Want To Bet? Grief Gambling Syndrome

Recently I came upon an article about grief gambling syndrome, something I hadn’t learned about in my masters programs. It brought to mind one of my hospice patients who wanted to know if it was alright for her and her caregiver to go to Atlantic City to the casino. Since hospice is about living as fully as you can for as long as you can even as your disease runs its course, I let her go. She had to promise she was only going to be gone for the day so we weren’t fraudulently billing insurance for her care. Never did I think about whether or not she “had a gambling problem.”

Information about grief gambling syndrome is readily available through Google. What I learned is that, not surprisingly, older people can be more susceptible to compulsive gambling. The parts of the brain that regulate executive decision making begin to fail or dementia sets in, leaving the person more as risk to be taken advantage of. They don’t recognize the risk they’re taking.

Others use gambling to escape loneliness, depression, isolation, or regrets. This is known as escape gambling. It can become as addictive as substances like alcohol and other drugs as it serves to minimize existential pain. In fact, the American Psychological Association declared in 2013 that compulsive gambling is an addiction, not a personality disorder. In some cases people aren’t necessarily escape gamblers, but they like action and excitement and they have a sense that they can beat the system. These gamblers have been around for a long time, but they used to have to go somewhere to gamble. It’s become easier to gamble online, so homebound elderly people can participate right at their own computer. This makes it ever easier to lose everything.

I’ve also read that chronic gambling is linked to many chronic health conditions. These include obesity, heart disease, intestinal problems, fibromyalgia, migraine, depression, insomnia, and stress-related disorders. Unfortunately, some drugs used to treat physical ailments like Parkinsons and restless legs syndrome deregulate parts of the brain and result in increased gambling. Since this syndrome is one I haven’t studied, I won’t pretend to understand the connection between gambling and these diseases but encourage you to research the topic if it applies to you or someone you know.

One source of help is Gamblers Anonymous at www.gamblersanonymous.org/ga/