Recovering Gamblers Offer Rose Advice: Seek Help for Addiction

When Bob W. finally decided to seek help six years ago, his gambling addiction had drained his $50,000 savings account and left him $32,000 in debt.

Like many other recovering compulsive gamblers, the 47-year-old Anaheim businessman sees in himself the problems currently embroiling baseball great Pete Rose, who has been banned for life from the game by Commissioner Bart Giamatti.

And while the Cincinnati Reds manager has professed that he does not think he has a gambling problem, Bob, other recovering gamblers and experts in the field say that Rose exhibits an addict’s classic denial.

It is the same denial they say they went through before their gambling habits became so costly they had to try and quit.

Bob’s advice to Rose: “I think he should go to Gamblers Anonymous. But it’s hard for anyone to say, ‘Hey, I’m sick’. “

An estimated 3 million people nationwide have a gambling problem, said Richard Rosenthal, a Beverly Hills psychiatrist who heads the California Council on Compulsive Gambling. In Southern California, about 500 people--many of them professionals--regularly attend Gamblers Anonymous meetings, according to leaders of the groups.

The common denominator among all compulsive gamblers is that they are out of control, consumed by “the action,” say former gamblers.

“I used to tell my wife I would play cards for two hours and I’d come back 30 hours later,” said Bob, who like several other members of Gamblers Anonymous declined to give their last names.

“The family, the friends and the job all get in the way of gambling,” added Bernie A., 50, a negotiator and recovering gambler from Westminster.

Bernie said that he refused to acknowledge he had a gambling problem until he lost his wife, his children and his home. Bernie said he attended his first Gamblers Anonymous meetings the same day he was so broke from gambling losses that he did not have enough money to get his clothes back from the cleaners.

“Toward the end, my whole life was caught up in gambling,” said Bernie, who was rendered penniless despite an annual income “in the six figures.”

“It was like I was in a fog all the time,” he added. “It was horrible.”

Jim, 28, a salesman from Long Beach who has been attending Orange County Gamblers Anonymous meetings for nearly two years, said that he lived like a pauper--despite making $90,000 a year--because of his obsession with sports betting.

“I’d bet on anything. I’d bet on games that I couldn’t name two players on either team,” he said. “I couldn’t stop. It started off as a fun thing. But then it was more and more until I hit bottom.”

By the time Jim was 26, he said he had lost $400,000 to gambling and was $10,000 in debt at the time he finally decided to seek help.

“I think Pete Rose has a problem,” he said. “You start betting illegally with bookies (as Rose allegedly has done) and you’ve got a problem.”

Rosenthal, the psychiatrist, said that denial is “extremely common” among compulsive gamblers; even more than other addictions.

“Since no substance is ingested with gambling, the denial is even stronger,” Rosenthal said.