An October 2024 report by USA Today revealed that 450 million adults worldwide engage in “risk gambling.” Simply put, it’s when an individual’s finances, mental health, profession, and personal relationships are severely impacted. Eighty million people suffer from gambling disorders, which, in some cases, take a sinister turn.
These statistics may show the severity of gambling addiction, but the stories you’re about to read paint a grimmer picture of how it affects a person. These accounts are from casino employees, former addicts, and spectators, all of whom took the time to answer a recent Reddit thread.
Most responses are heartbreaking, as they show how menacing a disease addiction can be. Scroll with caution.
#41
As a card dealer, on two separate occasions - with two separate players - I took $100,000 each within a couple hours.
11points
#42
I know someone who won 30k gambling. Went to a car dealership to buy a car. He was like 5k short of the car he wanted. Told them he would be back and then Proceeded to lose all the 30k.
11points
#43
Well I have 16 years in the casino business. I was a dealer for about 3 years and a pit boss for 9.
The saddest thing I had witnessed happened over time. There was a genuinely very nice couple that came in and played Let it Ride. The game is atrocious odds-wise, utterly boring, and I was always miserable dealing it. The woman was in her early 50s, quite overweight, and wheelchair bound and the husband was very thin and mousey. The husband was always the one to play, and the wife would sit behind him. They didn't even bet heavily, but they were there 7 days a week for hours and hours a day, weeks in a row. As time went on they stopped being as nice, to the staff and to each other. They were both obviously not taking care of themselves as they had been...hygenically speaking. Eventually one night, the husband turned around to ask the wife for more money and she absolutely broke down in a shaking, sobbing fit. Just uncontrollably, inconsolable. He was pretty demanding and she was slow handing over the last couple of 20s out of her purse and she said - "Tom this is it....if you lose this we won't eat this month."
I absolutely refused to take the money, called my supervisor over and explained the situation, and thankfully, unlike a lot of joints, they backed that decision up.
That was very early on in my career and it really hit me hard that I had taken 10s of thousands of dollars from those people. If I remember right we evicted them lifetime and connected them with the state problem gambling service.
When I was a pit boss, watching a table in high limit I saw a guy buy in for 5,000 and run it up to about 250,000 by the time I went home. Badass run. So I come back in the next day at 5pm and the guy is still there. Not surprising. The guy has about 125k in chips in front of him so I say oh man Dave took a bit of a thumping while I was sleeping. The pit boss I was relieving was standing off to the side making the *STOP TALKING* gesture so I chuckled and went over to get him relieved. Turns out the guy had given it all back....and was in 350,000 more. Oof.
Probably the craziest thing I had seen in all of those years was a guy, again in high limit (I was there all the damn time once I was a pit boss) who got beat up all night. Just hours of just getting thumped, after a particularly nasty beat on some splits and double downs he said "I lose one more hand I'm s******g on the floor." I informed him that would be a super bad idea and went over to call surveillance and security. It was right at the end of a shoe so this I'm calling while the dealer is shuffling.
Security is up there close, but not too close. Surveillance is watching. First hand out of the shoe dealer 10...peaks ...rolls over the ace.
Quicker than I could blink the dude has his pants down grunting. Gaming commission and security were none to happy arresting the guy...but I was entertained.
The saddest thing I had witnessed happened over time. There was a genuinely very nice couple that came in and played Let it Ride. The game is atrocious odds-wise, utterly boring, and I was always miserable dealing it. The woman was in her early 50s, quite overweight, and wheelchair bound and the husband was very thin and mousey. The husband was always the one to play, and the wife would sit behind him. They didn't even bet heavily, but they were there 7 days a week for hours and hours a day, weeks in a row. As time went on they stopped being as nice, to the staff and to each other. They were both obviously not taking care of themselves as they had been...hygenically speaking. Eventually one night, the husband turned around to ask the wife for more money and she absolutely broke down in a shaking, sobbing fit. Just uncontrollably, inconsolable. He was pretty demanding and she was slow handing over the last couple of 20s out of her purse and she said - "Tom this is it....if you lose this we won't eat this month."
I absolutely refused to take the money, called my supervisor over and explained the situation, and thankfully, unlike a lot of joints, they backed that decision up.
That was very early on in my career and it really hit me hard that I had taken 10s of thousands of dollars from those people. If I remember right we evicted them lifetime and connected them with the state problem gambling service.
When I was a pit boss, watching a table in high limit I saw a guy buy in for 5,000 and run it up to about 250,000 by the time I went home. Badass run. So I come back in the next day at 5pm and the guy is still there. Not surprising. The guy has about 125k in chips in front of him so I say oh man Dave took a bit of a thumping while I was sleeping. The pit boss I was relieving was standing off to the side making the *STOP TALKING* gesture so I chuckled and went over to get him relieved. Turns out the guy had given it all back....and was in 350,000 more. Oof.
Probably the craziest thing I had seen in all of those years was a guy, again in high limit (I was there all the damn time once I was a pit boss) who got beat up all night. Just hours of just getting thumped, after a particularly nasty beat on some splits and double downs he said "I lose one more hand I'm s******g on the floor." I informed him that would be a super bad idea and went over to call surveillance and security. It was right at the end of a shoe so this I'm calling while the dealer is shuffling.
Security is up there close, but not too close. Surveillance is watching. First hand out of the shoe dealer 10...peaks ...rolls over the ace.
Quicker than I could blink the dude has his pants down grunting. Gaming commission and security were none to happy arresting the guy...but I was entertained.
10points
#44
I used to be a "Game Tech" We were glorified helpdesk IT for the machines and we also paid out people's jackpots. It was a small indian casino in rural OK. We would have a guy from Wichita who'd come down and fill our $25 machines with $100 bills and play $75/bet and we'd have to clean 60k out of the cash cassette more than once per night. He would pay random casino guests to run to the convenience store and get stuff for them, then tip them $100 even though they weren't employees. Allegedly dude was DEEP into some real-estate, supposed to be the youngest person to ever get their realtor license in Kansas, and he was old AF.
8points
