UK’s first women-only residential treatment for gamblers offers hope

“I remember getting scratch cards, winning and losing, and opening accounts online. . – Her congenital depression.

After scratch cards, Rebecca started betting on horses, even though she knew nothing about racing. “I was looking for this dopamine hit—that side of my brain going: gambling, gambling, gambling,” she says.

Last summer, Rebecca spent five weeks at Britain’s first women-only residential gambling centre. Here, addicts who have hit rock bottom have a chance to turn their lives around.

The BBC was granted exclusive access to The Centre, a modest terraced house in Birmingham.

Rebecca said being away from her children for so long was upsetting, but since leaving the clinic she hasn’t gambled and feels positive about the future. She says her relapse is “not an option.”

Just like Rebecca, gambling has completely ruled 34-year-old Caroline’s life. She once spent her £30,000 online in three months.

She stayed up in her bedroom until early in the morning gambling.

“You have no concept of time. You isolate yourself,” she says. “It was the lowest point in my life, because everything around me was being destroyed.”

Before being treated at a clinic last October, her condition worsened and she considered ending her life. It’s obviously painful for her to talk, but she wants to share her own story in the hope that it will help others.

“I felt like not being here was the only way,” says Caroline. “Life will be easier for everyone. It will be cheaper for everyone.”

She choked up when she told me that last May, sitting in her car, she wrote her last letter to her parents.

“It wasn’t worth going down that road because I knew I could have been better off with help. Now I keep the letter as a reminder to myself.”

The treatment center is located in central Birmingham. When you enter the entrance of Terrace House, you will be greeted by posters filled with supportive messages from the women who experienced the program.

One message is simple: “This place saved my life.”

Positive artwork and messages adorn every surface – even in your kitchen cupboards.

It’s a homely atmosphere, it’s a homely atmosphere. Each resident is welcomed with a letter written by the woman who last stayed in the room.

The clinic, run by charity Gordon Moody, is the first to allow media access since it opened toward the end of 2021.

Meanwhile, the number of women seeking treatment at the clinic has more than doubled from 77 in the first year to 210 at the end of March this year.

Women can refer themselves to the center or it can be done by a medical professional or other gambling organization.

Harp Edwards, the center’s manager, said the women being treated here need the “highest level” of support as they may be self-harming or suicidal.

“They feel it’s the last straw for them, so getting treatment is sort of a last resort,” she says.

During their stay, women have limited access to phones, money and online services and are not allowed to gamble. But the center also limits women’s exposure to everyday life, so “all the stress in the outside world is one of a kind,” says Edwards.

Residential programs are designed around the needs of women.

“I think the importance of having women-only treatment is that women are in a safe space where they can focus on women-only issues,” says Edwards.

The length of stay for women is shorter, just 5 weeks compared to 14 weeks for men. There are also other differences, Edwards said. For example, women want to focus on personal experiences that may have led to gambling and how it affects relationships.

“Men tend to talk about gambling first before they see trauma, but women talk straight about the impact gambling may have had on them,” she says.

The intensive five-week program includes daily therapy and psychoeducational sessions, as well as creative workshops where women are encouraged to express their feelings.

Elissa, 36, admitted she didn’t attend the workshop when she first came here, saying she was “too rigid.” She now jokes that she’s “not rigid, it’s just garbage” to the craft.

She told me that she started gambling on arcade slot machines when she was just nine years old.

She kept it a secret from her friends and family for years, but things got worse when she started gambling online even at work.

“I was gambling in between all my work. If I had been on the phone at work, I would have been gambling,” Elissa says.

“I would come home from work and gamble before the kids and wife came home, and I would take my phone down the toilet while I was taking a bath.”

Since leaving the center, Elissa has moved to another part of the country and is now training to run her own gambling recovery group.

An estimated 22 million people gamble in the UK each month. Statistics from the charity GambleAware show that the number of women receiving support for their gambling addiction more than doubled in her five years, to 1,134 in 2015-16 and 1,134 in 2020-21. She has 2,423 women treated.

Elissa, Caroline and Rebecca all feel there is a need for more regulation in the gambling industry and more treatment programs like this. I am throwing

‘Do they do it because they have a general concern for customers who spend thousands of pounds on their website?’ she asks. “Or is it the law, so we have to implement it?”

The Betting and Gaming Council, representing the UK industry, said in a statement to the BBC: % – Down from 0.2% in the previous year. ”

They added that the industry will donate £110m by next year to tackle harmful gambling and that advertising and sponsorships will have to comply with strict guidelines.

The Birmingham home is the temporary home of the clinic, which will move to a more permanent and larger location in Wolverhampton later this year. At the moment she can only accommodate 5 people at a time.

There are also recovery beds available for those who need longer stays after completing treatment.

This means we can help more women like Rebecca, Elissa, and Caroline.

“Thank you for everything,” Elissa says to the staff. “You taught me how to love myself.”