or I’m going to hit.” So I’m going to keep riding this thing out because I’m not walking away. I committed to this thing.

So then you get down to, let’s say, $800—boom—you hit the bonus round. And you’re like, “Okay.” And then you shoot back up, and then you get back up, and then I’m like, “Okay, I’m going to ride it out again.” Boom, boom, boom, go down—boom, back up again—bonus. And all of a sudden you start getting above where your baseline was for that initial bet. And as long as—and that’s where the gambling got addicting though. But as time went on, I realized that I wasn’t actually gambling for money. I was gambling for dopamine. I don’t know if you know about that.

Jamie: Oh, yeah. And I guess, were most of your kind of gambling sessions, it sounds like you’re similar to me in that it was like, “Okay, you had this money. Once it was in, it wasn’t a matter of like—there was no quitting when there was 30% left. There was no quitting when there was 10% left. It was, it’s going to go to zero or it’s going to go up to a number.”

Joe: That’s exactly it.

Jamie: That’s exactly it. And my other thing, I kind of—when you were talking there, talk us through that thought. I mean, you’re walking in with $10,000 to play slot machines at $150 a hand. When you first started, it wasn’t even fathomable that you would ever do that, right?

Joe: Not at all. That would be out of my—I couldn’t even—I couldn’t even be able to think of that. That wouldn’t even be able to materialize in my mind. But then as the gambling continues, as you progress, it becomes more and more comfortable. The dollar becomes a $10 bet. You know, the $10 becomes a $20, the $20—and then you just—your comfort level starts to grow with the bet.

Jamie: One other thing. Did you notice that money that you were using for slot machines and stuff, you treated it differently than kind of like—personally, I would never have spent the money I spent on myself or buy myself things in real life. I mean, I’d be checking my bank card to see if I could buy Subway yet going on and buying in for $400 tables to play poker. Is that similar to you, that you had a different value of money when it was gambling versus kind of outside in your normal life?

Joe: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. There were two different people that I was. I was Joe the gambler, and then I was just Joe, just the average Joe. So if I’m going to go, like you suggested, to Subway—oh, or, you know, “That’s okay. That’s $8. Do I really need that $8? Oh, those pants—they’re pretty nice, but that’s $60. Do I need that $60?” But when it came to gambling, yeah, no problem—like you suggested, I’ll pay $400 a hand. Money wasn’t money in gambling. As weird as that sounds, money was never money in gambling. It was just a means to place a bet. It was like a game. So money didn’t actually have a value. Money just had a purpose. It wasn’t even about the money because I didn’t have ever thought, “Oh, if I got up to this amount of money, I could translate this money into this.” It was just a game. It was just a game that I got sucked right into because I wanted just to see if I could beat a system. I wanted to see if there was this challenge ahead of me, and I wanted to see if I could overcome it. And it was just—I don’t know what I gained out of it at the end. I know what I lost out of it at the end. I lost a lot, but it wasn’t actually ever about the money—what I’ve come to realize.

Jamie: So talk to us a little bit about some of those things you said you lost. I mean, obviously, you went into it, and you had no thought about what you would gain. But what are some of the things that you lost? What were some of the side effects of your gambling?

Joe: Well, the first thing I lost really is my value of money. I lost

I lost my value of money. I would say I lost my self-respect. I lost my control. I lost the importance of how others respected me. I lost the importance of having a positive self-image. I lost the importance of feeling the need to be a credible person. I lost the importance of, I guess, being empathetic to how others felt. I lost the importance of, you know, just wanting to do better in life.

Because what gambling took over was my sense of thought. That’s really what happened with gambling—as I progressed with gambling, my mind eventually got shut off. I couldn’t think anymore. I didn’t want to think at that point, actually, because when my gambling really escalated, I was going through a divorce. And so, what gambling gave me was a distraction, but not just a distraction—it gave me an off switch. So instead of having feelings, gambling presented an off switch for me, so I could turn off my feelings, I could turn off my thoughts. And I just became submerged in this life that wasn’t even existent. I almost was living in a dream and not having to wake up.

Like, if you were to say to me, “Hey Joe, who was sitting next to you at that casino?” I couldn’t tell you one single person that I sat next to. I couldn’t tell you one person’s name, couldn’t tell you the story of one person I met. Because when I was gambling, I was strictly in a zone that just existed between me and gambling. It was like a dream.

Jamie: I can relate to everything you just said. I mean, it’s my story exactly—the feelings. I mean, I always say like, someone asked me the other day, “What were the feelings in rush?” and I was like, “When I started losing it, and even all the time probably, I just felt hollow.” There was like emptiness, like distance. I mean, I would describe myself as distant. Like you said, people around me—I had no clue. The people at the table—so poker is obviously kind of, you’re playing with other people. When I did play live, which was rare (most of it was online), most of the time I’d sit there with my headphones on, cranking up music, just—and I was a robot. I mean, it was a whole, like you talked about two different people. Like just a zombie, hollow, and empty, and there was no meaning to any of it.

Joe: No meaning, no sense of feeling, no sense of—you didn’t feel—like I didn’t feel—once, I won—I could win $7,000, and I didn’t even feel a rush off winning $7,000.

Jamie: Yeah, because the game’s not over, right? I mean, it’s not only—we know that, like, that the win—the only time it ends, at least for me, was when I was out of money. Other than that, I mean, then it was just a delay in the game, almost like a pause in the game until you had money again, and then it started over. And it didn’t matter how high that roller coaster went, it was always going to come crashing back down to the bottom.

Joe: Absolutely. But somehow or another, you’re going to find a way to get that money back up.

Jamie: Yeah.

Joe: Because, you know, “Oh, they knocked me down, and now I’m going to try to find a way to get back up.” So whether that means trying to apply for credit, or using another credit card, or whatever you have to do to try to come up with that money, you’re going to do it so that way you can continue—get back up to where you were.

Jamie: Oh my god, I remember thinking once I hit that zero, “I can’t believe I did this. I made this horrible mistake, but if I do this, this, and this, I can get back to where I was, and then that will never happen again.”

Joe: Yep.

Jamie: So we always think, “Okay, I just won’t—” I mean, me, “I just won’t go on tilt next time. I mean, when somebody beats me with a bad hand, I’ll just leave.” And it’s the fantasy, and that’s—

Joe: Exactly.

Jamie: Yeah. I think the other thing that’s so fascinating with gambling, I mean, and it’s part of the devastation of it, is that I’m trying to think of another addiction where the only way out seems to be to continue to do the thing you’re addicted to more. I mean, when you think about it, it’s all of us, I mean, it’s like, one, when you lose, it’s like, well, I’m not going to go work to get it back. I’m going to gamble to get it back. Once I gamble back to this point—and I mean, you would never do that with—I mean, alcohol, you don’t drink to solve your problem. I mean, you don’t do more heroin to solve your heroin problem, you don’t—I mean, smoke more cigarettes to quit smoking, you don’t do that. But gambling, “If I just do it one more time with my addiction, if I partake in this addiction just one more time, then I can get rid of my addiction because I can’t go out on a loss.”

Joe: Exactly.

Jamie: “I’ve got to go out on a high.”

Joe: Exactly.

Jamie: Like, I’ve got to make up for this. And I’m going to use an eraser, and that’s basically going to scratch off what previously happened.

Joe: Yeah.

Jamie: And then nobody has to know about it.

Joe: Exactly.

Jamie: Thinking that nobody has to know about it, it never happened, I’m back to square one, and I can just go back to being the person I was before. And I think the reason why that is, from my experience, is there was a Joe that people didn’t know about. So if I were to hide that Joe, that Joe didn’t exist. And if I were to right the wrong of what that Joe did, kind of cover up my evidence, well, now I’m just back to being the other Joe, and I will never go back to being the gambling Joe.

Jamie: Yeah, I think that that sums it up pretty well. I mean, I think one other thing I noticed—and I can kind of sense from you—is that competitiveness. I mean, were you a former athlete or competitive in other areas? I mean, that seems to be a common thread of a lot of, I mean, problem gamblers and addiction. Is that part of your background, or…?

Joe: Yeah, I was never competitive in the aspect of me versus you. I could care—I always just looked at it as me versus me. So I became competitive in knowing if I could control myself. That’s where I became competitive. So gambling became addictive in a manner where I saw what I was doing, I saw when I was losing control. So I wanted to know if I could walk away. I wanted to know if I could control myself. That actually became the competitiveness for me. Could I refrain from betting again with this win? Could I actually—because I knew when I was gambling, what I was doing was getting the better of me. But I wanted to see if, okay, maybe there’s a way for me to control this addiction. Could I basically control the beast? There was a beast inside of me, and I wanted to know if I could control the beast. And I can honestly say, no, the beast beat the shit out of me.

Jamie: Yeah.

Joe: I have—I had to succumb to the beast.

Jamie: Yeah. And it’s only through that acceptance. I mean, I went through the same process that you said, “Okay, I’m not going to fight this game I can’t win any longer,” and to get to the freedom that we all want.

Joe: Absolutely.

Jamie: And…

and well, Joe, you were talking—and I love that you’re talking about how the beast basically like beat the shit out of you, right? And I think we can all relate to that. For me, I was lucky—I mean, my beast ran into a pocket dial from a riverboat when I wasn’t supposed to be there, and I got caught. So if you could, kind of walk us through your story—how do you go from this addiction, with these $150 spins on slot machines, to the point where you are now, where you obviously are in a much, much better place? If you could just kind of share that story with us.

Joe: So, where my story started and where the beast kind of manifested itself to its highest strength, which took over my life, would be when I sold my marital home. I now had access to funds to do some serious gambling. I went an entire year, hard gambling, consistently, in every different avenue you could think of. So, if it was a scratch ticket, I wasn’t buying a scratch ticket—I was buying packs of scratch tickets. And if I was gambling, I was gambling, and then I would gamble after that, and then I would study fights and bet on sports fights on the weekends. So whether or not I was gambling, my mind was in the mode for when the next bet was. So my mind was consistently on the gambling mode.

I exhausted the funds, and I was like, “Oh, what am I doing?” And then I threw up a Hail Mary—I was wanting to try to get my money back. And in December of 2013 to January 2014, I hit a big slot win. All of a sudden, I got my money back. But the gambling was still taking part. And I knew I should have walked away at that point, but I couldn’t, because I was addicted, and the beast still wanted to be fed.

Kept going a bit, the money started dwindling. I knew I threw a Hail Mary up before—come July, well, time to throw another Hail Mary. “We’re going to hit it again because I’m going to win.” And as we talked about earlier, the gambling mind does not recognize the consequences—it only recognizes the rewards. “If I do this, I can get this, so I want this, because I don’t like the situation I’m in and I want to change it, but I don’t want to wait for it to change. I want it fixed now.”

So I wanted to go down to Vegas. I was going to place a big bet on a boxing match. I’d studied the fighter, watched all of his amateur fights—I knew he was going to win. I knew that the betting market hadn’t caught up to him yet, so the odds were good, and I was going to place all my money on this guy.

Got down to Vegas. I was very tired because I couldn’t sleep a couple of nights before—because when I was gambling, I would go to bed at 7 o’clock in the morning. That was regular—8 o’clock in the morning, that was regular, because I wanted to gamble when the world was asleep, but I felt most awake.

Got down to Vegas. As soon as I got there, I wanted to gamble, so I gambled until 8 o’clock in the morning. I wanted to place my bet, but I was tired, so I wanted to take a nap—and I slept for 12 hours straight. I woke up, “Oh my God, I got to make that bet,” because I knew that fighter would win. Got in the taxi, went to the closest casino, rushed up to the window—”Sorry, sir, betting’s closed for that fight.”

But I got a big wad of cash in my pocket. I see the high limit slots—well, I guess I can do this. And I knew in my mind, because when you’re a gambler—and you’ll know this, Jamie—when your mind’s not right, you know what’s going to happen. But there becomes a part in your mind where you don’t give a shit. Eh. Because you start self-loathing, and you almost start to want to take the hit in the face. And I didn’t feel that at that time, but subconsciously, I think that’s what was going on.

So I started gambling that night. Money started dwindling down. All of a sudden, I got it back up. Because of how I played, the host came up to me and said, “Hey, you know, why don’t you stay here for a couple of days?” Stayed there for a couple of days, just gambled straight—four days straight. Must have slept within those four days, I don’t know, maybe eight hours in total. Just kept gambling—I just didn’t want to stop gambling. All the money—gone.

Now, here happens—I go home, and I’m like, “Okay, I’m going to go home, and I’m just going to never gamble again.” Well, got $100 left. And then when I got home, I hit that roll, Jamie—I hit the roll. Place $100—boom, boom, boom, boom, boom—starts going up. Okay, got it up. Place and start betting that money—boom, boom, boom, boom, boom—starts going up, and I’m starting to control my gambling, so it appears by the night at least, because I’m like, “Okay, I’m up, I’m going to actually turn it off.” And I was doing online gambling this time. I’d run upstairs, I’d take off my router, I’d throw the router, I would disconnect the internet so I couldn’t continue online gambling.

Start the next day—boom, boom, boom, boom, boom—comes up, and all of a sudden, the money starts coming up again off of $100—da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da. And I get all the money back that I lost in Vegas. “Oh my God, this is perfect, I got it all back, I’m back at square one, I can walk away from this thing now, I can finally do what I wanted to do, which was walk away on my terms. This is my set, this is perfect, this is lined up, I’ve controlled the beast.”

Well, so I thought.

It takes a couple of days with online gambling when you want to cash out your winnings. Winnings stay in the account. Well, all of a sudden, I start having a personal issue, and I start with the self-loathing. And when you’re not gambling and you’re on that win, and you’re not gambling for three days—that feels like three years, because you’re thinking, “Well, maybe I can keep going a little bit further, maybe I can keep going further.”

And I had a personal issue where I started to feel some emotional distress, and then I went into that self-loathing state. And within four—I don’t know how long it would have been—probably five hours, all that money that I reaccumulated off of this roll was gone. Because I had maxed out my bets at this point to $300 a time, and I started saying, “I just want this money to go, because I do not want to continue to gamble, because I just want this to hit zero so that way I can just bottom out,” as you talked about earlier—just to bottom out.

And I did that, and it went down to zero. And I looked back, and I said, “Did I have to go that far? Could I have not just walked away?” But one thing I’ve learned with gambling is when you’re gambling, you’re not in a logical frame of mind—you’re in an emotional state of mind.

And so I bottomed out, lost all my money once again. And then I knew, “Okay, I gotta just kind of pull back and not gamble.” But I tried to do it on my own, and I would do it for like five months, six months maybe. But then I would hit some type of emotional situation where I started to feel a little uneasy, a little uncomfortable, and I wanted to gamble again. And then when I’d go to the casino, I would lose easily in a night what somebody would take a year to lose. Like, you know, whatever I had access to—da, da, da, da, da—goes down. You know, next time I’d wait maybe another two months, three months—again, whatever I had access to—da, da, da, da, da—goes down.

And I really, really realized that by quitting for 60 days, I was never quitting, because I was just more or less refraining myself. I was trying to control myself—I was trying to lock up the beast. But the beast wasn’t being put to sleep. And so I kept going in this pattern.

And I had a best friend, and her brother was an alcoholic, and he actually ended up, unfortunately, a couple years before that, losing his life to alcoholism. And this person came into my life, and I was very blessed for that. And she said, “You know, I think you really need help.” And I didn’t want to hear that, but I knew she was right.

And so I kept with that pattern of a couple of months. I was off a couple of months, not gambling, and I just—I couldn’t beat it. So I ended up calling this mental health helpline. We have that set up in Canada. And I said, “You know, I really have a serious gambling addiction. As much as I try to beat this thing, 90 days, 60 days comes up, and I just have to gamble again. I just can’t control it. And when I gamble, I can’t control myself, and I’m just losing constantly.”

And they said, “Well, you know, there’s a center—there’s a place where you can go, and they have what’s called a behavioral therapist, and she can talk to you about gambling. She can help you kind of understand what’s going on in the mind with gambling.”

So I reached out for help from professionals—from behavioral therapists—and she started teaching me what was going on in the mind with the gambling. And I started kind of following what she said. It took some time, and I had to go through a lot of withdrawal. And that’s what led me to my recovery. It was kind of finding people who could give me guidance on how to recover, because I didn’t have that ability to recover on my own.

Jamie: Yeah, and I think that’s awesome that you have that in Canada. I think we have some similar programs here in the States, but it’s not as formal. It really is—getting in with a therapist really helped me quite a bit. So I’m sure that was the same for you.

One question I do have—so your friend, the one who really encouraged you, what was the tone of that conversation? Because I know when my wife brought it up, it was very comforting, but also very direct. Like, “Hey, you’re going to go get help.” And your friend’s obviously in a different situation. I’d love for you to speak to that a little because there are a lot of people who ask, “How do I bring this up if I have a father or a loved one that has this?” Do you remember the way she said it or what she said? Was there anything that really stuck with you from that conversation?

Joe: Yeah, there was. So what I was doing, because I had self-restricted myself from gambling websites, I was asking my sister to create an account in her name so that I could gamble. So when I lost that money after I came back from Vegas, it was actually in my sister’s name. I didn’t want to ask my sister again. So this friend of mine, I asked her if I could set up an account in her name. She went along with it, and I got the money up. And then, of course, I had that moment where I just lost it all and went on tilt.

But what she said to me that stuck with me was that she was really concerned for me. It wasn’t about her saying, “You could have given me this money, but you didn’t.” She never even said that. She just expressed concern and said, “I think you really need help to overcome this.” And I could see that she had genuine concern for me and my emotional well-being. She basically said, “You’ll never be able to beat this on your own, and I want you to be better. I want you to feel better. I don’t want to see you hurt. It hurts me to see you hurt.”

And that’s when I realized—though it took me a long time to fully grasp—that when I was gambling, I wasn’t just hurting myself. I thought that I was only hurting myself—that’s why I justified it. I thought, “Well, I can’t drink and drive because I could hurt someone, but when I gamble, I’m just hurting myself.” But I was wrong. I was actually hurting a lot of other people. And what she expressed, without directly blaming me, was that by hurting myself, I was hurting her. And she was also feeling my pain. That made me realize that I had to overcome this addiction because it wasn’t just about me—I was hurting others, too.

Jamie: Yeah, I think that sharing of empathy from her is really what helped you, right? And that was kind of what helped me, too. My wife told me, “Look, you’re lucky I watch a lot of Intervention because I know people have problems and I know they can get through them.” It wasn’t accusatory. And I’ve been on the other side of it, trying to help a friend. It can be easy to get frustrated and to say, “Just stop, and you’ll be fine.” But it really takes that empathy, and I appreciate you sharing that. I think we can all take something away from that—whether it’s alcohol addiction, gambling, or anything else. I really believe that connection is key, and empathy is a big part of that.

Joe: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. When the addiction was taking over my mind, I wasn’t in a very good frame of mind. And I’m, of course, responsible for my actions—I take full accountability—but a lot of what I was doing was feeding my addiction. It’s easy to get frustrated with someone and just say, “Why are you doing this? You should be logical. What’s wrong with you? Snap out of it.” But it’s not that easy because the person isn’t in a logical frame of mind—it’s an emotional state. And it takes a person like your wife or my friend to recognize that and to have sympathy and empathy for the person, and to be patient and try to help. It was very thoughtful of her, what she did for me.

Jamie: Yeah, I can tell just by listening how appreciative you are of her.

Joe: Yeah, because if it wasn’t for her coming into my life, I think I would still be gambling. And I hate the thought of that, because she at least gave me that push to get help. And then, when I went to get help, the professionals taught me things about gambling that I didn’t know. I realized there was a lot of mind trickery going on at the casinos that I wasn’t aware of. And that made me think, “Maybe I shouldn’t be so hard on myself.” I learned that a lot of these games are designed to create addiction—with things like near misses and losses disguised as wins. I started to go easier on myself. And then I learned things like emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and being mindful in the moment. I started practicing meditation. By doing these things, I realized I didn’t need to reach that point of distress where I had to gamble.

Jamie: Yeah, and I think those two things you mentioned—the near misses and the losses disguised as wins—those are two big ones. Once you understand that, it’s really eye-opening, especially when you realize that these games are so scientifically designed to create addiction.

So, I guess in addition to that, what other things did you learn from your therapist? Were there any specific action steps they encouraged you to take? What has your recovery looked like for you?

Joe: Well, the first 90 days were probably the hardest. Honestly, I just couldn’t grasp what they were teaching me at first. I was dealing with withdrawal, and it wasn’t easy. I remember my first steps into recovery—I’d get an urge to bet. I would see odds, and my mind would just start thinking of gambling. The constant urge was always there. I had to let these urges pass, so I remember sitting on my couch, binge-watching Netflix, whatever I had to do just to pass the time.

I had withdrawal symptoms too—I would get shakes and feel cold. But I had to get through that. Then, as my recovery progressed, my behavioral therapist started teaching me about what was happening in my mind. She explained that my brain was seeking dopamine and had essentially shut down my serotonin system. My brain had created pathways that were wired for the thrill of gambling. And she explained that I had to give it time—time and distance—to let my brain reset. I had to give it time to return to its original state.

She also taught me to be more mindful. She taught me to recognize when I got into a heightened emotional state because when that happens, we all want to hit the escape button. We want to reach for something that will give us that dopamine hit, but I learned to bring myself down, to follow my breath, to be present in the moment.

I also did little things, like a half-smile when I was feeling stressed. I’d hold a smile for a couple of minutes, and that would tell my brain, “Hey, I’m not doing too bad.” And it sounds silly, but I got Botox because it took away my frown muscles, and I couldn’t send those signals to my brain saying, “I’m stressed, I’m pissed off.” So it helped me maintain an even mood.

With gambling, if you looked at a scale of 1 to 10, I was either at a 1 or a 10—never a 4, 5, or 6. Now I live in that middle range. I’m more even-keeled, and I try to stay there.

Jamie: Yeah, it’s like gambling is all about extremes. Give me an A or give me an F, right? It’s all or nothing. And it’s funny because those habits, like mindfulness, can seem so small, but they have a huge impact, especially in the long term.

Joe: Absolutely.

Jamie: So, how about new habits or activities? I mean, obviously gambling took up so much of your time. Have you found new things to fill that time as part of your recovery?

Joe: Yeah, definitely. I’ve gotten much more serious about fitness and health. I started working again, and when I was deep into gambling, I wasn’t working. So getting back to work filled a lot of that time. I also started spending more time with my family—actually being present when I was with them, which wasn’t happening when I was gambling. I started redeveloping friendships that I had let slip away.

I filled my time with being social again, practicing mindfulness, listening, and just trying to be a better version of myself. Meditation and mindfulness are the big things that I replaced gambling with. Meditation lets me focus on my breath, and it gives me a moment to become aware of what’s going on inside. When I get an urge or start feeling stressed, I recognize it. That way, it doesn’t take over me.

If I’m having an argument or a conversation that’s leading to distress, I can recognize the signs and walk away before it blows up. I’ll take 24 hours to let things settle down, and then I’ll revisit the conversation. It’s about being mindful of my emotions and not letting them control me. Do you do anything similar?

Jamie: I do, yeah. Meditation is something I’ve tried to build into my morning routine. When I do it, I notice a huge difference, but I haven’t been as consistent with it as I should be. It’s been on my mind a lot lately. There’s a great book called The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod, which really focuses on building a morning routine and mindfulness. He even came out with a version specifically for addiction recovery. It really emphasizes starting your day with intentional actions like meditation.

I think that’s the thing—creating those routines and habits, especially in the morning, helps us stay grounded. When we’re gambling, we’re always focused on the next bet, the next thrill. Mindfulness brings us back to what’s happening right now.

Joe: Exactly. It’s all about staying present, staying in the moment. When I was gambling, my mind was always in the future—focused on what was coming next. But being in the here and now is where life really happens.

Jamie: 100%. I think that’s one of the greatest gifts of recovery, honestly—being able to just live in the present. Let me ask you this: What’s the best thing that has come out of your recovery? I know a lot of times we focus on the losses and the hardships that come with addiction, but what are the positive things that you’ve gained?

Joe: The best thing is that I saved my life. When I was gambling, I was either stuck in the past or worrying about the future. A lot of my gambling was tied to regrets—”Why did this happen?” or “Why did that happen?” But I’ve come to accept things for what they are. Life is what it is, and I’m at peace with that. It could change tomorrow, but for now, I accept things as they are.

Recovery gave me an appreciation for life. When I was gambling, I didn’t appreciate life. Now I do. I value every day, and that sense of appreciation is the best gift I could have gotten out of this.

Jamie: That’s incredible. It really is. To be able to live every day and appreciate it is something most people take for granted, but we know how valuable it is.

I just want to say, Joe, you’ve been amazing. This conversation is going to help a lot of people. Before I let you go, I have one last question. You reached out to me on Instagram—why now? What made you decide to share your story at this point? Because I know that’s a tough step for a lot of people, myself included. It took me a long time to share my story. What made you decide to share it now?

Joe: For me, it was a lot about letting go of the shame and guilt that I had carried for so long. When I was gambling, I felt so much regret. But I’ve decided not to live in shame or guilt anymore. I’m accepting my past because it made me who I am today.

The reason I’m sharing is because I want to show people that there’s nothing to be ashamed of. I’m just an average guy—just like anyone else you’d pass on the street. We all have something we struggle with, and I don’t think anyone should be ashamed of that struggle. Instead, I think it’s important to recognize it, understand it, and do whatever you can to contain it.

For a long time, I felt so much shame. I remember having thoughts like, “This sucks, I just want it all to end.” And I know there are people out there who feel the same way. I want to show them that it doesn’t have to go that far—that they can recognize the beast inside, that they can contain it, and that there is a way to get back to a good quality of life.

Jamie: That’s so powerful. I think by sharing your story, you’ve done a lot to reduce that stigma and help others who are in the same position you were in. I really can’t thank you enough for that.

Joe: I appreciate that, Jamie. And honestly, you’re doing amazing work. It’s important to recognize that gambling is an addiction, just like alcohol or drugs. For some people, it’s a fun thing they can do on occasion, but for others, it can take over their lives. And for those people, it’s about recognizing that and being able to step back and say, “This isn’t the life I want.”

Jamie: Absolutely. And I think that’s why these conversations are so important. I mean, the more people I talk to, the more I see how similar our stories are. The feedback I get is often, “Your story is just like mine.” And I can say the same for you. Whether it’s slots or poker, the addiction is the same. And it’s not a life sentence—life does get better after gambling.

Joe: Totally agree.

Jamie: Well, Joe, I really can’t thank you enough for coming on the show. You’ve been incredible, and I know you’re going to help a lot of people. I’d love to have you back on again sometime, if you’re up for it.

Joe: I’d love that, Jamie. Thanks so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

Jamie: Fantastic. Well, thank you, Joe. And I hope to meet you in person someday. Thanks again for coming on.

Joe: Thanks, Jamie.

Jamie (closing): So, now you can see why I was so excited to share this episode with you. There are so many great takeaways, and I hope you got a lot out of my conversation with Joe.

As always, remember, we are not healthcare professionals, doctors, lawyers, or therapists. The views we express are just our opinions, and we do this for educational purposes only. Gambling addiction is extremely serious, so if you’re struggling, please reach out to a professional for help. Talk to your doctor or a counselor about any issues you may have—don’t rely solely on the information in this podcast.

Music for the show is “Something Elated” by Broke For Free, and it’s licensed under a Creative Commons license. Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you in the next episode.