“I had insomnia”: Patriots WR Kayshon Boutte details his struggles with gambling addiction

New England Patriots wide receiver Kayshon Boutte nearly lost $90,000 to gambling addiction. At just 20 years old and at LSU, gambling took over his life. Others could put the phone down, but he couldn’t. He would wake up in the middle of the night to bet. It was a drive he could not control.“I’d wake up early in the morning, and the first thing I’d do was bet,” Boutte shared via The Players’ Tribune on January 7. “I’d stay up late and bet. All day. All night. I had insomnia, so if I woke up in the middle of the night, phone next to the bed, I’d bet. Any little money I had, it was going straight to FanDuel. I knew I was addicted. When you lose, and you’re an addict, there’s this voice in the back of your mind like, No, no, no…… I gotta get my money back. I GOTTA get it back.” Boutte called gambling a “complicated thing. Especially with the apps.” He described it as a mind game designed so bettors forget the outside world and lose track of time. He said it feels like “a lonely experience. Like you in an empty casino, alone at the blackjack table.”“Adding more money to the account,” Boutte said. “And more money, and more money, with the press of a couple buttons. You lose touch with reality. It gets to a point where it feels like the money ain’t even real. But it is real, because in the real world, I was living paycheck to paycheck. Waiting on NIL checks to clear.” At one point, Boutte realized his mind was working against him. “It’s sad when I think about how, as a kid, my ability to dream was an asset,” Boutte shared. “That’s what got me to LSU, and later, all the way to the NFL.But as a gambling addict, my dreaming was my biggest liability. It was like my own mind was working against me. Nobody was forcing me, I wasn’t being hustled. I didn’t even have nobody to be mad at but myself. I was digging my own grave.” Soon, he was without a penny. He had hit rock bottom. He had put in $90,000 and lost it all. He saw “$0.00” on the app and realized it was his last. He thought, “How the hell did I get here???”The 23-year-old wideout recalled that after his first real injury as a college football receiver, everything changed. “After surgery, it was like everything was pissing me off,” Boutte shared. “Riding around on a scooter was frustrating. I couldn’t drive my car. Eventually, I got so fed up trying to adjust to this new life I just said, [- - -] it, and started walking around with the boot on, which only made things worse. I wasn’t healing right, so in February, I flew to Green Bay to see Dr. Anderson. He’s one of the top ankle specialists in the country. I had another surgery and did everything the right way this time. But I was still struggling. I wasn’t really able to sleep the way I wanted to.I was in a lot of pain, so they had me taking pills. And a lot comes with that mentally, trying to figure out life without football. I had more free time than I knew what to do with. It’s like a thick cloud was just hanging over my head, keeping me in a funk. I was mad all the time, losing my patience with people. I was doing anything to escape. I started doing drugs. Then I think I sank into a depression.”Boutte found himself asking, “So how do you escape when none of the escape routes are working? How do you get that feeling back of competing?” The answer came to him: “You start gambling.”He admitted, “That’s how I ended up going down a dark road. That’s how I ended up pacing around my apartment at 3 o’clock in the morning, betting on whatever I could bet on at that time of night. I don’t even know….. It honestly didn’t matter. You’re just caught in the cycle. That’s how I damn near ruined my life.”“I wish I could tell you I came to my senses on my own.…. But honestly, only two things saved me,” Boutte expressed. “One was getting healthy enough to play football again. The other was becoming a father, as a junior in college. Nothing wakes you up faster than that. I just looked at myself in the mirror one day and realized, Bruh, the way you living ain’t healthy. And if I’m being honest, I think there was probably a little bit of shame to that realization, too.” “Growing up, my dad was a real hard-working dude, doing offshore, blue collar work — getting up at 5 or 6 a.m.” Boutte continued. “I didn’t really come from a rich household, but anything we wanted, my parents made it happen. And I wanted to be that for my family.” “Having a kid coming into the world,” Boutte said. “I think that’s when I started taking my mental health more seriously, and things got better for me. After my junior year, because of everything I went through, I still wasn’t 100% physically. But by the grace of God, I made it to the NFL. By the grace of God, New England [Patriots] saw potential in me.”Also Read: Stefon Diggs scans the stands searching for Cardi B after New England Patriots’ big 42-10 win over New York Jets