Ask Allison: ‘My husband told me he had sorted his gambling issues, but now he’s blown money I had saved to fix the house. Can I trust him again?’ -…

Q: I am really struggling with my emotions at the moment. I have a six-month-old baby with my husband of three years. He had issues with gambling in the past but he assured me that it was all firmly behind him. We have plans to do some work on the house and I had a lump sum from a redundancy and some savings to do the work. But now my husband has told me that the money is gone he gambled it. He swears that he will get help but I wonder if I should give him another chance? I had no idea he was lying to me. Will he ever stop gambling? How can I ever trust him again?

Allison replies: Trust, once broken, is hard to fix. Lets imagine trust is like glass, pottery, and a rubber ball. Drop a rubber ball and you can bounce back from it; these are the normal life stressors and disagreements that can be brought to the fore, resolved, or accepted. But when you drop glass it shatters, this can happen with addiction when the trust has been broken too many times.

Perhaps you are at the pottery stage where the trust is broken, but if we think of the Japanese art of kintsugi or golden joinery, they fix broken pottery with gold to show where the vulnerabilities and breaks were with the intent that it can still become something else and develop.

I love this idea, as no one is perfect or without flaw. Everyone makes mistakes and it is possible to change. However, we cant underestimate what it takes to change and that unfortunately is completely out of your control and addiction is never a quick fix.

Sitting with this for a moment, lets bring back what you can control and bring some space back to you. How are you doing? That must have been an awful shock for you. Six months into having a baby is when the weight of the pure exhaustion and continuous lack of sleep or disrupted sleep makes its presence loudly known along with everything else. Post-partum can be a vulnerable time physically, emotionally, and psychologically, and becoming a mum for the first time is life changing. The sense of love and responsibility is on a whole new level.

There are many new fears and worries, and post-partum anxiety can be present and yet less openly discussed than the more commonly known post-natal depression. Add in the rug being pulled from underneath you and I imagine you feel blindsided by this financial infidelity, and it would be only normal to feel angry and betrayed. You had your hopes and dreams for your new future as a family.

As you land in motherhood it can make your head spin as you try to find your feet in a foreign terrain, with many mothers expressing doubt in themselves, their confidence and decision-making.

When you add having a partner who has a gambling problem into the mix, this is when you need to reach out and get the support that you need. You can contact Gam-Anon of Gamblers Anonymous Ireland, which provides support to family members and partners as they live with someone who is gambling. At present, they are providing one-to-one phone support until further changes with Covid. Check out their website for more details gamblersanonymous.ie.

A gambling addiction, or compulsive gambling, is a progressive illness and the compulsion to get pulled back in is so easy even after long periods of not gambling. From your perspective, even though it may feel out of the blue, it might be helpful to look back and see if there are any patterns that lead to periods of gambling.

Does it occur at times of stress or change, are there any other addiction issues with alcohol, drugs, or sex? Have you noticed any changes in his mood or behaviour? At times of gambling is he more distant, not present, or preoccupied? Are there major mood changes in terms of highs or lows of noticeable irritability?

The difficult truth about addiction is that it is up to your husband to get help and that is so hard. He may go and get help now, but until he is ready, the change wont come. That can be so upsetting to everyone, and the frustration can be immense for you and your husband.

One red flag word is that he says he will get help, this is future based, there is no quick one-step solution or answer to your question. Keep the focus on what you can control and create boundaries about what you wont accept.

Seek support and help, but help yourself first. Set out your non-negotiables separate them into financial, emotional and what you wont accept going forward. Wishing you the best of luck.

Helplink has joined forces with the Gambling Awareness Trust to provide a national gambling addiction/gambling dependency counselling service that is available for free; seven days a week and out of hours. For a minimum of six free counselling sessions contact gamblingsupport@helplink.ie or call 0818 99 88 80.

Allison regrets that she cannot enter into correspondence. If you have a query you would like addressed in this column email allisonk@independent.ie

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Ask Allison: 'My husband told me he had sorted his gambling issues, but now he's blown money I had saved to fix the house. Can I trust him again?' -...