There was a dark period of my life about five years ago when I was fresh out of college and couldn’t get a job–but that’s not really central to this story other than I had massive amounts of free time on my hands. One of the things I did to occupy my time was to drive down to San Diego and spend my days at the Indian casino. Now I know what you’re thinking (an unemployed fellow shouldn’t be spending his time at the Blackjack tables) but it sorta worked out for me. In retrospect, I might have been precariously close to having a gambling problem. Perhaps the only thing that prevented it from being a “problem” was that I always won.

Sometime around the height of my Blackjack days a dealer handed me a brochure that outlined the signs of a gambling problem. I’m not sure why he gave it to me (maybe it’s because I was still sitting at the same spot when he went home the night before). I never thought I had a gambling problem because I never showed any of the signs.

Inability to stop gambling.  Why would I want to stop? I was winning.Betting bigger . . . . .