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Most people can gamble without becoming addicted. The problem is to identify those who can’t gamble socially without falling into the pit of uncontrolled wagering. Next, it’s even a bigger difficulty to get them to avoid gambling before it becomes an addiction. No one knows how – yet. But the experts agree: Giving money to a gambler is like giving alcohol to an alcoholic. If your gambler won’t seek treatment, stand aside or you almost certainly will be drawn into a web of lies spun to support this habit. Of course, you can try to ease the way, but the gambler must want to help him or her.

How can you tell whether someone is a gambling addict? Look for clues: betting slips, casino chips, unexplained big credit card debts, absences from home or work. Here’s how gambling grows into addiction:

•   Phase 1: “Social” gambling. Gambling is done less to be social and more to fill a need. Men need gambling for excitement; women, for escape. Wagers – and wins and losses – will increase.

•   Phase 2: The trigger. A very large win is heady stuff. The gambler feels Lady Luck will repeat the win. This leads to large losses of money and self-esteem.

•   Phase 3: The chase. To pursue wins, the individual places more and more bets. Addiction has set in. Big borrowing begins.

•   Phase 4: The gambler feels out of control and tries to stop, feeling he or she has hit bottom. In debt, the family devastated, gambling stops, then resumes with greater frenzy.

• Phase 5: The gambler bottoms out and finally seeks treatment. It could take years to reach it, but there is yet another bottom, with family and assets gone, a huge debt, and possibly a criminal record. Now treatment is wanted. Few compulsives achieve long-term abstinence, but victory is all the sweeter for those who do.

Says Howard Shaffer, director of the Norman Zinberg Center for Addiction Studies at Harvard, “Gamblers don’t get the sympathy drunks or drug addicts get. We blame alcohol or drugs, which aren’t the cause but rather are the expression of these addictions. Gambling can’t be blamed on a substance, but gambling too expresses an addiction, not an evil personality.”

Compulsive gambling is destructive and costly, and we are doing too little to stop it. Medical and scientific research may yield a solution, some day. But our social attitudes about gambling also could yield a great deal through change, today.

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GENERAL HEALTH