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Sports Betting Addiction: Where to Start

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

Sports betting is the gambling most of my clients bring in, and the one that looks least like a problem from the outside. It's legal, it's on your phone, your friends do it, and the apps are built so that the next bet is always the easiest thing in the room. By the time someone calls me, they've usually deleted the apps more than once and watched one come back by Thursday.

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 sports betting: how to tell whether it's a problem, why it's so hard to stop, what actually works, and what the Illinois numbers look like. Start with the question below.

Start with the question

If you're not sure whether your betting 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 already know, and you want to stop tonight rather than wait for an appointment, the 24-Hour Betting Shutdown Plan walks through the first day step by step: apps, money, accounts, and what to do with the evening.

The reading path

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

Why it's so hard to stop

  1. Parlay Addiction: Why Same-Game Parlays Can Be So Hard to Stop. Five legs hit, one didn't. Why the parlay is built the way it is.
  2. What Your Sportsbook Promo Is Really Saying. Profit boosts, bet insurance, VIP hosts, and what the book already knows about how you bet.
  3. Betting on the Midterms: When Following Politics Turns Into Gambling. The all-day loop of headlines, market checks and trades.

Stopping

  1. How to Stop Sports Betting: A Therapist's Game Plan for Football Season. The long guide. Stopping starts with access, not willpower.
  2. How to Quit Sports Betting When All Your Friends Bet. The group chat is full of parlays and you're trying to quit. What to tell them.
  3. How to Self-Exclude From Gambling in Illinois: Casinos, Sportsbooks, Lottery & More. The Gaming Board list covers casinos and licensed sportsbooks. What it does and doesn't reach.

Betting that doesn't call itself betting

  1. Are Prediction Markets Gambling? Kalshi, Polymarket, Robinhood & the Risk of Addiction. Where event contracts cross into gambling.
  2. How to Self-Exclude From Prediction Markets: Kalshi, Polymarket, Robinhood & More. Your state list doesn't cover them. How to close every door, platform by platform.

Prediction markets have a page of their own: prediction market addiction, where to start. For the wider picture, start at gambling addiction, where to start.

Every sports betting post, newest first

The numbers behind it

If it feels like everyone around you is betting, the Illinois numbers say you're not imagining it.

$15.40 billion wagered on sports in Illinois in fiscal 2026, and $1.48 billion of it lost: about $146 for every adult in the state.

98 percent of the money is bet online, almost all of it on phones.

355 million bets were placed in 2025, about 35 per Illinois adult, and 65 percent of the money goes on in-play, prop and parlay wagers.

The full picture, updated monthly from the Illinois Gaming Board's reports, is on Illinois sports betting data. For every form of gambling in the state, see Illinois gambling statistics.

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

If you need help right now

Illinois gambling helpline: call 1-800-GAMBLER or text GAMB to 833234. Free and confidential, any hour.

National Problem Gambling Helpline: call or text 1-800-MY-RESET (1-800-697-3738).

If you're in a mental health crisis or thinking about suicide, call or text 988.

If you're in immediate danger, call 911.

If you need to stop today, the 24-Hour Betting Shutdown Plan walks through the first day step by step.

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