prop bets<\/a>, which are opportunities to bet on an individual play or a player statistic. Experts say by adopting the look and style of video games, the apps are also particularly attractive to younger men.<\/p>\n\u201cIt\u2019s truly apples and oranges, as far as what gambling looks like today versus what it looked like even 10 years ago,\u201d Mr. Sciandra said.<\/p>\n
When Mr. Everett quit betting for six months in 2023, an app offered him credit every week, called fantasy free play. If he won, the credit turned into cash. If he lost, he owed nothing. One day he decided to put $5 on a fantasy basketball team he created.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut then I did it the next day, and it turned into \u2018I\u2019ll just do five bucks at night,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cAnd then it turned to, \u2018Well, I will do 20.\u2019 It\u2019s a slow progression to a fast progression, really quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Search for Help<\/p>\n
By 2024, Mr. Everett was 29, with no car and no job. His wife had kicked him out of his house, and he was attending three or four Gamblers Anonymous meetings a week, often virtually. But none of it quite clicked.<\/p>\n
Then, late last year, someone suggested he try a new weekly meeting, affiliated with G.A., just outside Denver. Started by a former mixed martial arts fighter, the group was nicknamed the Young Person\u2019s Gamblers Anonymous. It was a different kind of group in one key way: It catered mostly to people whose problems stemmed from online sports betting apps.<\/p>\n
On the surface, it used the same 12 steps, the same books. It even took place in a church building. But to Mr. Everett, it felt different. It wasn\u2019t just that the others understood the lingo (though they did). Or that they had also hit rock bottom (though they had). It was that they dressed and talked like him. They laughed more. Most of them had gotten into gambling after 2018 and had crashed out only in the previous year.<\/p>\n
Jamie Glick, the president of the Problem Gambling Coalition of Colorado, a nonprofit organization that connects gamblers with treatment, says that recognizing yourself in the people around you is a crucial element to effective recovery, and one that\u2019s often missing from therapy and support groups.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis addiction happens in isolation,\u201d said Mr. Glick. \u201cIt\u2019s once people find community that things change.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the meetings, Mr. Everett said he was more honest than he had been before. He told them about how he stole from his father and girlfriend. How he once told an aunt that he was collecting money for a birthday gift and then gambled it away. How he scared his wife.<\/p>\n
These days, there are dozens of people at every meeting. But the support extends beyond that. Mr. Everett plays basketball on the weekends with Ben A. and Matt F., two other members of the group who requested to be identified only by their first name because of concerns about their reputations. Others play pickleball or golf. And they text a lot.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur rent went up 900 a month \u2014 I have been having panic attacks again,\u201d Mr. Everett wrote one day in September, adding: \u201cBut I\u2019m staying clean.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cStay strong,\u201d Matt replied. \u201cYou\u2019re in the best position of your life. Let\u2019s stick with it. I\u2019ll give you a call later.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr. Everett has been sober for 18 months, he said, and still doesn\u2019t trust himself with a credit card. Most recovering gamblers do relapse. But this time, he\u2019s more confident that he can stay sober.<\/p>\n
In early summer, Mr. Everett got together with Ben and Matt at a driving range. They laughed, hit golf balls, poked fun at each other and had a couple of beers. After a while, Matt pulled out a phone to watch the N.B.A. Western Conference Finals. The Oklahoma City Thunder were routing the Timberwolves, Mr. Everett\u2019s favorite team.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is so bad!\u201d Mr. Everett moaned.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwenty-two points,\u201d Matt agreed, looking at the score.<\/p>\n
Mr. Everett sighed. \u201cBack in the day,\u201d he said, \u201cI would have had so much money on this game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then the pair lost interest, turned off the game and headed out. There was no spread to cover, no last-minute fourth-quarter money to be made. They had just been a few buddies, hanging out, watching a game.<\/p>\n
Audio produced by Sarah Diamond.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Growing up in the Midwest, Zach Everett saw gambling as little more than a fun diversion. He\u2019d play…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252503,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[105142,105144,102,1906,6623,11965,105143,56,54,55,570],"class_list":["post-252502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-athletics-and-sports","tag-audio-neutral-informative","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth","tag-mobile-applications","tag-therapy-and-rehabilitation","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-youth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252502"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252502\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}