Hi Vicky
I think it was perfectly reasonable for you to believe your husband was just placing a few £5 bets for fun; after all it is what so many people do without any addiction arising from what seems a harmless pastime.
The anger, distrust, pain you feel is understood here, as is the nastiness you have encountered and I am glad that you have started your thread. I have had trouble with my computer or I would have replied sooner and I apologise for the delay in you receiving any replies to your first post.
Many F&F have felt like jailers and detectives and long for a life when such feelings can disappear. Many F&F have heard that they will never understand how the CG (compulsive gambler) feels and you are right that this works both ways. Having said that it is important to know that ‘you’ do not have his addiction, you can think reasonably and logically whereas he is befuddled with addiction – therefore you are stronger than him even if you don’t feel it.
Your husband’s addiction has hit upon the notion that telling you when he has gambled is a way of gaining your trust. I hope the following will help you cope with what he is possibly/probably doing because although not recognized professionally as a coping mechanism, it has worked for many, many F&F as they struggle to cope with deceit.
Imagine your husband’s addiction as a slavering beast in the corner of the room. As long as you keep your wits about you and don’t threaten his addiction it will stay quiet, although it doesn’t sleep.
Your husband is controlled by his addiction beast, which is a master of manipulation and it has found that if he tells you when he has gambled, you back off. The addiction uses confusion, lies and deceit as it seeks to blame and demoralise you. Equally what you say to your husband is controlled by his addiction distorting truth to fit his personal perspective.
This was explained to me by a CG who lives in control of his addiction that whilst you are telling your husband that, for instance, if he didn’t tell lies and was honest, your lives would be better; his addiction is telling him that what you are saying is not true. Your husband owns an addiction that makes him feel a failure and worthless so how could ‘you’, someone who is successfully managing her life possibly love him and understand him and what he wants. Believing himself to be a worthless unlovable failure, his addiction fights back with the only coping mechanism he has – lies and distortion of truth.
I think that maybe it would be better to say something like ‘I’ve sought support and although you have told me that you have gambled, don’t expect me to believe that you are trying to control your addiction’ and leave it at that – no further discussion, just a simple bald statement allowing him the knowledge that this method of manipulation is wasted.
I believe F&F waste valuable time ‘wanting’ to believe that the CG they love is telling the truth and that ‘this’ time, maybe, he/she is different. If you can stand back a bit, rather than entering the fray, and listen to what your husband is saying, it becomes easier not get caught up in an argument that has no point apart from making you feel less in control. Once you begin to try and put your side the addiction has something to get its teeth into.
This all sounds a little negative but the positive side is that it removes you from the centre of the addiction giving you time and energy to look after you.
By looking after you first you will become stronger, you will reclaim your own life and be able to cope with your children and make the right decisions for your relationship.
You are right that your husband can control his addiction – if he couldn’t I would not be writing to you now, however, it is quite possible that he doesn’t believe he can change his life but spends his days trusting in an addiction that basically hates him.
I would never suggest to anyone that they leave or stay with a CG – but I do not believe that staying with him, on its own, is enablement. What do you mean when you say that you are trying to keep him afloat and his life in order?
I will leave this reply here Vicky as you have been left too long without one but please come back to me if there is anything you disagree with or want to know. It would be great to ‘meet’ you in the F&F group on Tuesdays between 20.00-21.00 hours UK time – nothing said in the group appears on the forum – you will be safe and understood.
Velvet
