Gambling and running - Episode 5

Series One - Why Run? podcast - 15th April 2022

Graham joined the army when he was 23 and started running then. At this time, he says he had a “love-hate” relationship with running, as everything about the training was outside his control: how far he went, what pace he went, what weight pack he had to carry etc. 

 Graham was in the army for five years and had postings to Germany and Afghanistan before being demobbed. Looking back, Graham now says that he was “a horrible person” at this time. “I used to scoff at the unfit ones. I think I put myself on a bit of a pedestal, because I was stupidly fit”.

 Graham ran his first half marathon soon after and achieved a personal best, which he’s never matched since, despite dedicated training in recent years. “It’s mad, as at this time, I was drinking, smoking and didn’t even have the right trainers,” he laughs.

Graham first started gambling in the army, playing poker with his friends. It was when he started playing on his own against other people in the world and then later, against the computer that “things got really out of hand, really quickly” says Graham and he ended up with debts of several thousand pounds. When he opened up to his wife, Amanda, about what he’d done though, she bailed him out, and Graham said he’d stop gambling.

 After moving house though, Graham entered a self destructive phase. “I was gambling, I was cheating and I was not a nice person to be around.” Graham found some companionship in gambling, as he didn’t have any friends in the area they’d moved to.

When Graham was a child, he was bullied, and the determination, discipline and sheer bloody-mindedness he possesses - and used to overcome earlier difficulties in life - were a double-edged sword. With gambling, they made him refuse to quit.

“I got into a big, big hole,” he explains. “I’m quite good at poker, but when you’re playing on a computer, against a computer, you don’t realise that it’s rigged. You end up chasing losses. I started playing the fruit machines to make up some money, and that’s when things got really bad. That’s the devil’s work. It’s evil. My money vanished in seconds.”

 Graham lost thousands of pounds. The Government has now outlawed gambling on credit cards, but at this time, he was able to build up thousands of pounds worth of debt on different credit cards to fund has gambling addiction. 

“When you’re paid a good wage like I am, they just threw credit cards at me, I didn’t buy anything though, it all just went in to the ether.” 

At this stage, Graham was chasing losses constantly and he was bouncing money off from one credit card to pay another. “It’s not the way to go at all and it took me to a very dark place.”

 In desperation, Graham tried to drive his car into a truck, but stopped at the final moment and didn’t go through with it, as he thought what would happen to the poor truck driver. Instead, he pulled off the motorway and phoned the Samaritans. Eventually after about half an hour he got through and the man said: “Go home, and tell everything to your wife.” Graham went home and confessed about all his self-destructive behaviour, which included affairs and nastiness - as well as his gambling.

 After few months, Graham felt frustrated that his wife had sorted everything out and tried gambling again and it was then that Graham’s wife kicked him out - unable to take anymore . 

 Graham then called Gamcare, who stopped all his cards and he signed up for five years to stop him gambling. They also put him on to counselling straight away. He was £40,000 in debt and in one-to-one sessions, Graham learnt so much about why he felt like he did and why he did what he did. He talked about what had happened in his childhood, and then later on in his life, and it made him realise that once he understood the reasons why he gambled, it would help him stop. Counselling opened Graham’s eyes to many thngs, but mainly his refusal to quit. 

In counselling, Graham saw an advert for CALM – the Campaign Against Living Miserably – which is aimed predominantly at men. He got in contact and ran his first marathon for them. 

 Graham says he’s now 100 per cent a different person. He now embraces his bloody-mindedness but points it toward something positive and says it has made him more rounded, made him feel better about himself and forgive himself. 

 Graham now runs ultra runs, crazy challenges and marathons to raise money for charities. “I have a gift and I use it for good. I can go the other way, but what a bloody waste.”

 Running in the mountains keeps Graham grounded and allows him time to think and his mind to wander. “Nowadays we don’t allow ourselves time to be calm and rest. We’ve got everything coming at us constantly: the telly, the phone, the tablet. If you give yourself time and let nature do it’s things, it’s amazing especially when I go to Brecon Beacons. My wife laughs that she’s going to bury me there.” 

  Graham still plays a game of cards with his friends in the house, but he won’t bet online. “I can live now with losing a pound or a fiver, but I’m not putting my house or my life or anything else at risk.”