Katey's story

My mum HAD a gambling problem. When I was growing up, I thought I was invincible. My mum had 4 kids, me being the second oldest.

Mum had a partner, who was the father of my two younger sisters. Through the years they had their arguments. I never really thought much of it. One night, my mum and her partner were having a massive fight. Mum started throwing everything she could lift. Smashing all the plates against the walls, swiping her hands across the bench and knocking everything to the floor.

I was so scared, I grabbed my two younger sisters who were aged just 2 and 4 at the time. I stood in the doorway and we watched in shock. Mum eventually got so mad she lifted up our glass dining table and pushed it over and it shattered everywhere.

I also watched her yelling with her partner as he cut up multiple $50 notes into pieces. I then later found out it was all over her gambling problem. She had been going to the pokies every night. A few weeks later, they split up. I was so confused and had no idea what was happening.

My mum was left to look after us four kids on her own. Mum started working three jobs to provide for the family while also receiving the family tax benefit. Yet we always seemed to struggle with paying the bills on time, we never had take away food and only got new toys for birthdays and Christmas. Two years later, mum said to me one day, 'I wish I could give you kids everything you deserve in life'.

We weren’t really sure what she meant by this. A week later, our mum went missing. Three days after that, she was found. She had committed suicide. It then came to me what was happening. What she meant by 'I wish I could give you everything you deserve'. It was because our mum had gambled away everything.

She had multiple maxed out credit cards, owed thousands of dollars to family and friends and had nothing left. She knew that the only money she had left, was the money in her life insurance. She committed suicide because of the gambling. She felt like there was no other way to stop the gambling and able to give us the life she wished we had. I am now 20 years old and have a partner who is 23. He also has a gambling problem. He makes over $60,000 a year through working, yet every cent goes to gambling at the TAB. He often says to me that he wants to die because he has nothing left.

I want to help him but it’s just so hard doing it on my own. I don’t want him ending up like my mum.