1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - Choices Treatment Center: Gambling Problem pt. 1-March 14th

Episode Date: March 14, 2022

Choices Treatment Center: Gambling Problem pt. 1-March 14th Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It's time to go one-on-one with D.P. Coming at you live from the Coppull Chevrolet GMC Studios, here is your host, Derek Pearson, presented by Beatrice Bakery, on 937 The Ticket and the Ticket FM.com. Welcome everybody to one-on-one. Thank you for joining us today. 402-464-5, the starter-hameymeant text line, on the Lincoln Hotline if you want to call in.

and we want to text in. But we have company. And the reason why, and it's important, and folks know me, you know that I'm not a better. That's on purpose. A lifetime full of being around sports and seeing what happens when it is done without boundary, control, or responsibility.

And so today, we think it's a good thing with Selection Sunday yesterday. that everybody have this conversation. So I've asked Jake Sorensen to sit in as well because I want this to be a stationwide conversation. I want folks outside of this space, particularly as well, to carry this thing through. So Jake, come on in and let the folks know. How does this meeting of the minds happen? How does this group, how do these two folks get to you?

Well, we are joined in studio by Deb Hammond, the director of Choice of Treatment Center in Lincoln and Mike Chandra, also the education outreach coordinator at Choice of Treatment Center. And we were just talking back in February how it's important, like you said, D.P., that this is a big time of the year where the sports books get busy and people make bad decisions because they get excited about what can come from their great minds they have, and all that leads to problems and trying to get out of the hole. And that's why we have Deb and Mike here today to talk about that. And we thank you guys for joining us today.

This is obviously a huge week for you guys trying to talk about problem gambling awareness this whole month in general. So I'll start with you, Deb, as the director of the Choice of Treatment Center. What goes on this month to you guys and how important is it for you guys to get the message out there about the importance of being smart with the whole gambling concept? It's a very big deal because over the pandemic, we have seen a 30 to 60% increase with online gaming. And that is not primarily adults.

That's a combination of three years and up that can get on their cell phones and have at it. So even though it's around March gambling awareness month, it's a big deal all the way across the country throughout our state. And as we look at legalizing and now, we've already legalized, sorry. Right. the casinos, we're going to have sportsbook in Nebraska. And that's close.

There's licenses being issued now and probably going to see our first one within the next three months opened as far as a casino. What does, we understand the business behind it. But I think what gets lost sometimes is the psychology behind it. right why people are drawn to this and it's purposeful and it's in its draw and it's magnetic power Mike you can speak to this what is it that makes it so appealing to people even when we know deep down that it generally has a negative outcome well first thing I can tell you all is that I am a problem gambler I'm in recovery but I mean for over 20 years I was had a very serious issue with it. And it was all sorts of different forms of gambling. But the big thing for me is

that it was, first of all, it was something that was just a part of my family. Is that something we grew up? My family went to the casinos, did all sorts of different things as far as gambling. It was part of our regular conversations. So it was very normalized in my home. But then from there, you know, as I got older and more responsibilities, more family, more money needed, you You know, that just that cycle starts where you start betting, then you get behind, and then you start trying to catch up, trying to chase. And that's, you just get into a cycle where you're either, it almost comes across as like, it can almost manifest it in like a bipolar sort of sense, you know, as far as you get the

mania of the rush of gambling, the rush of winning, and then the low lows of losing. And it gets to a point where it's just like any other addiction, any substance. abuse, anything like that, that you're just chasing that high all the time. And you'll do anything to chase that high. And it's very similar in far as look and feel to a substance abuse or any other addiction. Deb, how does this, you know, within treatment for this, how much of the focus is on the things that lead you there rather than the reaction to after you've already involved yourself? Marketing, there's some high-level branding and psychological marketing that goes on to get people to

the window and online to the sites. How much time do you spend dealing with it and how? Well, actually, I'm going to probably have Mike address that a little bit, but I do want to clarify something with all of us because 80% of the population can gamble normally. It's the 20% that can't or the 20% that's going to be affected. And so a rule of thumb used to be that an addict would affect seven to 10 people. Gamblers, problematic gamblers affect 50 or more individuals because they're borrowing money, they're out there trying to chase that bet. So when you asked about the importance of it,

I wish I could put the articulate the words to tell everybody the pain that's there for the ones that can't. But for those groups of individuals who can gamble normally, they need to maintain what that normalcy looks like. I mean, the minute you start to lie or you're stealing money or you're crossing that line of spending monies that are not disposable incomes, then there's a problem already happening. And so our upbringings are huge. I mean, we are a product of our environment sometimes. We have to break those cycles.

So back to Mike as far as your actual question. Okay. Mike? I mean, as far as it goes for me, it was a matter of, I mean, in treatment, we broke it down right away. First of all, I was very fortunate. I was treated through choices. And so I'm going to be pro choices. But any counselor would go through the same process, I feel like, as far as we started out just kind of examining my life, you know, doing a timeline of where this whole, where the behavior started, what it looked like.

And I feel like it would be the same with any addiction treatment. But we really kind of started out just with that timeline breaking your life down, you know. Because for me, the life that I lived seemed normal to me from the time I was accused. kid all the way through being an old man that I am now. You know, it was just normal for me and for me to actually sit down and go through a timeline, go through just breaking down step by step year by year, kind of what my life looked like. It realized, hey, this isn't normal behavior. You don't have to live like this moving forward.

And that's what got me into treatment in the first place is that I was just exhausted. I was truly living a double life between what I was doing from the gambling side of me versus who I was trying to portray myself to be to the outside world. And that exhaustion, I knew it was wrong all along. I knew what I was doing wasn't right. So for me to actually have someone help me understand that, help break it down for me, really made all the difference in the world. Deb, what's the thing that allows you to get up and do this every day?

Because you're watching battles, victories, losses. What's the thing? 36 years ago, I stopped sports gambling myself. Right, right. That's usually, and within these spaces, there usually has to be a rock bottom. Well, you can call it rock bottom or you can call it, you've lost everything. I mean, you don't have anything left, whether it be financially, emotionally, mentally, unfortunately, 7% of the individuals that we treat have had some suicidal ideation.

And obviously, when we want to prevent the actual successful suicide. if we can intervene faster or if individuals like Mike or somebody who has a problem, I would much rather treat that early on than to have them be at their rock bottom place. I would much rather do a lot of preventative educational pieces. I can guarantee you that most sports gamblers of, say, 12 to 20, they're going to tell you they know that, what, odds, but I don't necessarily think they understand what the odds are and how directly they can be affected by that. Should that be the messaging, though, that, look, this is not a winning proposition at all.

Like, it just isn't. No, it is. The odds are not in favor of the gambler or there wouldn't be gambling, you know. But again, it's set out there to be for entertainment purposes. It is not designed, as you stated earlier, that it is business. I mean, business is business. But at the same time, there's an obligation and a moral obligation that each and every one of us have to take. Because the last thing on earth we want to see is somebody financially devastated or they lose their family or they end up committing suicide.

We have to be proactive in saving and talk about this. This is a public health issue. And we're putting our heads in the sand. It's a community issue. Yes. That affects workload. It affects family, how people engage in the community, responsibilities, all of those things. And I, we jokingly, Jake and I have had this conversation that as a part of what we do,

I'm asked to predict and suggest. And I run away from it in full. He did today. He did this morning. Like in full because I understand, one, what it does to, the person, then it understands at a greater level and expand a level. You said if it affects 50 people outside of the person who's making a decision, what I would ask is how do you, what is the reach?

What is, what's the plan to get into the dark corners to get people to admit and understand that they need help? It's okay to need help, which is probably almost as important for people to feel like it's okay to not be okay in this space. You said a mouthful there. For us, for choices in particular, I met with my bookkeeper and my CPA and I just said, you know what, we had to do something because we're not getting the message out there.

Our calls are up because we go out and we do an outreach piece. So therefore hiring Mike as the marketing director made sense to me. recovery and marketing go hand in hand. Individuals are more apt, if they hear somebody talk about it, they're more apt to reach out. Also, we're dealing with a different type of gambler. The gambler in my age, you know, I'm over the top here, 36 years, not gambling, but, you know, you look at the gambler today and it's all, it's technical. It's all online for the most part, or you go into the casino and you place your bet and then you leave normally. That's not where it is today.

It's so much online and it's so ready accessible and there's so much done whether they're at work or whether they're at home. And, you know, there's a lot of time that's escaped from tracking. Tracking is easier, right? Now you can follow games and now you get more information on games that maybe aren't local to you or convenient to you. But that also leads to the obsession piece of it too, which I think is a huge part of the addiction in general. And that's something that it has become an obsession with a lot of people out there.

And it isn't even just your normal betting. It can be your daily fantasy. It can be anything here. It can get to that obsessive point. And that's where the addiction, the really disordered part of it comes into play. Like that, you mentioned the word that triggers, fantasy. The fantasy betting. has made it, it used to be a Sunday thing, right? It was a Sunday thing. And then it became a college

football thing. So Saturdays are now involved. And now, then there's a Sunday night game, a Monday night game, a Thursday night game. Every day of the week. Every day of the week. Now with baseball, now you can bet on pitches, you can bet on lacrosse, you can bet on foreign sports that don't even exist in your space. Cricket. Right, like all of it, right, like for all of it. So in the messaging, how do you attack? Because you have to attack this.

You can't be passive in letting people know that you're here for him. You're there for them. I wish we could be a little bit more aggressive. Right. In our wording, I think we offend people when we become aggressive, though. So, you know, reaching out, we're starting to move back into the school. We will be talking with hopefully junior high and level and up. Honestly, I think we need to be talking to.

Which you need to say that again. So people understand how deep this thing runs. Junior high level and up. I would really think that quite frankly, we need to be in the elementary schools and just talking about it because kids see their parents. They see their uncles, their aunts, their friends. And I'm not saying that it is all done at home because it's not. Honestly, our statistics show us in the state of Nebraska that the majority of individuals learned how to gamble from a friend.

Oh, absolutely. Not from a parent. But I do have a lot of clients in the past and most currently another individual who learned it from a grandfather, innocently. He could do fractions at five. You go to the horse track, you know. You used to go play Kino and you'd go with your parents and Kino, Keno, glorified bingo. Is what that is to me. It really is.

My family, look, my mom, Gailup, rest of soul. But that was a thing that her and my sisters would do. And it provided stress. Like, it created drama. And I just said, oh, I didn't identify that as gambling. Well, that's the other misconception. Most people in the state of Nebraska don't identify that we have gambling. gambling because we don't have a casino.

Lottery. But we have the lottery. Tickets. Yes. Like lottery tickets. There are people who are religious about it. And I think those conversations in this space, especially in the sports space. And I use that as the jump ball for gambling because they're tied together so uniquely.

Televised card play, poker tournaments as such. televised pool tournaments. I had a friend who bet on bowling. Wow. Yeah, pro bowling. And I went, wow. And then I have a friend who he literally bets on pro wrestling. And I just, it took him saying, is this weird?

Like he actually just confess. He said, okay, is this really weird? Is this really bad? And that's when the conversation really begins, when somebody says, I'm accepting that this is not normal and this is not good. If you have to ask yourself that question, you have a problem. It's the thing. So for middle school kids, how do you reach them? Are the educators a boundary?

Is it just the families? Is it the teachers that recognize that the young person is going through some sort of change or stress, how do you approach that? Let me, I'll chime in here because I'm the dad of a middle schooler right now. So I see it firsthand is that just mental health issues in general at that age are skyrocketing. And these teachers are aware of what's going on. They know what's going on in their classrooms. And it's not necessarily everything that they see kids all day that are stuck to their phones.

And my daughter tells me about how people are making TikToks during class. They're doing different things on their phones all day. And that includes things as far as games, as far as playing games, as far as which can lead into betting and stuff like that. The main thing at that age is to really set that behavior and just make sure you're not obsessive about any behaviors that are going to isolate yourself. And, I mean, a lot of what we do on our phones these days isolate yourself overall. So I think that's a good place to start is working with that.

We don't have to go into the nuts and bolts necessarily of gambling. just those behaviors in general. If we can get away from those obsessive behaviors, then work into the gambling piece of it as well. I think that's where you really hit home with your middle school students and their teachers. As a coach, and I've been in high schools all of America, and the phone engagement and the phone boundaries set by parents

who pay for said phones, this is important to understand. Should parents think, do I need to go through the apps, Do I need to go through the phones? Do I need to, or simply, is it just asking the question? Is this something that appeals to you or that you're interested in? Well, I don't think it's wrong at all to sit down and talk to your children. Actually, quite frankly, the NCAA brackets are going to come out in the paper,

and it's family fun and entertainment. You pick those. I know several families that get together and do that. This is our opportunity to talk, though. Talk about the odds. Teach them what the odds are. There's nothing wrong in teaching what the odds. are life is a gamble it's it's how we we choose to set those boundaries I will say this in

defense of Lincoln Public Schools they have been very good to us in the past and with the pandemic we we had to stop but I think it will pick back up again especially on the high school level the consumer family science classes they bring us in they allow us to come in they allow us to screen they allow us to do a survey with those individuals and undoubtedly every class there will be at least one student who won't have a story to tell us from either their family background or knowing a friend who has a problem. I don't remember the exact date. It was probably four or five years ago where Omaha had the student that was in junior high that was collecting bet at the school, I believe,

on the brackets. That's mind-blowing. I'm sorry, that's fire-blowing. In some ways that, because gamblers are very high intelligence level. Yeah. No doubt. They have to be. Sometimes in order to stay ahead of the game with chasing for the monies, obviously, borderlines between criminal behavior and thinking. Oh, there's some bullying.

Absolutely. At a high volume because of this. Like that's the, when you talk about junior high and high school kids, when the betting mentality becomes how they live, then the collections of said and the running from the evading the avoiding and the lies that have to happen how do you address that what's the messaging to tell a young person listen if you're if you're telling lies to do this you probably shouldn't be doing it how do you handle that because that's that's a little tough that's a little tough for a 12 year old 13 year old to hear but how do you

handle it i think just what you just said right there just being as one and honest about it as possible because they know, I mean, my daughter knows that 14, she's known it for years, that if it's something that she doesn't feel comfortable telling me about, there's probably something wrong with it. And it doesn't matter if she spilled something in the living room or if she saw a friend doing something that they weren't supposed to or she went to a party or whatever it is. She knows that if she can't tell me about it and can't be honest about,

there's something wrong with it. And we need to be the same way regarding phone usage, whether it's something gambling related, whatever it is. Just having that conversation, having that open dialogue with our kids about all of this stuff is just key. Average onset age in Nebraska for gambling is eight to ten years of age when they have been. That's literally what I was going to ask. That's where. That's literally what I was going to ask you.

Like how early are the signs when do parents need to really start to engage? That's when they're introduced to gambling. Problematic and disordered gambling, I can't even tell you. That is heartbreaking. Because we don't have enough statistics to show us that. Our gamblers assistance program is just getting up and running really well to where they have this website that you can go to. And then there's a number there for people to call. There's screening and there's symptoms of problem gambling.

But this comes back to the basics of parenting. I'm just, I have kids. Everybody in this room knows a child. So this again, as I've said before, you said community, I say public health issue. It is a huge issue because it is so commonly and it is so easily acceptable. You know, it's just a little bit. It's just a little bit. Okay, is marijuana a little bit of marijuana?

And then we take on to the next drug is alcohol, a little bit of alcohol. And then we go to the shots. From the shots, we move up to the beers, you know, the mix. Whatever it is, there has to be boundaries. There has to be communication. There has to be a level of acceptance on what's tolerable. When we talk about, we need to talk to children about this. Unfortunately, we have households that don't have meals together anymore.

We have households that almost all the parents are working two jobs to make ends meet. You know, you've got your individuals that we have to juggle our schedules at home as to one's work in this shifts, one's work in this shift, and who's going to do this with the kids and who's going to do this with the kids and who's, who's going to do that. And keeping the kids active. I think it's very important to keep kids active. And the kids will tell you. Children love to talk. Oh, they can't wait to tell you who they are.

Deb Hammerman and Mike Saundra, Choices Treatment Center, Lincoln. Have we identified why people gamble? It's fun. It's entertaining. Right? I mean, that, that, that, and the things that are fun to us, are often risky to us. Is it the thrill of it that you have to deal with and manage?

Is it the consequences of said thrill that you have to manage from? Are you managing proactively or reactively? All of those are questions. Which one's the most difficult to answer? Reactive or proactive? So somebody comes to you and says, I want to keep my child from doing this. How do I do it?

Or is it simply in dealing with the choice made already? I think there's an education piece to it is where it should start. I mean, you want to have some proactivity there with it just as far as having a conversation. I know I'm very open about my past and my experiences. So I've had the conversation with my daughter, letting her know kind of what I've went through.

This is it, yeah. And this is just lay it out there, you know. She's at the age now where she understands it. And it's a matter of, and this is with anything. Anything can become problematic. If you lose control over it and it becomes an obsessive part of your life, it can be food, it can be gambling, it can be substance abuse, whatever it is. Just being able to have that conversation, just knowing, hey, if something gets out of control with you, that's not right. You know, you can do everything in moderation.

but once it gets past that point, that's when you need to start reflecting and looking back and start talking to other people. And it comes back to that communication piece. I'd love to ask you all, everybody in the room. We've talked about it from the parent standpoint, but just as important and maybe as volatile is the spouse significant other aspect.

So Jake, how would you? I just look, just look, just. to see how you would deal with how I would more likely ask you how she would deal with you um but better question better question but what are the steps for a spouse significant other and identifying realizing accepting assisting the person in their life well first of all if if they're not if money doesn't add up at home depending on how they handle their monies because lots of families don't put their monies together anymore. They have their money, his money, her money, kids' money.

So money is the tool that is used to gamble with. But the minute there's a lie or there's absenteeism, can't make this or can't make that event, those are little tell-tale signs, obviously hiding their phones or not allowing somebody else to see their phones. If they're married, they should have access to each other's. phones. Oh, that's going to cause fights for listeners today. Yes. I just say you just opened up a can of worms. Yeah. You just set that off.

I get that. But if we're being totally honest about it's, that's why you have the discussion. Absolutely. Why do you think it's so hard for parents to talk to kids? It's because they're doing it themselves. Yeah, it's a very hard for them talk to each other. It's a very difficult process when you go gamble over here, but then your children want to gamble. How do you do that?

I think from a spouse point, I just want to put up this one point because I'm actually in a class right now. I'm taking classes to become a certified gambling counselor. And I just got done with one for about significant others. And the biggest thing they talk about in there is that spouses a lot of times are relieved when they find out that their significant other is gambling because they thought it was cheating. Yeah, it's like, oh, it's just money. It's because it manifests in a lot of the same way. you know, that dishonesty, that absenteeism, all that sort of stuff, it looks very similar. They are having an affair.

Male or female, you're having an affair with gambling, like it or not. You're not paying attention to that home. And that is, and that's why when Mike said that, that is something that was taught many, many years ago, that the spouses that finally came out and actually asked for help, which is why Nebraska, when we legalized the lottery, we actually put in legislation that family members, and concerned others can have treatment at no cost as well as the gambler because it is those individuals that are affected the most it's not the gambler we can stop the chaos with that but we can't we can't make somebody forgive somebody for lying to them we can't we can't make up the

monies that's been lost the time that's been lost that takes a joint collaborative effort and and for individuals that are going to be successful in this their their support system has got to be great. It has got to be encompassed by people that understand. So working with our biggest intakes right now, our largest number of intakes right now, is not the gambler themselves. It is the family member. They've heard an ad or they've seen something and they reach out for help. And then it's an intervention process from that point on. It becomes, okay, what are you going to do to raise that bottom? Because you have to stop the enabling. If you're the spouse that's enabling and you don't even know you're enabling until you stop the chaos,

long enough, then we can get that other person in. We can get the problem. It's the tracking and identifying before the 23rd hour, right? Where, hey, I'm really in trouble to get to that point before it gets there. I think, look, for whatever vices we all have, I think if we all learn one to have the communication to identify it, but then finally, we're moving the stigma of it. Right. Oh, what are people going to think when they find out that I didn't have control of this thing or that I didn't have the money or I didn't have the resources? Removing the stigma is a huge part of the treatment, I would imagine. Embarrassment is the number one reason that people don't present for treatment. It has nothing to do with money. It's embarrassing. And we do have to be able to accept this. We don't have any choice. We are full, full blown gambling now in the state of Nebraska. So like it or not,

We had it before the majority of it before with our phones and access to the computers. But now to have them locally is even more important for us to be able to talk. And like I will reiterate this till hell freezes over. Sorry. You're good. You're good. That 80% of the population can gamble normally. We have an obligation to the 20% of the individuals to not let it get to a point where we have either a suicide or we have a family break up.

I mean, that is extremely important to us and that is probably the lead message for Mike is to give people the opportunity and let them know that there's help. One thing that gap has changed, which I think is extremely important for us and it's going to work very well for Mike in the future, is when you call the helpline, you actually talk to a live counselor in Nebraska now. and there's on the website you can actually go on and you can there's two interviews that are being that you can watch two individuals that are in recovery are they share a little bit about their story and about hope and about how treatment worked and here's a number we want people to call before they're 150, 200,000 dollars in debt we want them before their 20 30 credit cards or online checks

you know we got rid of the check cashing places in the in Lincoln but we didn't get rid of the banks that offer the overdraft protection at $35. They're online now. And then you got them online and you can easy access to cash online. So there's a lot of hurdles. There's a lot of barriers. But there's also help. And that is the most important piece for me is that somebody can listen to somebody else's

story. Because if you hear somebody else and you know what they went through, then they in turn can begin that process. Now, bring in that mental health and bring in that substance abuse piece also because you have to treat from a holistic approach because over 50% of treatment

for substance abuse individuals in the state of Nebraska indicate that there's at least 25% of those individuals that have a gambling problem. They're just not being screened for it. So we need to all work collaboratively together to treat. I'm going to ask you two to stay.

We're going to go to break real quick, pay some bills and come back. I want to go into how folks can reach you, how they can find you, and then the steps that are required to make this stuff work and make it happen. With order to break here on 101, 937, The Ticket. Download our app by searching 93.7 the ticket in your app store. You're listening to One-on-One with DP on 937 the Ticket in the Ticketfm.com.