HYDERABAD : In a quiet room at a city rehab centre, a 19-year-old sits across from a therapist recounting how he blew through Rs 14 lakh borrowed from friends and family, on a cricket betting app. He spent six months in rehab but relapsed shortly after.Today, the teenager is buried under a mountain of ₹40 lakh debt.Behavioural addictions like betting or even online gaming and pornography, once considered mild and treatable through outpatient counselling, have turned into severe crises now, say city psychologists. With caseloads increasing, they add how they are also reassessing treatment processes.“Unlike in cases of substance abuse, we cannot put such patients in confinement,” said Praveen Kearl, a de-addiction therapist and founder of the Corner Stone deaddiction centre. “So, we use different types of therapy which breaks the habit loop that keeps people addicted. We also use cognitive behavioural therapy, gestalt (focusing on the present) therapy, etc to help them understand their triggers and change their behaviour.”GAMBLERS ANONYMOUSBut Kearl maintained that recovery takes time and relapses are common. “In order to support long-term recovery we are setting up support groups like Gamblers Anonymous or Sex Addicts Anonymous, where they can find community support.”Therapists say the average age group of behavioural addicts is 12 to 25 years. The treatment usually spans three to six months.“Since many are teenagers, we allow parents to stay with the child under a parental care model if the case is severe. Even short stays improve recovery outcomes,” said Siddharth Zaveri, from Zorba Rehabilitation Centre. “Some suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), others from low self-esteem. We use group sessions, individual therapy, and emotional regulation. If they hang on, they come out stronger,” he added.Gideon Surya Rao, founder of Living Sober, who has 14 young addicts of behavioural addiction, said, “Parents think it’s ‘just a phase’. But by the time they reach us, the child is anxious, isolated, sometimes even hallucinating. For instance, a 15-year-old porn addict who locked himself in his room and stopped speaking. When his phone was taken, he hallucinated the same content. He eventually suffered from partial eyesight loss due to obsessive behaviour and stress.”He said many of them are now raising awareness among parents to help them identify early signs of addiction among their children.Covid triggerExperts say the pandemic triggered a surge. As schools went online and screen time soared, many teens turned to the internet for escape. The pattern stuck even after the lockdown ended. The problem is only getting more complex, with young people constantly finding new ways to stay hooked, other experts shared.“Students are now connecting online and offline, engaging in group video watching sessions and multiplayer gaming on various platforms. In one incident, a school had to ask parents to delete their children’s accounts. But how closely can parents or teachers realistically monitor them all the time?” said Devaki Rani, counsellor at Phoenix De-addiction and Counselling Centre.
