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Gambling Addiction: Where to Start

By Chris Beerman, MSW, LCSW, CADC. Gambling and alcohol therapist, Logan Square, Chicago. Reviewed October 27, 2026.

A gambling problem doesn't always look like everything falling apart. Most of the people I see are still working, still paying the bills, still showing up for their families. What has changed is private: the chasing, the apps deleted and downloaded again, the transfers nobody else knows about, the promise to stop that didn't hold.

I'm a gambling and alcohol therapist in Chicago's Logan Square, and I see clients in person and by secure video across Illinois and Minnesota. This page is the front door to everything I've written about gambling: where to start, which guide to read next, and what the numbers in Illinois actually look like. You don't have to read all of it. Start with the question below.

Start with the question

If you're not sure whether what you're doing counts as a problem, that's the place to begin. The free test is nine questions and takes about two minutes. Your answers are scored in your browser and never sent anywhere, not even to me.

Take the Free Gambling Addiction Test

If you'd rather read than answer questions, start with Do I have a gambling problem?, which walks through the ten signs I look for.

The reading path

Sixteen guides, in the order I'd suggest reading them. Each one stands on its own, so skip to whatever fits where you are.

Is this a problem?

1. Do I Have a Gambling Problem? 10 Signs You Shouldn't Ignore. The signs, and what each one looks like day to day.
2. Can Therapy Help Gambling Addiction? What Evidence-Based Treatment Actually Looks Like. What treatment involves, and what the research says works.
3. Gambling Addiction and Mental Health: How It Affects Anxiety, Depression, and Relationships. How gambling and everything around it feed each other.
4. ADHD and Gambling Addiction: Why the Risk Is Higher, and What Helps. Read this one if you've ever been told you're impulsive.
5. Freud Thought Gamblers Wanted to Lose. Was He Right? The oldest theory of why people keep gambling, and what it gets right.
6. Dostoevsky Knew the Trap: Why Winning Doesn't Make Gambling Easier to Stop. Why the big win is often where the trouble starts.

Getting back on your feet

7. How to Stop Chasing Gambling Losses. Chasing is the engine of most gambling problems. This is how it stops.
8. I Gambled Again. What Do I Do Now? How to Stop a Gambling Relapse From Becoming a Spiral. The first hours and days after a slip.
9. Gambling Debt: How to Recover Financially After Gambling Losses. The money, in the order to deal with it.

Other forms of gambling

10. Are Sweepstakes Casinos Gambling? What Illinois and Minnesota Players Should Know. The sites that say they aren't casinos.
11. Whatnot Addiction? When Sports Card Collecting Starts to Feel Like Gambling. Breaks, boxes and live auctions.

Sports betting and prediction markets each have a page of their own: sports betting addiction, where to start and prediction market addiction, where to start. Trading has one too: trading addiction, where to start.

In Illinois and Minnesota

12. How to Self-Exclude From Gambling in Illinois: Casinos, Sportsbooks, Lottery & More. Every program the state has, and how to sign up.
13. How to Stop Playing the Slot Machines in Illinois Bars: A Therapist's Guide to Video Gaming Terminals. The machines no self-exclusion list reaches.
14. Online Gambling Therapy in Illinois: What to Expect From Telehealth Treatment. What a video session is actually like.
15. Online Gambling Therapy in Minnesota: What Treatment Actually Looks Like. Including what the state will pay for.
16. Gambling Addiction in Chicago: Signs, Treatment Options, and Where to Get Help. The local picture.

Every self-exclusion program in both states, and the gaps between them, is on gambling self-exclusion, where to start; Minnesota has no statewide program, so here's how to block gambling there anyway. For how state-funded, private and residential care compare in Illinois, see gambling treatment in Illinois.

Every gambling post, newest first

The numbers behind it

If you've wondered why the machines and the apps are everywhere, the numbers explain it.

I keep the full picture, updated quarterly, on Illinois gambling statistics, with separate pages for video gambling, casinos, sports betting and the protection gap index, which compares what the state takes in with what it spends on treatment.

If you'd rather talk than read

Reading helps some people decide. Others need to say it out loud to someone who won't flinch. That's what the free 15-minute consultation is for: tell me what's been happening, ask whatever you want to ask, and we'll figure out whether working together makes sense. You don't need to have decided anything before the call.

Schedule a Free 15-Minute Consultation

What therapy looks like, what it costs and which insurance I take is on the gambling addiction therapy page. If someone you love is the one gambling, start with help for partners and families and the partner gambling test.

If you need help right now

Last reviewed October 27, 2026. This page is general information, not medical advice, and it doesn't create a therapist-client relationship.