This is my story, warts and all, to share my journey and battle with a 33 year long gambling addiction.
I wish it was a story, I wish I had exaggerated and falsified parts of it, but unfortunately, it is my life, I have lived it, and those around me have lived it and experienced every bit of hurt.
From the age of 9, my life was dominated and I was controlled by gambling. My teenage years and young adulthood seen the beginning of behaviors that would cause hurt and anguish for those I loved. I joined the Navy at 18 and could have had an amazing career had it not been for my addict. I had many opportunities to change and ask for help but I ignored them as my addicts ego was huge. This ego would win along with my addict to take me to what I believed would be my lowest point by being sent to prison in 2018 but this wouldn’t be the end of the hurt.
This book covers my childhood, young adulthood, 13 years in the Royal Navy and my pathway to prison. There are stories of addiction, domestic arguments, emotional abuse and even an episode of physical violence.
For the addict reading this, I try to explain the thought processes, the feelings and the emotions that drove my behavior, as well as identifying areas that you, yourself could identify and work on to avoid these same behaviors.
For the affected others, I hope that by sharing my thought processes, and explaining the way I manipulated others, that this will help you to recognise the signs in your loved ones, to assist you in getting them the help they need, or if needs be, to leave and protect yourself, before you are broken by the addict inside of them.
I mention my ‘addict’ as we are two completely different people; my addict is horrible, he manipulates, lies, commits fraud and will hurt anyone without a second thought to protect his love of gambling and his addiction. I wouldn’t want to spend a single day in his company and I despise his behavior. I don’t look to blame him solely or to use him as an excuse as I’m a grown adult who made bad decisions, but they were dominated by his influence and the gambling industry who have very little in the way of morals, who even today, continue to prey on the vulnerable addicts amongst us.
The real Andy or ‘Drew’ as I have now been affectionately known as, is a completely different person; he is loving, caring, empathetic, intelligent, thoughtful, honest and he has a real desire to use his understanding of his addicts behavior to help others avoid hitting the same depths that he did.
For those of you thinking, it’s not a big deal and an easy addiction to control and break, the chances are you are the lucky one as you have not been touched by it; if you touch it, you will get burnt. ‘Just stop’ is not possible.
If you have been, then you will know the truth. A gambling addiction is like all others, it is relentless, cruel and shows no mercy; it is hard to spot and easy to hide.
I was a manipulative monster who would lie, cheat and take everything and anything I needed to feed it; it will destroy loved ones, relationships, careers and ultimately, it takes lives through suicide.
It is not though, impossible to understand it, to identify the trauma or behaviors that allow it to flourish and to take back control. Recovery is possible; it will be hard, it will take time and there will be many hurdles to overcome but it is worth it.
There is always hope, help and a way out if you choose to ask for and accept the help available. I could never achieve abstinence alone, let alone recovery.
My support network is huge, the people involved care and my peers are my idols. I am now in recovery and thriving thanks to all of these people and the help they have given me.

Jonny, you are a legend and Dave, all I can say is, we all need to ‘be more Dave’.

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