5 minute read
HOW ADDICTION TO GAMBLING CAN HAPPEN
by Sadie Foxton
I have always looked down on gamblers. I used to turn my nose up when I saw someone going into a betting shop. “Wockless” I would mutter under my breath, and I would make a judgement that they had no ambition.
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Strange thing is that my mother, who is quite posh and well to do, loved to put on a bet on a Saturday – I am not sure if she used to put one on in the week, but on a Saturday, she and daddy would look through the newspapers and do ‘the Pools’, and occasionally, if there was a Grand National race, she would put a bet on, and I remember putting a bet on Red Rum and something called Black something or other with a couple of other horses on a 5p each way accumulator, which meant all horses had to come either 1 st , 2 nd or 3 rd , and I remember winning what was then a lot of money, but I can ‘t remember how much.
What I am getting at is that I never pushed my nose up when my mum and dad put on a bet, and my dad, used to put on a little bet regularly, so I am not quite sure when I started sticking my nose up at anyone who walked into a betting shop. I had a friend who was dating someone who liked to bet, and in the end she ended the relationship with him because she said he had no ambition. If he could be satisfied sitting in the bookies all day, then that wasn’t the man for her. I asked her if he had tidied up the home, gone to the bookies, but by the time she got home, he had the dinner ready, and gave her a few bucks from his winnings, would it have made a difference that he spent every day in the bookie – after a little thought she said, no, it wouldn’t have mattered. What bothered her was that he was at the bookies all day, she would come home from work, the house was untidy and she would still come in to cook even though he wasn’t working. I understood her plight. Gambling is quite complex – is it society’s take on gambling that makes it an unsociable habit? Is it the fact that it controls some people’s lives so they end up becoming addicts and sell off loved one’s possessions – some even borrow against the mortgage or take out loans on credit cards! When gambling spirals out of control, that is when it becomes a problem.
I have a friend who is a gambling man, and I have tried to work out what is it about betting on horses that is addictive. I followed him to the bookie one day, to do my 10p e.w. Accumulator and 1p Yankee, which came up to 21p and he told me that it was a ‘bookies bet’. I told him I didn’t care, because it if it came up, I would make a lot of money. Anyway, all 4 horses never came up, during the time I did them; there was always one that let me down, sometimes two. My friend gave me £2 and said Sadie, try Scoop 6, you never know – you might get beginners luck. He gave me the ‘Scoop 6’ form and said: "we can do the ‘Scoop 6’ every two weeks" and try out luck. It seemed harmless enough and showed an element of control. I would choose 6 horses, and all had to win or place, and they ran in specific meetings. The meetings ranged from Haymarket, Cheltenham, Uttoxeter, Plumpton, Warwick, Fairyhouse and many more, but the newspaper would highlight which horses from certain meetings needed to be selected, and I needed to choose one horse from each consecutive race, (what they called Legs), and there 6 ‘Legs’ in other words, One Horse from each of the Six Races, hence the term ‘Scoop 6’.
I got a kick out of it, and I found myself trying to prove to my friend, that it had nothing to do with who was riding the horse, how old the horse was, how much the horse weighed, or whether the ground was flat, wet or dry, but it was the luck of the draw, and as soon as he realised that, he wouldn’t take it so seriously. I had a penchant for outsiders. I didn’t like odds on favourites; in fact, I didn’t like favourites at all. I thought to myself, if I get good odds for an outsider and it comes 2 nd or 3 rd , I still get – because what would happen is that when the 50/1 won, and the 66/1 came 3 rd , and the 20/1 came second, I wouldn’t get nothing, because the fourth horse blew out. “If you did a Lucky 15, you would have got over £20 for your a £1.50 Lucky 15 bet, instead you get nothing! “ Sometimes I would get 2 out of 6 horses, 3 out of 6 and once I even got 4 out of 6 horses, but never 6 out of 6 and the drive to get 6 out of 6 was addictive. I got dissatisfied being restricted to specific races – sometimes the horse I liked the name of was in a different race, and so I would say to my friend, why can’t I put a horse on in that race? Or I would tell him that I didn’t like the idea that all six horses had to win or place, and it was a waste of money. He then told me about ‘Lucky 15’ which he said, if one of my outsiders came up, I would be guaranteed a return on my stake. That made more sense to me.
However, the woman in the bookie had got used to me doing the Scoop 6 so she would run over to me with the paper showing the ‘legs’ for the Scoop 6’ and say, I have saved the Scoop 6 for you. The embarrassment of sitting in a bookie didn’t seem to bother me anymore. Instead, I would look at the Scoop 6 and start rationalising in my head, that there friend would say, don’t worry Sadie, I will give you the money for the Lucky 15, so my £2 stake increased to £3.10 plus a 20p each way accumulator, so my total outlay was £3.5 – a bit jump from 21p!! I decided that I didn’t like going into the bookies, and decided to open an online account. Seemed harmless enough – I put my debit card details in, and I would restrict myself to £5 per week – but then I found if I was hedging my bets and dong that Lucky 15 for £1.50, my £5 wasn’t lasting me very long and no matter how many times I told myself ‘Sadie, you are not winning anything much with the Lucky 15, just revert to you 10p e.w.. Accumulator if you are addicted to the thrill’, it didn’t work. I would put on the 10p each way accumulator and then I would say, yes but supposing two them win and the other two don’t you lose your money, and so that’s when I realised how the addiction forms. I noticed that I wasn’t too bothered accompanying my friend in the betting shop – in fact I was quite astonished at the number of people I recognised in there. It didn’t make me feel better, something deep inside me was still saying to me, Sadie this is wrong, but I justified it in one way or another. I then started getting self-righteous with my friend, asking him to not put on another bet, telling him, that he didn’t need to watch the race, and that he needed to watch how much he spent, all the time knowing that I had already lodged my online bet for £1.70 or whatever it was.
By this time though, I realised I had a problem of addiction, even though I wasn’t betting high amounts – I noticed the frequency and the desire to place a the habit and cut my losses. This is what I call responsible gambling. I no longer put on a bet for more than 50p a day, sometimes it’s 20p a day, depending on whether I want to round off the balance, and I do it online. Each night I have the thrill of looking on line to see if I have won anything, and I do not feel angry at myself if I haven’t, because I have only forfeited 50p. I don’t feel so guilty either.
I use the knowledge of how addiction happens to be less judgemental of others, and I am glad I got the experience, and I am glad I have the self-restraint to curb it. I am fortunate that I am reflective and that I monitor my behaviour, otherwise, I could have become like many who gamble their lives away.
