Hello,

My name on here is Burnt Soul, I am from Australia and have 2 wonderful children, to a man .. whom USED to be the same.. WONDERFUL.

For the last 3 out of 4 years of our relationship we have struggled with this nasty addiction, I have gone from naive, to smart, to back to niave, cos I have come to realise that he will lie about anything, even things that I would not find a reason to lie about.
this addiction has always come and gone (still gambled, but not where id notice) but this time, (starting 3 months ago) it took its toll and has never been this bad, money wise, his attitude, lack of care etc etc you prob know it all.
he has been staying at his mums for the last 3 months.. and have so many times in this time said thats it, I basically have to walk away from us, cos it doesnt matter if I argue, cry, yell, be silent, be nice, understanding, loving, compassionate etc etc, I always end up with the same feeling ** HURT ** he doesnt appreicate anything I bring to the table anymore, whether I am sick, happy, sad blah blah.

I have given him space - didnt work
I have threatened him that he will end up with nothing - didnt work
I have swore I will stick by him if he gets help - didnt work

and before you say anything, this time I have accepted and realised that no matter what I say, or do... he will NEVER change unless he has a drive or need to do it for himself.

I have just been so scared of totally cutting myself off from him. I am scared that this could really be the end after reading a lot of stories like 'It took her/him 18.20. or 30 months to get help.

Anyways I will get to my point....

How many of you all out there, wish, or thought or hoped that your partner actually left you during your addiction period? or hoped that they'd left you sooner? would it have helped you?
Also the ones that didnt leave, and stuck by you when you didnt accept you had an addiction, did you ever wish they would leave you? if yes why?

I hope I am not offending anyone by writing this message... I guess I have exhausted every avenue, and now am getting to the realisation that theres nothing left for me to give and that I really do need to let him see this time i have to live my life for me and the kids.

I just want to ask from the other side, what anyones thought and or opinions are?

if you dont mind.

(PS - My threads are in Family and Friends)

Thank you for your time

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Hi Burnt Soul,

The Questions you ask are very difficult to answer. I can only give you my personel experiance and view.

While i was gambling there were many occasions I wihed my wife would leave me. This was because I wanted to gamble without accusations and agruments. All I wanted to do was gamble to my harts content without faceing the consequences or responsibility a relationship brings. However my selfish side was glad there was someone to cook, clean and iron. This was because I did not have time to do these things myself. Eventualy the mounting pressures finacialy and mentaly ended with me leaving the relationship without warning or thought of my familey.

My need to gamble was that great it overtook my life. Nothing else mattered. As I have said this is only my view and experiance allthough I am sure I am not the only one. You are right in saying nothing can be done if the gambler does not want to stop. Now I am in recovery (because I wanted to stop) life is easy to handle, and im better for it.

I can only hope you partner comes to terms with his gambling and realises he needs to stop. What is important is your well being keep posting on here even if its just to relive your emotions.

I wish you well,
MICK (G.H.)

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Hi Mick, and thank you.

I appreciate your response, for being very open and honest. I cannot explain or begin to explain how much i value this or any feedback.

The hardest thing I have tried to come to terms with is letting him go, I just kept feeling like he may think I have stopped loving him (then my mind thinks then again he prob doesnt even think of that) then I think he might do something silly like hurt himself.. he has hinted a few times, and I would die if he did it cos I had left him.

I love him so much and know he would never come on here, i have given him the web address for this site but I know, I just know in my heart of hearts he will never come on here to read my posts let alone for himself, so yeh.

Its so hard to stay happy thru all this, you try and be strong, loyal, loving but also cruel to be kind but no matter what he always finds something to blame me for, and it hurts.

and I have walked away from him and told him this yesterday cos I could do him favours (not money wise though) and he will get angry with me, I could ignore him and he will be nasty, I could cry etc - you get the drift , doesnt matter what I do, he hates me.

He says he loves me, and im sure if he didnt gamble that I would beleieve it cos he would show it. its the demon that is coming in between us, i tried so hard to not let him but my man is. cos not only is he not coming home to us, he refuses he wants help, yet he can see all the damage he is doing. its so powerful. I feel sorry for him and I wish I didnt have to let him go. I wish we did have a future together like we once planned when we were happy..

ohhh im upset and could go on, but its making me upset so i must go (thank goodness you say lol phew!)

thanks

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Hi again Burnt Soul,

Your last post was what you needed. Realeasing pent up emotion is good, get it all out, rant and rave, even cry. In a small way it will help. Keeping it in for apperances will do no good. Ignor his blackmail threats. Those who theaten seldom do anything. Just keep posting (as i know you will) and hope one day SOON he will see the light.

Best regards,
MICK (G.H.)

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Hi burnt soul
As you spend a lot of time in the f+f section you undoubtedly know my better half and a good deal of our story together. I look back now and think the best thing betty could have done was to leave me, but at the times it didn't feel that way. I thought it was great initially, i didn't have anyone to explain where i'd been, what i'd been doing and i had a lot more time to gamble. I failed to understand why betty left me, thinking it was easier to blame her for running away from our problems. My children have always been a huge part of my life and the one thing i did not want was to let them down, because of this i saw betty quite a lot and deep down i knew i still loved her, though at the time i didn't show it at all. It took me 18 months to hit my rock bottom and I was lucky i could go to her for help, that leads me to now.
Would it have happened earlier - That we will never know
Would it have helped if she'd stayed - probably not i wasn,t ready
Overall you need to be looking after yourself and your children and making sure you are safe from harm. How can you be safe if you are with a C.G.?
Stay strong and all the best

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Hi Bettys honey,

You may know me from F&F and that my hubby is about to leave. Can I just ask you how your life went after betty left you and how you came to your rock bottom? Hope you don't mind me asking and not sure if you'll even see this.

Thanks Diddy x

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Hi Diddy
My life went from bad to worse when betty left me. At first i THOUGHT it was great, i could have all the time in the world to gamble/run away from things, i would gamble at work, when i got home from work and when i should have been sleeping. I always tried to see my kids regularly, usually every couple of days, this meant i saw betty a lot, for me this was hard because i never stopped loving her. I would make all sorts of promises to betty telling her that i would sort out my problems. Eventually i couldn't even fool myself into thinking it was going to be ok.
My rock bottom was when i sat on my chair in my rented house thinking about committing suicide. My father had tried when i was young and i DID NOT want my children to feel the same way i had at the time. I was in floods of tears and desperate to sort things out, eventually i went to betty and asked her for help.
I am not sure what would have happened if she had not been there for me at that time, fortunatly for me she was still interested in helping me.
The rest is, as they say, history

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Hi bettys honey,

Thanks for telling me your story. I suppose I shouldn't expect too much too soon but hopefully he will come to the same conclusion as you did.

Good luck with your continued recovery and thanks for taking the time to reply.

Luv Diddy x

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Ditto to that for my man also

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