Gambling Problem
Treatment Program
Gambling Problem Treatment
The Gambling Problem Treatment Program offers a specialized comprehensive approach for compulsive gamblers, their partners and their families.
We also treat the co-occurring mental health and/or substance abuse problems that often go with compulsive gambling. Our staff are trained experienced and nationally certified gambling treatment providers who “get it”.
Our Gambling Problem Treatment Program is unique in the United States, because of the depth and breadth of the services and support we offer to compulsive gamblers.
If you are a resident of New Mexico, scholarship for services are available. From outside of NM affordable services are available.
All of our services are highly confidential in order to protect anonymity.
Gambling Problem
Called by many names; gambling disorder, compulsive gambling, problem gambling, gambling addiction, or pathological gambling; it’s not just about losing money.
Gambling problems causes heartbreak and can affect a person’s whole life, threaten their relationship, put family members at risk, jeopardize a career, and even limit your desire to live or not.
If you or someone you love feels out of control with gambling you and your loved ones can get the help you need here at The Evolution Group with over 12 therapists on our staff who are certified by the National Council on Problem Gambling as treatment experts, ready to help you work out a way to manage you urge to gamble and get your life back to a sense of integrity, wholeness, peace, and happiness.
Who It’s For
If your relationship or family life is being destroyed by your gambling, we can help you.
We work with problem gamblers and their partners & family members to establish a connection for positive change. We focus first on harm reduction, enhancing motivation for change, and utilizing peer support.
Together, these are proven to be successful in interrupting the cycle of compulsive gambling and developing the groundwork for abstinence & eventual recovery from other addictions such as with substances or sex.
Warning Signs
Why gambling problem might develop:
– Part of the cause may be heredity
– An addiction to something else has been present prior to this
– Some people develop problems believing they can win back money they have lost, or because they like to be “in the action.”
– Others have many life stresses that make gambling a way to escape for a welcomed relief.
Gambling is a problem when it:
– Gets in the way of work, school or other activities
– Harms mental or physical health
– Does damage financially
– Damages a person’s reputation
– Causes problems with a partner, family, or friends
What You’ll Experience
Program Elements
- A primary therapist that assesses you and helps you develop a tailored treatment plan
- One-on-one counseling with your primary therapist
- Individual therapy for partners, family and loved ones
- Group therapy utilizing our Integrity Recovery™ curriculum
- Financial counseling and finance management education
- Drug and alcohol treatment (when needed)
- Sex addiction treatment (when needed)
- Family therapy (when needed)
- Couples therapy (when needed)
The compulsive gambling treatment program offers compulsive gamblers and their families a unique set of services unlike any other.
Testimonials
“Betty’s” Story:
There are many defining moments in my journey. I give you here a condensed version of my testimony.
I was working as an EMT for five agencies in New Mexico who sent me to 17 different facilities. I had to work 100 hours full-time a week to keep my compulsion to gambling rolling. I often slept in my car. Hitting the casinos between shifts, my fingernails were cracked and my hair was falling out, from lack of proper nutrition and backbreaking stress.
The week I went to the Evolution Group I had suicidal ideations flashing in my thoughts. One night my futures broker called me stating he had a broken down semi-truck in Tennessee filled with some shoe store mirrors. He needed five grand to bid and had a buyer. I said yes and 8 hours later had $60,000 in my account.
I told all my agencies that I had an emergency and was taking a week off. The week turned into 13 days of sitting at my $100 slot machine at my favorite casino. I lost it all, the entire $60,000, and on the 13th day when I had lost everything, on the way back to my apartment, I stopped at three pawn shops and then at Walgreens for two straight edge razors. I filled my tub with hot water, drank three glasses of wine, and sat down on the end of my bed.
I then recalled a GA meeting I had attended years earlier. The speaker had 20 years without gambling. He stated that if you ever decide to end it by suicide scream out “God! Help me” and he will. I screamed out, God! Help me”. My eyes then caught a sentence in an ad in the penny newspaper on my bed stating, “call 505 242-6988 for help with a gambling problem”. I dialed the number thinking I would get a recording and it would never work. But a pleasant and kind voice told me in our short conversation that I lived one block away from the Evolution Group. That moment became the most defining moment of my life. At that moment I surrendered totally saying “I will do anything to stop this insanity”.
My counselor at the Evolution Group gave me the next defining moment. I was taught that if I find myself at the casino there would be no punishment. I was just asked to please “do the how”.
HOW stands for honest, open-minded, and willing.
I was raised by nuns and no punishment was calming nor felt forgiving. No punishment felt relaxing. I remember how free my walk home from counseling felt. I noticed a pretty tree and how lovely it’s leaves felt. A cat came up to me from a porch I never noticed before. Somehow the “HOW” freed me. Another huge defining moment was a counselor bringing me into the “now” of the moment. He asked me to describe what I was noticing. I did. He then described his moment, even down to the tea bag in his cup. He asked me to get up a few minutes early and set a timer and light a candle only noticing my breath as I inhale then exhale. I was willing to do anything to heal.
Integrity was something I only dreamed of having. That came as I began to work in a workbook called the Integrity Recovery Workbook that the Evolution Group provides as part of a group therapy. I really came to know myself working in this book. My child had left me fragmented. Working the workbook “Integrity Recovery” made me whole. My fragmented parts pulled together into one person. I began to feel grateful, happy, even laughing.
Five of my close friends died last year. I was very sad but I did not get stuck in depression. I did not get stuck in anger. I was able to help their families with the wisdom Evolution Group had taught me. I have integrity. I look in the mirror every morning and smile saying, “I love you””. I truly am the happiest person I know. Suffering has been the teacher. The “How” has been the answer;
Honest, open-minded, and willing.
