We'll see. As one of the few who have seen all 75 minutes, I think poker players will really enjoy this film

How do you know if someone is a recovering addict?

Dont worry they will tell you themselves within the first five minutes of meeting them.

Michael, if you don't mind, I have a few questions about things that are unclear to me:

1.) You mention in the video that you believe you are a good poker player but a bad money manager. Do you still believe this to be true?

2.) Unless I am mischaracterizing your story, you've insinuated that online poker caused you to be suspended from two colleges (?). I didn't exactly follow what you were saying about speaking in front of a board that decided to suspend you. Were you suspended explicitly for playing poker, or was it something else, like bad grades?

3.) Sirswish6 already asked but I was hoping you could maybe give a clearer answer. Do you have an estimate of how much money you lost just from playing poker? I mean the total amount of deposits, not ancillary losses like college tuition.

4.) Do you really believe that awareness is the biggest issue to address? My take is that common people think pathological gambling is way more prevalent in those who gamble than it actually is. It seems to me that education, treatment, and prevention are the things that really should be the point of emphasis, but maybe I am wrong.

No problem.

1.) I said, "Yeah, I was good." Past tense. That interview was filmed more than a year after I had quit playing. Today, it has been more than 2.5 years. Whether I am good now is irrelevant, because I don't play poker. What is different now from then is that without the gambling, I have become a good money manager.

2.) I am assuming you are referring to my story from the 12-minute short. It doesn't tell it all very well. In the final it is much more complete. I stole money from my friends to gamble. This is what got me suspended from colleges. Not grades, not for playing poker, but for the thefts that were gambling-related.

3.) I understand your interest in knowing the details and statistics, but because I had so many accounts, so many interaccount money transfers from friends, so many freeroll cashes, and because I never kept a record of any of it, my best guess is somewhere between $20,000 and $50,000. The most I had access to at any one time was around $10,000. But I still want to reiterate that the amount I deposited and the amount I stole is immaterial. It wasn't about the money, it was about the rush it would give me, and the fact that I stole to feed that monkey is awful, regardless of the amount.

4.) When I talk about awareness, I sort of mean all of those things together. You're not wrong. The fact is that almost everyone who gambles does not and will not have a problem with it. But for the people who do become pathological gamblers (which I think is around 1 percent of all gamblers) things like suicide rates are astronomical compared to other addictions, and because there are no direct physical effects of gambling on the body like there are with other drugs, pathological gamblers often dig themselves in really deep while still being able to hide from other people.

Thanks for asking. Feel free to ask anything else.

good luck man, don't agree with everything you said but its big of you to come to this troll pit and answer questions...GLGL in the future

How did this director come into contact with you?

Did you announce publicly that you were doing this and he found you?

Did you all know each other before hand?

How and when did you decide to do this journey and how did this convert into a documentary with you in it?

Basically curious about all the chain of events that lead up to this....

Thanks, Rick. GL

1. He was referred to me by somebody else, tracked down my e-mail address, and called me while I was on the road near Santa Fe, NM.

2. I never made a public announcement or sent out a press release or anything like that. I started in Seattle, WA, and went through Portland, OR. The director lives in Portland area, so when he decided to make a documentary about poker, he started looking for sources. One thing led to another, and he came across me. Good timing, I guess.

3. No, we had never met or knew about each other before February, 2011.

4. I decided to walk across America in June 2010. I left in October 2010. This was after my second college suspension in April 2010, at which point I quit gambling. (The first suspension was in March 2006.) I wanted to do something good for myself, and hopefully for someone else too. The school I was at accepted me back for fall 2010, but I decided to take a break to make sure I had my head on straight, and to gain some confidence regarding my commitment to staying away from gambling. I thought a walk would be a great exercise in slowing things down -- taking things one step at a time, if you will. As it turned out, it was. I finished the walk in June 2011 and finished school in May 2012. I guess it didn't really "convert" into a documentary, but my path merged with the director's path. I think our meeting was really lucky, considering how hard it is to find somebody who wants to be public with his gambling problems.

My story, in short, is that I spent 6 years of my life doing not much besides gambling or thinking about gambling (mostly poker). After two college suspensions because of gambling-related crimes, I figured out that I couldn't gamble and and also live a normal life. I decided to drop the gambling.

EDIT: just to be clear, I'm not proud of the things I did that got me into trouble, but I'm a better person today because of it. I'm not against poker and gambling, but I wouldn't want even my worst enemy to go through something as bad (or worse) than what I did. The best thing for me to do, in this case, is to share my story, and the documentary was a good opportunity for that.

Michael, I just wanted to say thanks for coming to the thread and giving us your perspective. I saw the trailer a few months ago, and just based on the 10 or so minutes I saw, I labeled you a hapless douche. If I remember correctly I might have poked fun at you to my gf. I apologize for that. I can tell from the quality of your responses here that you are bright, grounded, and definitely not a douche.

I don't think you posting in here, or the documentary itself is dangerous to poker players, no more than a documentary on an alcoholic is a threat to anheuiser bush. If you feel you have a responsibility to reach out in an attempt to help fellow gambling addicts, then I applaud you for that. I am a recovering heroin addict and one of the key factors in me attaining my 2 years of sobriety was fellow addicts reaching out to me and giving me the straight dope (metaphorically, of course). Anyone who flames you for that is clearly selfish and has little regard for what others may be facing.

One thing I havent seen answered and I'd be interested in hearing is this: do you support or oppose the legislation and regulation of online poker in the US? And why or why not?

And btw lol at anyone saying he shouldn't have taken the dogs. My dog would happily lick my sweaty balls nightly if I took her on a walk across the country. I'm sure they were in heaven. Wolfs have no problem walking all day erryday. In reality you probably "saved" them as well. It surely was a healthy and cleansing trip for all involved, whether walking on 2 legs or 4.

Good luck in the future Michael, and keep us posted!

Thanks, GL to you too. I'm in the process of planning another trip for next October, and I update Facebook (www.facebook.com/MichaelWalksAmerica) and Twitter (www.twitter.com/MichaelWalksUSA) daily.

As far as legislation goes, I think online poker should be legal in a regulated fashion. Basically, as said in the trailer, "Prohibition of alcohol didn't stop people from drinking, and prohibition of online poker isn't going to prevent people from playing." Of course, legalization and regulation is only acceptable to me if a small percentage of the (massive) potential revenues is designated for problem gambling awareness/prevention/treatment. Statistically, the odds against becoming a pathological gambler (if you gamble) are roughly 99 to 1. So think of a small tax for prevention/treatment as a sort of insurance in case of the less-than-one-outer falling on the river to beat you, or maybe your aces losing to aces.

Anyway, that's my take. I know a lot of poker players will resist that idea, saying that they're not responsible for addicts' problems, but oh well.

I like that idea. And it could possibly serve as a small good faith gesture to the legislators.

+1 ,
Watched the doc and will def watch full length. Seems a lot of the posters just wanna see the standard started out poor and now I'm killing it story. Perhaps not everybody's type of contrast but it came off genuine if nothing else.

They found the biggest loser in the poker world and put him in a documentary about poker? Cmon man...

For every 2 million poker players theirs some life fail like him...why put him in the spotlight? Very bad for the game.

Ill tell you what, lets do a documentary about Baseball. We'll find a guy that tried to make it as a professional but didnt have the juice. So he then turns to drinking and then to Meth and then kills his entire family. We'll call it MethBall.

Mike, first off, thanks for having the stones to come to this thread.

At the begining of the movie you state "Poker almost ruined my life." Well Michael...with all do respect...Poker didnt ruin your life. YOU ruined your life. You....you.

I understand you have a gambling problem; the human condition is a mother. We all have weaknesses and strengths, but DONT blame poker.

Ill tell you what. Why dont you move to Vencie beach in California. They have a Chess park there and some World Class, Grandmasters play there. Take all your money and keep playing those guys till you go broke. Then go steal from your family, go back there and lose it again. Then go rob a bank to play them somemore. Then do it again but this time...opps...you get arrested. At your araignment, stand before the judge and say: "I blame Chess...chess ruined my life."

Its stories like these that religious whackjobs in power use to take away all our rights and freedoms. Hey check out the middle east, women in Burkhas...its amazing.

Poker is the Greatest game on Earth. Thanks alot Mike...

stopped it like a minute twenty in when jamie gold said "there are a lot of people claiming to be professionals who are slowly going broke"

shouldn't use such inaccuracies. he is quickly going broke.

Statistically, for every 2 million poker players I'm sure there are at least 1.6 million who aren't successful. For every 2 million poker players there will also be at least 100,000 who have some sort of gambling problem, and 20,000 who become pathological gambling addicts. What's bad for the game? the truth about its impact?

I have responded to this many times, so I won't waste our time and do it all again. I'm not blaming poker, but like I said, it would be INCREDIBLY naive to say that poker wasn't part of the problem. Thanks for your input, though.

Yes, yes you ARE blaming poker. You 100% ARE blaming poker. You can be a degerate gambler utilizing any sort of outlet possible I.E. Casinos, scratch tickets, lottery, off track betting, sports betting, Keno, etc, etc, etc. The variations are unlimited. You just happend to choose poker to feed your personal addictions. If you lost everything in Las Vegas, would you be walking across America to bring awareness about Black Jack? No. **** you. Poker is a game of skill and you got your ass handed to you on a porcelin platter because youre a gambler and you feel you deserved to win...now you got an axe to grind.

You are pigeon holing the poker world with your skewed, degenerate sense of your personal perception of reality....which is NOT reality. Poker is not the problem. Its your addiction to gambling. If you got the energy and drive to walk across the ENTIRE country, then you have the will to admit your mistakes and move on to bigger and better things.

This is just absolute blither. Im not even going to try and refudiate any of these claims.

Your a textbook example of this psychological theory. Dude, please, please read this entire thing...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_...edited_beliefs

Yes, thats EXATCLY what theyre going to do. EXACTLY.

They are going to use that for their own personal agendas. You are giving them a perfect weapon for their political ambitions and desires. Its a perfect nectar to delude the ignorant masses in this country. Youve given them a perfect political platform to launch their lie rockets from.

Thanks bud.

Okay, I read it. Now, discredit those claims (in re: "Persistence of discredited beliefs"). That was based on a LIBERAL estimate that 20% of poker players are lifetime winners. It's probably more like 10% in reality, but it's hard to measure scientifically.

I sort of wish you would try to refute those statistics (i.e. ~5% of gamblers have gambling problems, and ~1% become addicts), because those are professionally and medically accepted rates.

Also, I think you meant "blather." And "you're" instead of "your." If you're going to come in here trying to look academic, then please, try to look academic.

No they're not. Their personal agendas equate to money. My agenda takes money away from them.

The prosecution rests its case your honor.

LOL you said it yourself.

"No, they're (they are) not."

"Their (possessive) agendas..."

Thank you. Whichever prosecution you're (contraction: you are) using has been dismissed.

EDIT: By continuing with your (possessive) blather [blather, n.
Long-winded talk with no real substance] you're (contraction: you are) not helping yourself and other credible perspectives from poker players. As for myself, I have a sort of blither [blither, adj. Showing a casual and cheerful indifference considered to be callous or improper] reaction. Please forgive me.

lol