Editor's note: Is gambling causing problems for you or a loved one? Help is available in Washington and around the country. Find a list of resources here.
Gambling on big sporting events like March Madness is simply a source of entertainment for many who partake.
But the rapid growth of sports betting in recent years, both in casinos and online, has put more people at risk of developing gambling addiction.
That’s true even in Washington, which restricts sports betting more than most states. People can only legally wager on tribal lands or in tribal-run casinos. So, at least legally, people here aren’t placing bets from their phone while sitting on their couch as they do in other states.
As sports betting attracts new, younger customers, who are more prone to gambling addiction, the number of calls to the state’s helpline has risen sharply.
Many people affected by gambling addiction don’t seek help — it’s easier to hide than an addiction to a substance, experts say, and stigma can make it feel like a moral failing rather than a medical condition.
And for those who do seek help, only a tiny fraction of the state’s mental health professionals are trained to provide specialized counseling for gambling addiction. A state-funded program offers free counseling, but increased costs mean the program is serving fewer people than it was five years ago.
There are easy workarounds to the state’s regulations, like unauthorized offshore sites and “prediction markets” like Polymarket or Kalshi, which offer live trading on sports outcomes without the same regulations as gambling. State Attorney General Nick Brown sued Kalshi in late March, calling it “a bookie with a fancy name.”
In Washington and around the country, legal sports betting is playing out as a live experiment, with no federal investment into research or treatment.
“The addiction risk goes up when the product is fast, widely available, emotionally engaging and gives intermittent rewards,” clinical psychologist and University of Washington researcher Ty Lostutter said. “Modern sports betting checks all of those boxes.”
How gambling addiction works
The science behind gambling addiction is simple: Our brain feels good when we win money.
It releases dopamine, a neurotransmitter that makes us feel pleasure. It’s the same reward pathway in the brain that’s activated by sugary food, alcohol, drugs and even scrolling on social media.
Our brain is wired to repeat behaviors that provide that dopamine rush. With gambling, the key factor is that the reward is “intermittent and unpredictable,” Lostutter said.
“You don’t win all the time, but you win some of the time,” Lostutter said. “That unpredictability is what makes people keep going because they think they’ll be able to win if they just persist.”
Most people who gamble don’t develop problems. A 2021 study funded by the state Health Care Authority found that about 3.5% of adults who had gambled in the past year were at moderate or severe risk of problem gambling — an estimated 90,000 Washingtonians.
For those people, gambling can turn into an isolating hobby. People become focused on financial outcomes, rather than watching sports with friends. Trying to win your money back — what treatment providers refer to as “chasing losses” — is a key warning sign.
Gambling addiction can slip under the radar more easily than other addictions.
“If you have a family member using substances and they show up to Thanksgiving dinner, everyone’s going to notice that something is different this year,” addiction counselor Marguerite Christenson said. “Not so when we talk about any form of gambling. It can be longer before people seek help.”
‘There’s somebody out there like me’
Patrick Chester started placing bets on football games with friends in high school and at the University of Washington in the late 1990s. The small bets continued into his early 20s, using offshore websites or traveling to Las Vegas. But in 2002, he won a big football bet — a parlay on three or four different games.
“I won a lot of money, for me at the time,” he said. “A light bulb went off in my head then, and that’s when I really remember it kicking into high gear. ”
He owned a landscape design business and tapped into money from clients, so $500 bets became $5,000 bets. He began betting on any sport he could find, he said, even those he knew little about — cricket matches in India, soccer matches in England.
Chester recognized his gambling was a problem, he said. But as he got deeper in debt, it also became his solution; he could dig his way out if he just kept going, he thought.
He was also married and hiding his gambling — and financial losses — from his wife. By the time he reached his late 30s, he was nearly a million dollars in debt and was planning to take his own life.
Just after the 2015 Super Bowl, his family intervened. He had bet on the Seahawks to beat the Patriots and lost a lot of money. His family didn’t know the scope of his gambling problem, but they’d picked up on red flags.
They sent him to 30 days of inpatient treatment in Minnesota — one of the few residential treatment centers in the country focused on gambling. Soon after he got back to Washington, he spent four months in jail for gambling with his business clients’ money.
After he was released, he found support and a community through Gamblers Anonymous. He started seeing a counselor who specializes in gambling addiction, and has seen her for 11 years. He started working again to gradually pay back his debts.
At first, it was difficult to watch sports without having money on the line, Chester said, but now he can watch “for the sake of just watching.” March Madness is still triggering — at the height of his addiction, he and his father would go to Las Vegas and spend days betting on the games in sportsbooks.
Now, he works with gambling harm prevention company EPIC Global Solutions, sharing his story with college athletes around the country so they can understand the potential consequences of sports betting.
“My inspiration was to share my story so that others could come forward and know that they're not alone,” Chester said. “There's somebody else out there like me, and I've seen that he can turn his life around, so maybe I can turn my life around.”
Treatment can be hard to find
Gambling is often seen as a moral deficit, not a true addiction, and feeling shame can prevent people from seeking treatment. Only a small fraction of people who have problem gambling habits will seek treatment, research shows.
A landmark Supreme Court decision in 2018 opened the door for states to legalize sports betting. Since Washington's legalization in 2020, the state Problem Gambling Helpline run by the nonprofit Evergreen Council on Problem Gambling has seen a significant increase in calls. In 2015, the helpline received 5,985 total calls; in 2025, that number had nearly doubled to 10,636.
“I would love to tell you that it's because we do such great advocacy and awareness and outreach work that people are just more aware of the helpline, and I certainly hope that that has had an impact,” Deputy Director Tana Russell said. “However, I think most likely the biggest driver is the expansion of gambling.”
Many people call with questions about whether their gambling is a cause for concern, Russell said. Some are looking for information about counselors or support groups in their area. About 5%-7% of calls lead to a longer intake process, where people answer a series of detailed questions from an operator about their gambling. And some calls are wrong numbers or people looking for casino information — but Evergreen still sees those as opportunities to spread awareness and share resources.
There aren’t many certified gambling counselors to refer people to. Out of more than 20,000 licensed mental health professionals in Washington, only about 40 have gone through a 30-hour training and completed at least 100 supervised hours working with people affected by problem gambling, the Evergreen Council on Problem Gambling says.
Outpatient counseling is the most common form of treatment. Counselors frequently use cognitive behavioral therapy — an approach that helps clients change their thoughts and behaviors that contribute to gambling disorder. Multiple providers said it’s important to understand the root of the gambling: Did it start as a coping mechanism to deal with trauma or a difficult life event?
Through a state program, Washington residents who can’t get gambling treatment covered by their insurance can access it for free. The state Health Care Authority partners with a network of contracted providers to offer free assessment and outpatient counseling for people struggling with gambling addiction or for their loved ones.
Longtime mental health clinician Dorothy Capers didn’t know the specialization was an option until she saw ads from the Evergreen Council and the state Health Care Authority. She contracts with the Health Care Authority and said the state “is doing a great job making sure the services are available,” but still needs more providers doing this work.
“They need more people,” Capers said. “I think I’m one of maybe three clinicians of color, and they could improve on representing different experiences around Washington.”
After a 2022 state task force report found that the state’s program didn’t have enough resources, the Legislature increased funding for the program by 66% — to $2.43 million for the 2023-25 biennium.
Despite the budget increase, the number of clients served has dropped by nearly a third since 2020. In fiscal year 2020, the state’s program served 389 clients; in fiscal year 2025, the state estimates it served 264.
In that same time period, the average cost for clients in treatment nearly doubled, according to Health Care Authority data. The state increased its reimbursement rates for providers, and clients are receiving more treatment services on average, spokesperson Katie Pope said.
In the 2026 legislative session, the Health Care Authority requested authorization from the Legislature to spend more on problem gambling and contract with at least six new providers. The request was not approved.
Many tribal nations in Washington also run treatment programs. Inpatient residential treatment is another option for those struggling with a more severe gambling disorder, but there are only a few centers offering it throughout the country, and none in Washington.
What could help Washington’s challenges
There’s a lot we still don’t know about how pervasive gambling addiction is in Washington.
Unlike substance use disorders, there’s no dedicated federal funding for problem gambling treatment or research. Bipartisan legislation introduced in March would create a federal funding stream from an existing federal tax on sports wagers, generating an estimated $100 million annually.
Researchers say more frequent studies would help them understand the effects of legal sports betting and how gambling is changing in Washington over time. Washington’s last prevalence study, conducted in 2021, asked residents about their gambling in the past year — during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. It also took place before legal sports betting began operating in the state.
The Washington State Gambling Commission runs a self-exclusion program — a common approach where people can voluntarily ban themselves from gambling at card rooms. Tribal nations that operate casinos maintain their own self-exclusion lists, and online sports betting apps have their own lists.
A centralized list managed by a third party, with one sign-up form, would make it easier for people to exclude themselves, Russell said.
Treatment providers and researchers say more education and outreach, particularly in schools, would help young people understand gambling risks and what resources are available.
When Chester talks with student athletes, he asks how many of them were warned as kids about the dangers of drugs and alcohol. Every hand goes up.
But when he asks the same question about gambling, maybe 5% of students raise their hands, he said.
“Back in 2018, we threw legalized sports betting at society and said, 'Just figure it out,'” Chester said. “I think there’s starting to be a little bit more of an understanding of what is going on and how dangerous this can be.”
© 2026 The Seattle Times. Visit www.seattletimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
