recently announced<\/a> as a contestant on the upcoming season of I\u2019m A Celebrity \u2026 Get Me Out Of Here!, spoke to news.com.au about the gambling addiction he developed while playing for the Canberra Raiders from 2015 to 2019.<\/p>\nBateman said gambling was a common pastime for players at the club at the time, and he estimates roughly half of his teammates also had addictions.<\/p>\n
It was a debilitating pastime, one that cost him about $500,000 during his NRL career.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was horrible,\u201d he told news.com.au when asked how bad things got. \u201cI was literally at the point of suicide. I was at the end of the tracks.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite being a well-paid footballer, Bateman was often broke and had to ask his mum to cover his mortgage for him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think when I was in that place I \u2026 caused a lot of pain, a lot of misery to my loved ones and my family,\u201d he said. \u201cI was like, well I can end my own pain and I can also end all the pain that I\u2019m causing my loved ones.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would not wish it upon my worst enemy,\u201d he continued. \u201cI was in a very, very dark place.\u201d<\/p>\n
So what saved him?<\/p>\n
\u201cI just got to the point where I had two options left,\u201d Bateman told news.com.au. \u201cSeek help or end it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bateman chose what he described as the more difficult option, partly for his mum.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m so close with my mum and my family,\u201d he said as he became emotional. \u201cSorry, I\u2019ll tear up a bit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew that even though I was causing them pain, I knew that they would be in more pain without me.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it probably wasn\u2019t even for me in the end,\u201d he said about his decision to seek help. \u201cIt was probably more so for them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bateman checked into rehab when his NRL career ended and spent years battling to get his addiction under control.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince that day (entering rehab), it\u2019s been five or six years and it\u2019s probably only been in the last 12 to 24 months that things have really gotten to a good place,\u201d he told news.com.au.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn\u2019t horrible the whole time, but there were years of struggle,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Bateman hasn\u2019t been shy about sharing his addiction story, and says he\u2019ll continue to talk about it in a bid to help others who are struggling.<\/p>\n
When asked what advice he\u2019d give others who are battling similar demons, Bateman said, \u201cI would just say to them that they are loved, and we need their love here, not somewhere else, not gone.\u201d <\/p>\n
I\u2019m A Celebrity \u2026 Get Me Out Of Here! premieres on Sunday, January 18 at 7pm on Channel 10<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ex-NRL player turned TikTok star Luke Bateman broke down as he opened up about the darkest period of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":421197,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[221720,221722,202976,64,63,4532,120020,221721,221718,1675,221719,82709,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-421196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-addiction-hell","tag-addiction-story","tag-andrew-bucklow","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-canberra-raiders","tag-dark-place","tag-darkest-period","tag-entering-rehab","tag-gambling-addiction","tag-lifeline-factobox","tag-luke-bateman","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=421196"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421196\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/421197"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=421196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=421196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=421196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}