From the author: Three years ago I gave a report on Gambling, where I examined the nature of its occurrence and ways of fighting it. It was determined that Gambling is a mental illness, geneticists proved that it is a hereditary disease, and treatment methods were proposed such as therapy (individual, group and group of anonymous gamblers) is effective in 55% of cases, behavioral therapy and even drug treatment were considered more effective with up to 60%. While studying the report back then, I was unable to find proven, truly effective methods of curing this disease. And now, three years later, having seen the problem in practice, I want to add some small thoughts to it. If something happens, it means it is beneficial to someone, and in this case you always need to look for who exactly benefits from it! We will talk about Gambling, and actually about people surrounding the players themselves. A lot has been said about Gambling, even more work has been done in order to find ways to cure the ill-fated disease. Both Psychologists and Geneticists are working on the problem, trying to find the gene of heredity. Through joint efforts, many factors contributing to the development of diseases have been identified. Players were identified and divided into types. But to the question why for some people gambling is only entertainment, while others have a painful, pathological attraction that destroys life, there is no clear answer. There are not so many known, truly helpful methods of “treatment”, and as a rule these are trance techniques that can bring out the true cause of addiction. But as a rule, relatives cannot persuade the gamblers themselves to visit specialists; as a result, gamblers remain gamblers, wives are victims, and everything remains as it is. What the gambler himself feels cannot be interpreted at all; not only the desire to play is satisfied there. The game replaces sex, communication, and any, all kinds of entertainment. In truth, someone’s desire to be SOMEONE is satisfied, while for others, on the contrary, NOBODY!!! And how can you want to be “treated” from such pleasure? This is not vodka, which gives you a headache, and it’s not a drug that gives you withdrawal symptoms. This is just a game, we play as children, and we play now! This game is just expensive, and there is more risk. Moreover, I noticed that gamblers have this kind of stereotype: they definitely need to share their winnings with someone, and they, as if spellbound, always pay someone if they win, and pay whoever comes to hand - a security guard, a cashier, or a guy, who always stood nearby and for some reason suggested which buttons to press, in general it doesn’t matter to whom, but I need to share. To the question WHY? - the answer sounds SO NECESSARY... and for the rest of the winnings, you can still play, in the end he will still come home without money, but he will tell everyone how he won yesterday and will be in euphoria for several more days. And to the question WHY PLAY? – none of the players will be able to answer, but they will easily answer the question WHY! And here there are a huge number of possible answers. A visit to women, usually the wives of gambling addicts, prompted me to think, and the stories of how the money of the family budget is spent, and how hard life is for them, make everyone around them feel uneasy. And the question inevitably arises: why live with such a terrible person? The answers are usually standard, “I love but I can’t”, “what about children without a father” and all that sort of thing... But here I would like to say that it is not the player himself who needs help, who plays and feels amazing, but namely to the one who came for help...And I was convinced of this at the next session with a woman who suffers from an addicted husband, when, in response to a request for help, she was offered “holotropic breathing” training for her husband as a way of relief. – Naturally, she couldn’t persuade her husband, and perhaps she didn’t really try, but during a more detailed conversation they came to the conclusion that she began to doubt what he would need after he quit playing. And if it goes even deeper take a look then….