Change Your Gambling, Change Your Life Strategies for Managing Your Gambling and Improving Your Finances, Relationships, and Health Harvard Health Publications Series

From Howard Shaffer, PhD, a noted expert on gambling addiction, and Harvard Health Publications comes Change Your Gambling, Change your Life, a landmark new book which explains how gambling problems are related to other underlying issues: such as anxiety, mood fluctuation, difficulty with impulse control, and substance abuse problems. Dr. Shaffer offers a series of self-tests to help evaluate the degree of gambling problem and analyze the psychological and social context of the behavior, with specific strategies and approaches for ending the problems with simple tools that anyone can do.

• Explains why many people have a problem controlling their urge to gamble and how that can be corrected
• Includes a toolbox of resources for anyone who wants to stop the vicious cycle of gambling
• Offers advice for avoiding slips and preventing backslides and how to deal with the consequences

With candor and expert advice, Change Your Gambling, Change Your Life provides proven techniques for controlling the urge to gamble.

Preface ix

Acknowledgments xv

Introduction: How to Use This Book 1

Part One How to Begin 9

1 Assessing Your Problems 11

2 Connecting the Dots 23

3 Setting Goals to Help You Change 29

Part Two How to Change 41

4 Getting Your Gambling Under Control 43

5 Anxiety and Gambling 69

6 Mood Disorders and Gambling 103

7 Impulse Control and Gambling 127

8 Substance Abuse and Gambling 155

Part Three How to Stay the Course 187

9 Preventing Relapses 189

Resources and Further Reading 205

References 211

About the Authors 217

About Harvard Medical School 219

Index 221

Howard Shaffer, PhD, a pioneer in the field of gambling addiction, is an associate professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School and the director of the Division on Addiction at the Cambridge Health Alliance. He has an active private practice and consults internationally to a variety of organizations in business, education, human services, law, and government. Ryan Martin, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Department of Health Education and Promotion at East Carolina University. John Kleschinsky, MPH, spent three years at the Cambridge Health Alliance's Division on Addiction and is currently pursuing a DrPH in social and behavioral sciences at the Boston University School of Public Health. Liz Neporent, MA, is an award-winning health and medical journalist who has written fifteen best-selling health titles.