My interest in prevention began professionally as an associate dean of students at a college here in Massachusetts in the late 1970s. As a student life dean, I spent much of my time helping students with their own problems in living, most of those problems stemming from alcohol and drug misuse and/or other mental health issues. Feeling woefully unprepared, I began to learn about effective prevention practices and eventually received a certification as a prevention professional. This career path brought me to serving as the training manager of a professional development center for folks in the addictions field in Connecticut and then to owning my own company, The New England Center, where I work in a number of arenas including homelessness, co-occurring disorders, health disparities due to race and ethnicity, meeting the needs of our returning servicemen and women and recovery oriented systems of care. In all of these endeavors, I employ the principles and practices of prevention, an active process of creating conditions and fostering personal attributes that promotes the well-being of people.
My interest in prevention personally began in 1984 with the birth of our daughter and four years later with the birth of our son. Being a parent has been the greatest blessing of my life along with being joined in that endeavor by my best friend of 32 years, my wife.
We have entered the empty-nest years and are find ourselves enjoying reconnecting with each other. We had a wonderful and busy year in 2010 as both are children found their life partners and married – our daughter at a lovely garden wedding in June and our son at a Halloween wedding in October. Both were wonderful, happy and joyous occasions.
I asked my children the other day if they had joined a pool as part of March Madness as I know they have done so sporadically in the past. I was intrigued by all of the hype surrounding the fact that in the men’s tournament, there are no number one or number two seeds – bracket busters abound this year. I find March Madness to be a fascinating phenomenon in our country and one worthy of discussion regarding prevention of problem gambling! The FBI estimates that at least 2.5 billion will be wagered on March Madness this year with only about 100 million of that being wagered legally through Las Vegas book makers (approximately 4%). There are internet gambling sites where bets between $1 and $30,000 are possible. Although it is hard to get a handle on exact amounts because of the illegal and unrestricted nature of online gambling and office pools, it is quite possible that March Madness has become the nation’s largest betting event, surpassing the Super Bowl.
So what’s the big deal? It is true that the majority of Americans gamble and the majority of them do so without negative consequence. As preventionists, we work to keep it that way. Let’s take a look at some risk factors for problem gambling. They include; gambling illegally, gambling on credit or borrowed money, early age of onset, large first bets, chasing lost bets with more bets, and exceeding preset limits. How many of these are at play during March Madness? Some answers are clear, others not so easy. Does this mean I am advocating a clamp down on March Madness betting? Nope. I am just advocating that we use the opportunity to discuss gambling and the ways to reduce our risks of getting into problems with it. If you would like to start a conversation with others on this topic but feel you would like to know more before you do, visit our website at www.masscompulsivegambling.org. Another resource for those wishing to talk about gambling with children and teens check out this pamphlet on talking with kids about gambling at http://www.ncrg.org/public_education/talking-with-children.cfm
No comments:
Post a Comment