Reflecting on Recovery and Having Important Conversations
March 31st, 2026
It has been two thousand eight hundred and eleven days since I made my last wager.
And yet it feels like it was yesterday that I walked into that casino to test my resolve as a compulsive gambler, a test I predictably lost. It was the greatest loss I’ve ever experienced in hindsight because it set me on the path to recovery. That has provided me with a second lease on life - on career, on fatherhood, and on being a husband.
March is Problem Gambling Awareness Month, and a good opportunity to reflect on my personal journey and share why having open conversations about gambling is so crucial for everyone, whether you're an active gambler or a concerned family member.
When I look back on the bad decisions I made centered around gambling, I have clarity that is impossible to have when your entire existence is based on the chase to gamble and gamble some more.
Clarity and perspective are important tools to understand and own the bad decisions I made while deep in the throes of addiction. I often beat myself up that it took me risking and losing everything to have the clarity I now have. Even more frustrating was my resistance and reluctance to consider rational decision-making when it came to the amounts I wagered, the amounts I transferred and was willing to lose and the amount of time I spent emotionally and mentally on gambling. It was all consuming 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
It's that clarity that allows me to speak on the importance of active gamblers knowing in advance of ever making a wager that there are tools available to them that effectively protect them before they ever go down the same road I went down. Truth be told when you get to the level I got to, I would have avoided the tools in the same manner I avoided and ignored loved ones pleas for me to stop or to reduce how often I gambled.
But the tools are not for people who have already exhibited the signs of gambling addiction, it’s for everyone else to make sure they never get to that point, in other words for over 95% of everyone that will ever make a legal wager.
We are at a tipping point in this country with the proliferation of legal wagering, which is why I am so proud of my now 5 year partnership with FanDuel and why I feel so strongly that the positive aspect of this growth in gambling will be normalizing these conversations. We talk to our kids about drugs and drinking and for the first time we can now normalize having similar conversations about gambling. I’m very proud of the work my friends and fellow FanDuel RG Ambassadors Randy and Anita are doing to educate parents and mentors on these conversations.
The more we talk about the potential dangers and the available resources, the more likely someone is to ask for and get help should they need it. And don't get it twisted , this is a good thing, and I know first hand how important it is to FanDuel.
Consider for a moment a multi-billion dollar international company partnering with someone who was 6 months removed from Federal Prison. A person with a dramatic and very public fall from grace centered around problem gambling and asking that person to be the public face in many ways of the company as it began its US operations. That's FanDuel's level of commitment to doing what’s right even as skeptics roared and the industry didn't follow suit.
I spend every day of the week counseling problem gamblers and their families through the darkest of times. Its the most important job I’ve ever had and I know firsthand that sharing my story and educating people about the tools and resources that act as safeguards has helped thousands of people and their loved ones begin the journey towards recovery. The most important tool of all of course is self exclusion. A process that allows you to ban yourself from wagering at any time both online and in brick and mortar casinos.
Short of that, help often begins with a conversation. This March, it is my sincere hope that you will begin to have these conversations with the people you love to make sure they’re aware of the risks, and the available support.