Screening for PTSD, Depression, & GAD

People who are struggling with gambling may also experience other mental health challenges such as negative thoughts and emotions. These thoughts and emotions could have existed before the gambling issues became apparent. However, they also could be caused by the distress from gambling problems.

With our research at The Gambling Clinic^®, we have found that there are three common challenges that people with gambling problems struggle with:

1. Depression
2. Anxiety
3. Post-traumatic symptoms

Let’s explore each of these.

Everyone experiences times of sadness, depression, or feeling down. These temporary spells of  depression are normal and may be a response to lots of life stress: difficulties between you and your  partner, days where nothing seems to go right, or family problems. When a depressed mood lasts for  more than two weeks and interferes with your daily life, it can become a problem.

Typically, people who  are more severely depressed also experience sleep problems (too much sleep or difficulty staying  asleep), trouble concentrating, loss of interest in your usual activities, and negative thoughts about  yourself. If you are concerned about your level of depression, you may wish to complete this brief  questionnaire, which will gauge your level of depression.

Anxiety can be common for many people who experience gambling problems. The most typical form of anxiety-based problems is uncontrolled worry, or “generalized anxiety”. Generalized anxiety can be difficult to recognize, as we all worry sometimes. Two things make generalized anxiety different:

1. It is persistent and lasts at least 6 months or longer.
2. The worry is accompanied by other kinds of problems like muscle tension, feeling on edge, irritability, finding yourself planning for the worst, and trouble handling uncertainty.

Generalized anxiety can cause chronic feelings of anxiety and nervousness since it is very difficult to control the worry. If worry is interfering with your daily life, you may wish to complete this brief questionnaire to gauge your level of generalized anxiety.

A third challenge that we see among people with gambling problems relates to life changing events that have a negative impact on your life. If this describes you and if the event is still troubling you this can amplify problems that you have with gambling.

For some people, the experience of a really difficult event can result in Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). PTSD is a condition that involves problems such as:

• Unwanted thoughts about the event
• Avoiding places or people that remind you of the event (or even avoiding thinking about it)
• Feelings of jumpiness
• Not feeling safe with other people
• And having overly negative thoughts about yourself, others, and the world.

It’s important to remember that by age 40, most of us will have experienced at least one terrible life event; not all of these events are necessarily traumatic in the true sense of the word.

Within the mental health field, traumatic events include those that involve exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence. Most of us are able to recover from brief problems that may stem from these experiences. But when an event is traumatic, beyond our control, and significantly changes how we view ourselves and the world, there is a chance that PTSD may develop.

The symptoms of PTSD can significantly impact a person’s life in many ways. If you think that you may be experiencing PTSD, you may wish to complete two brief questionnaires, to help you understand yourself a bit better.