About This Book

Maybe you searched for a way to stop gambling. Maybe someone in your family told you to read something, so you opened this. Maybe you’re reading it during another “this is the last time.” If gambling is causing problems in your life, give this book a little of your time.

The book has 26 chapters. It was written using medical research and actual data from QuitMate, an app-based recovery community for people with addictions. It covers how the gambling brain works, managing money, dealing with debt, rebuilding family relationships, and a 30-day recovery plan.

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How to read this book

You don’t have to read it in order. Start wherever something catches your eye.

You keep blaming yourself

• Chapter 1: Gambling Addiction Is Not a Weak Will
• Chapter 2: The Dopamine Trap

You want to stop but can’t

• Chapter 9: What a Craving Is and How to Ride It Out
• Chapter 11: HALT

Money disappears as soon as you have it

• Chapter 6: Cutting Off Access to Money
• Chapter 7: Surviving Payday

Your family found out, or you have to tell them

• Chapter 19: Family Relationships

If you’d rather read in order, the chapters are arranged so that understanding builds slowly from one to the next.

• Part A (Chapters 1–5): Understanding what’s happening in your brain
• Part B (Chapters 6–10): Things you can start doing today
• Part C (Chapters 11–14): Finding and handling your triggers
• Part D (Chapters 15–20): Debt, family, and mental health
• Part E (Chapters 21–26): Turning recovery into a system

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What this book does not cover

This book focuses on what you need in the first 30 days of recovery. The following are outside its scope and belong with clinicians and specialists.

• Detailed cognitive behavioral therapy practice
• Trauma treatment
• Medication
• Inner workings of specific gambling machines or platforms
• Support for family members (family groups, Gam-Anon, and similar)

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Gambling addiction is not something you develop because your will is weak. It’s a problem in how the brain works, and it’s recognized as a medical disorder.

If you’re telling yourself “something is wrong with me,” start with Chapter 1. You may think about it differently afterward.