I Stole $500,000 To Fuel My Gambling Addiction | Ben's Story
Video Overview & Insights
I interview Ben Y about his gambling addiction story that led him to prison.
When her side hustle became a gambling addiction: https://youtu.be/07c3LGQnLTQ?si=VCxpzhJdBk-GehR_
🤝 How I Quit Gambling: https://youtu.be/ZUx9qIm4sNY
Ben’s story is a raw look at how gambling addiction builds over time: a father’s blackjack habit, childhood trips to Atlantic City, and early wins that fed an identity of “being the smart one at the table.” We trace his path from Chinese poker in middle school to the poker boom, online gambling, and a devastating descent into theft and prison. Ben explains the brain science of the dopamine hit, how chasing losses hijacks values, and why “I’ll pay it back when I win big” keeps people trapped. He shares the moment everything changed on his 40th birthday, the phone call to 1-800-GAMBLER, state-funded counseling, CBT tools, and the safeguards he uses today to stay honest and protect his family. If you or someone you love feels stuck between shame and the urge to bet again, this conversation offers clarity, practical recovery steps, and hope.
His kids will forgive him. God is good
Ben's email: i.am.ben.yew@gmail.com
This channel is dedicated to spreading awareness about gambling addiction and helping individuals better understand the risks of excessive gambling. Through powerful storytelling, educational content, and real-life experiences, we aim to shine a light on the dangers of gambling and provide tools for recovery. Whether you're seeking help, supporting a loved one, or simply looking to learn more, our mission is to create a safe space for open conversations about gambling addiction.
Thanks Rob for what you do. When I watch your channel I always think about all the times I spend my money on lotto tickets or sporting bets, house games, and online mystery bundles. I am 34 and have zero life savings. Gambling has never ruined my life or made me go so far as to steal money. And while my gambling dosn't look the stereotypical casino style. I can see how my habits to chase that "one big moment" have held me back. I hope everyone will learn what I have learned from your channel, and all who struggle will start to understand what their "game" looks like.
🙏🏻 Recovery Resources: https://odaatgamblingawareness.com/resources
1️⃣ First day trying to stop gambling? Start here: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQirxbLdrgPneNZshy-heKIhm9ftfqpwm&si=RgIHxiIJjC0Wi7yr
Imo addiction is a trauma that happened and the addiction becomes your safe place,love comfort zone whatever that makes you feel happy but when you lose your money or sober up you know your not doing the right thing i believe find yourself something your connected to because thats the opposite of addiction i know its easier said then done
😅 Subscribe To Avoid Making The Same Mistakes I Did: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCH8s1lNHQbXzltQg_aXMAQA?sub_confirmation=1
20 question quiz to determine if you have a gambling addiction (if you answer yes to 7 or more, you likely have a gambling problem)
U R a good person Ben. We all make mistakes but not many of us take accountability & try 2 make it better
1. Did you ever lose time from work or school due to gambling?
2. Has gambling ever made your home life unhappy?
Lol, no one truly wins at gambling. Even most professional poker players have gone broke or filed for bankruptcy before making it big. The house always wins, and even if you beat the casino for a while, you’re ultimately just taking money from other gamblers.
3. Did gambling affect your reputation?
4. Have you ever felt remorse after gambling?
Rough life, much of it caused by his Dad. I guess I was lucky as my parents kept me on the straight and narrow. Though as always kids will find a get minor problems. But I learned enough to keep my sons on the straight narrow, but they managed to stray a little now and then, but nothing involving the police.
5. Did you ever gamble to get money with which to pay debts or otherwise solve
financial difficulties?
I got to where I could win 6-10K a year at poker after 12 years of losing. I still haven't made up the difference but I don't care. Either use the addiction to your advantage and use iron will bankroll discipline and study and get to where you can beat poker(hard), or stop altogether. And if you're planning on playing slots or casino games please just donate to a charity instead.
6. Did gambling cause a decrease in your ambition or efficiency?
7. After losing did you feel you must return as soon as possible and win back your
Never.chase.your.money.casinos.r.all.ripoff
losses?
8. After a win did you have a strong urge to return and win more?
The ads for gambling platforms everywhere is just increasing the frequency of these stories. Luckily it never got THIS bad for me, but I’ve always thought I was very close to it. Similar to the guest, smart 1500+ SAT know it all etc etc. Family was into it etc etc. Saw enough sad ending for me to keep it under control - and as I grew older, gambling just felt more and more pointless.
9. Did you often gamble until your last dollar was gone?
10. Did you ever borrow to finance your gambling?
Best interview
11. Have you ever sold anything to finance gambling?
12. Were you reluctant to use "gambling money" for normal expenditures?
I lost all my life savings and was at rock bottom. I then bought my last ticket which now put me beyond my wildest dreams. Have a car, have a house
I work in IT for the government I’m now 35 I have control now.
I MAKE MY OWN Luck. You can control it. Just like they are
13. Did gambling make you careless of the welfare of yourself or your family?
14. Did you ever gamble longer than you had planned?
You look bored af
15. Have you ever gambled to escape worry or trouble?
16. Have you ever committed, or considered committing, an illegal act to finance
Thanks for sharing Ben. I'm a gambler whos in AA, thankfully gambling wasn't my addiction but we all got a cross to bear. You sound just like me, it's crazy, I'm also Asian and I know folks let me get away with things cause they see me like some responsible smart guy lol. I didn't talk to my dad for some time before he passed but a reason for that was I never saw a change in his behavior. If he just was honest with me I think I would have been fine keeping a channel open with him. Girls are smarter than guys so hopefully your girls will see you're putting in work and really want to be better. Now that I'm 42 I look back like damn, my dad was just a dude trying to survive this existence, I'm sure your girls will realize that sooner since they can see you speak on it. Just keep going one day at a time bro.
gambling?
17. Did gambling cause you to have difficulty in sleeping?
I am a practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine and spent several years around many Asian people while training and have much respect for them and the culture. They truly care about being good people but I have been on the other side of the city and seen Asian neighbours buying handfuls of scratch tickets that they won’t buy in their community. Shame seems very powerful in the Asian community
18. Do arguments, disappointments or frustrations create within you an urge to
gamble?
The day i understood that i was arrived at the MATRIX LEVEL ...
I was in Japan betting on 2 Sumo Samurai that they were fighting in a mortal Kombat fight ... Naked ...
The next day we were in the middle of a Ocean and a politician was giving 2 passport as prize and half a mil and 5 immigrant as to swim 5 miles far from the land ... No One of them arrived , i won a lot that time ...
Then i Remember also the Russian roulette in Cambodia, where they was using 10 years old children and i Remember also there i made some good money ..
Now i feel me bored , who know some place like that just write to me , i like betting party 😅..
19. Did you ever have an urge to celebrate any good fortune by a few hours of
gambling?
This guys reminds me of Andy Wang if he got into gambling. I bet this guy is a warrior.
20. Have you ever considered self destruction or suicide as a result of your gambling?
CHAPTERS:
My big bro was addicted to the casino. My father, brother in law, and big bro were flipping houses. They sold a house and made 150k profit, split 3 ways. He lost his 50k, then dipped into my dads share, lost that, dipped into my brother in laws and lost that too. Then went to the bank when it opened at 9am to take out a SECOND MORTAGE when my other bro had 99% ownership and my big bro only had 1%, and was still able to get 800k 2nd mortgage. He lost that too. He lied to my parents saying he was going on a business trip to Florida. 6 months, none of my family heard from him. My dad called his friends, they said they were in contact with him an he was alive and well. But he wouldn't respond to any of mine or parents messages. One day we get a call from the bank saying mortgage wasn't paid in 6 months and we were going to foreclosed on. We got a big family so we came up with 30k to keep the house. Then my parents messaged him saying that they forgive him and to please just come home. Losing the money is one thing but to lose a son and the money broke my parents hearts. The money was whatever, we could always make more. Big bro came back in shame, had to work a petty construction job for half of what he was making before he ran off. Broke my heart to see my big bro like that. Eventually, an opportunity came up to be a store manager of a grocery chain he worked at when was a teenager until he was 30 and made a career change. Out of 50+ candidates, he got the job! He's been working hard and paying as much as he can afford to pay back my brother in law. Im proud of him for coming back and changing his life for the better. I was livid when I found out what he did to my parents future. They bought that house for 600k in 2002. Sold it for 1.7 million. That was supposed to be my parents $$, but he pissed it away. They still made a small profit of about 300k but they had big plans for that money to use back home which destroyed their retirement plan. At the end of the day though, we just glad we got our brother back and he didn't take his life because he was very close to doing so. Don't gamble guys, shit ruins lives.
0:00 – Inherited Chaos: Dad’s Gambling & AC Childhood
4:45 – New School, First Bets: Chinese Poker at 12
I don’t gamble because every day is a gamble
9:30 – Poker Boom, Online Tilt, First Thefts
14:15 – Chasing “Edge”: Sports Obsession to 26-Hour Benders
Where's my money!
19:00 – Power of Attorney → Powerless: Crossing the Line
23:45 – Confession Without Change: Big Wins, Bigger Lies
I have an almost carbon copy path as this guest. The only difference is I wasn’t academically gifted. Quite the opposite. I found school to be brutal and gambling to be the only thing I loved. Luckily I woke up in my early 30s and smartened up. But I have been in the darkness. It is a lonely place. The sad part is gambling is 100x more accessible now than ever in human history with betting from phones. All legal and all advertised non stop.
28:30 – County to Camp: Gambling Behind Bars
33:15 – Relapse in Prison, Hollow Recovery Outside
Blessings dude. Wishing you all the best
38:00 – 40th Birthday Bottom: Hotline, Therapy, Clarity
42:45 – New Road: Safeguards, Amends, Next Right Step
It's never too late to improve and learn. The largest lesson I learned is always bet small. You're going to lose most trips so betting neat minimum is far better. Also never chase, take losses and move on, keep every session separate and take breaks. Like I say, if you can quit that's the best option but, if you dare gamble do so with strict rules. The moment you increase bet values or chase, is the moment you are in serious danger.
More User Perspectives
I’m lucky that I won 100 K and quit. I can only imagine what would’ve happened. Have I lost severely I know I would’ve kept going just like any of these guys.
@jSights1337My wife's parents are gambling attics. When my wife was a child, her parents left her and her 2 brothers at a public library all by themselves to go gambling. My wife was 7 and her youngest brother was 4 years old at the time. This is how my wife and her brothers ended up in foster care. Her parents still go gambling every weekend til this day and own nothing.
@Qfinesse21Praying for you and may the Lord give you strength to keep going and one day may your younger daughters have the spirit of forgiveness towards you. I also hope they don’t inherit the “gene” from your dad.
@coryazumbrado7027This guy seems like a squid game contestant.
@methanesprings4085Asians love to gamble.
@niners9485damn. this one changed me. 2/6 i'm done. ODAAT
@appie6710I swear, parents leaving kids in the arcade has to be in Asian culture! We all have such similar stories.
@Jellybean8249I'm not trying to let anybody off the hook. I'm not trying to let any degenerate gambler off the hook, but from my experiences and from what I know, these casinos and online betting sites and sports betting sites and poker sites, they all need to take some accountability. These billion dollar casino companies spend millions designing their websites in their buildings and their billboards to basically trick human beings into gambling. All their money away. Basically, they are designed that way the casino floors are designed to keep people there. They don't have a clock anywhere on the casino floors. They don't have any real daylight cause they don't want you to know if it's night time or daytime outside these places, the whole scheme of the casino floor is built to keep you there spending your money, they offer you a free room. If you win a big jackpot, why cause they don't want you to leave, they want you to stay on the property so that you could Gambled the jackpot right back into the casino, like I know people are adults and they make their own decisions, but humans are only humans. We're all only human and these companies spend millions researching how the human brain works and things like that, like all this stuff is done by design, it's not by accident. There is a ton of degenerate gamblers that will gamble off their last dollar and gamble away their families, home and gamble, either kids, college fun, and they're doing it for a reason it's because these big companies that run these casinos have spent millions researching on how to get the human mind. To gamble away all their money, they know what they're doing, and I feel like they should be donating hundreds of millions of dollars to every state that has casinos, for families that have got Apart because of gambling and donate towards the gambling addiction fund to help you know, addicted gamblers, but not just that I think they need to spend money reimbursing, some of these families that were torn apart cause no one in the right mind wakes app and says, you know what I'm going to go take out a second mortgage for my house for a quarter million $, I'm just going to go give it to the casino. Nobody ever wakes up saying that it's always a gradual snowball effect, and that's because the casinos have studied this and researched it on how to get someone. To come in and spend $5 and eventually spend 20.\n Dollars then eventually spend a $100 and next, you know, they're cleaning out their bank account in a year or 2, like they know what they're doing and it's sad that no one ever brings up the casinos or the online bedding forms and the sports betting sites in poker sites like nobody brings them up whenever there's an issue with gambling like there's a reason why you see so many new casinos being put up everywhere every corner you turn and it's not just people without money, it's rich people, it's athletes like even Dana, white, the owner or President of the Ufc. I believe red rock or station casinos with filing a motion in court to get lik $2 million that he owed them in markers. But if you watch any of the YouTube videos that he's on, he's walking out saying he just won a million $, he just won 1.5 million, he just won a 1/2 a million, but then you see the news saying that the station casinos or red Rock resorts is trying to get a million dollars in markers to be paid, so it makes you wonder. I know, Dana white has the money but it makes you wonder like, wow, he shows his winnings, but how big are the losses? And he's a multi-millionaire, and even the casinos grabbed ahold of him, so nobody's immune.
@jamesbroomfield7799Notice with these type of stories, the only person that is the degenerate, and that is at fault is usually the person doing the gambling and stealing the money and things like that, but you notice the casinos never take any accountability, the online websites, the gambling websites never take any accountability. The poker sites never take any accountability. The betting sports betting websites don't take any accountability. And so on and so on, these sites and these casinos are designed to trick you into spending all your money, it's not like you just walk in there and you just turn into a degenerate gambler, no, these casinos have the promotions in the marketing and the scheme and purpose or the scheme for the sole purpose of tricking you into spending your last dollar and even the casino floors are engineered and purposely staged for that reason, they don't have any clocks on the wall, they don't have any daylight, they're designed to keep you in there, spending all your money and they spend millions of dollars perfecting this, yet, none of these places take any accountability, when they ruin people's lives and yeah, they were all adults and we all make our own decisions. But when they spend millions of dollars to find and perfect, a way to manipulate human beings into giving away all their money, then they need to take some accountability, they should be Spending or donating a big percentage of their profits to non profits that help families that were ruined by gambling.
@jamesbroomfield7799This interviee this guy Ben is still a good sales guy who continuous to lie his way. You can tell by the way he talks. Ppl don’t change.
@JulieH1200GOOGLE JUMMANNE FOR REAL GAMBLING ADDICT
@spreadthembuttcheeksbabyThis guy is brutally honest! Respect ✊
@Bullish_Bear_ClubI hope Ben is doing better and staying on the path to recovery. It took a lot of courage to be so incredibly honest about the things he did that he was least proud of.
@dominickim1855My ex lost $300k by the time we divorced. By now, after another 12 years, she probably lost another $500k. She makes $100k a year, she rents a room, most of her money goes into gambling. Her dad and brother are also problem gamblers. She was a nice person suddenly one day after hanging out with friends at the casino she turned into a monster. I think deep down she is very lonely. She is insecured and now all of her friends are gamblers.
@JapaneseSentenceMiningbyKhaIt takes a real man to admit your addiction to gambling, Ben. I’m addicted to gambling and I’m not freaking proud of it. You’re a good man. It’s great to see you stepping out the House of the Rising Sun. Best of luck to you, bud.
@KiboGartoWishing this sincere man all the best
@omarshaaban90720:27 took her out to Applebee's lol
@sayto_00at least he gave you quarters to use at an arcade. My dad left me at the lobby of majestic star casino and I sat on that bench for 3-4 hours at a time.
@SangKang-q8pHis ENERGIES..... STILL.... an Addicted scamed.....SORRY...there is NO CURED for gambler...!
@KarenNguyen-x6s37:15 the edit lol
@KeepingUpWithAI-z1fDon't beat yourself up. Medicaid spend-down would've drained her account before they stepped in and helped with the bills. So, it's better that you took the money and had fun with it before they drained her account.
@2_Muffins_in-an_Oven굳은 의지 잘 지키시길 바래봅니다. 화이팅~!!
@두바이왕자-vipHe is honest and very funny.
@PatriciamyungGood for you man and it is not easy so congrats on where you are! Have you heard of ACA? It deals with all family dysfunctions we grew up with. It’ll add the shine to your recovery 🙏
@jonnytsunami8593Hey, on the upside, dude looks great for 42
@peternewson2275Powerful interview. I hope all of you that are struggling find peace and have success battling this horrible disease.
@Provemewrong967I can’t watch this dude man he is such a narcissist
@whatsgoingon1239