MR MARK Lim, the head of a once-flourishing timber business, earned $200,000 a month, lived in a $2 million bungalow and visited casinos across the world to indulge a 'hobby' in gambling.

Nine years on, the bungalow and business are gone. He has also lost more than $3 million at casinos and on 4-D. Home is now a four-room HDB flat, and he earns his keep driving a taxi.

'I was worried all the time - and was obsessed with recovering my losses,' says Mr Lim. 'I did not know that my gambling was like a disease to be feared.'

As Singapore gears up for the opening of its first casinos early next year, more are seeking help for problem gambling.

The National Addictions Management Service (Nams) saw 122 outpatients in the first quarter of this financial year alone, up from 88 for the whole of 2007. Nams is run by the Institute of Mental Health (IMH).

Of the 2,415 calls to Nams helplines, 1,518 were related to gambling addiction.

A recent study has shown that 3 per cent of youths here may be problem gamblers.

Meanwhile, two counselling centres - Thye Hua Kwan Moral Society and Care Corner - saw 600 clients for problem gambling as of March last year. The services were announced in May 2006.

At One Hope Centre, a Christian voluntary welfare organisation, attendance at support group sessions for gambling addicts and their families is overflowing. Three years ago, only 12 to 15 addicts and their families attended bi-weekly meetings. At one such meeting at Geylang Methodist Church last weekend, the crowd swelled to 80.

'I think problem gamblers and their families are worried about the new casinos,' says One Hope Centre's executive director, Reverend Tan Lye Keng. 'So, there is an urgent need for them to get better.'

Associate Professor Wong Kim Eng, who heads the service, says the rise could be a result of Nams' outreach programmes and campaigns by the National Council on Problem Gambling.

Her team has been building expertise. Consultant psychiatrist Thomas Lee, for example, spent a year attached to a gambling addiction programme at the University of California, Los Angeles in 2007.

Among the tips he picked up: Addicts adopt false beliefs. For instance, some gamblers here believe 'certain numeric patterns' can predict 4-D results. 'In reality, winning a jackpot is a completely random event - it's totally unpredictable,' says Dr Lee.

A sign that a recreational gambler has problems is when he wagers more than he can afford to lose, says Dr Lee. Pathological gamblers persist at great cost to their personal, family and work lives.

To those already chasing losses, unexpected wins spur them to spend even more in the hope of recouping losses quickly.

When Mr Lim lost $2 million in three years at casinos in Sri Lanka, Holland, Australia, Macau and Malaysia, the then multimillionaire began buying 4-D. Eerily, two early wagers - made within one month - netted him a total of $300,000.

'I thought 4-D was the fastest way to patch up the hole.' He began spending $100,000 on 4-D every month.

He lost his winnings in three months - and then his home, office and business. By 2005, the father of three had moved his family to a four-room flat and was driving a taxi. Even then, if he had $100, he would spend $90 on 4-D. Two years ago, he attended sessions at One Hope Centre, but dropped out soon after.

The wake-up call came only last year, when a close family member got hooked. 'That's when I realised that I should be a role model for my family - and decided to look for help.'

He takes his entire family to group therapy sessions. 'Talking to others in the same situation helps a lot,' he says.

Former regional sales director Timothy Aw, 44, also attends sessions at One Hope Centre.

His addiction started in his 20s. After nights entertaining clients, he began placing soccer bets, first through bookies, then on the Internet. He travelled quite a bit because of work, and his habit grew out of the 'sheer boredom' of staring at hotel walls.

By borrowing - he once owed money to 10 loan sharks - and rolling over his plastic debt, his debts grew to $250,000 by 2004. Then in 2005, the unexpected hit hard. The sole breadwinner and father of two young children was retrenched.

He drove a taxi for up to 20 hours a day to pay his debts. 'There was simply no time to gamble.' His wife has found a job and life is better. Mr Aw now helps with group sessions at One Hope Centre.

Temptations to gamble are growing. There are more than 200 soccer matches one can bet on daily, says Dr Lee.

A 2007 IMH study found gambling addicts to be overwhelmingly male, Chinese, married, employed and with secondary school education. Soccer betting, 4-D, casinos and horse-racing are their main habits.

But more people who are turning up for help do not quite fit this profile.

Take Mr Frederick Teo, a bachelor in his 40s who works in financial services. He sought help in February this year after losing more than $820,000 betting on stocks, mostly in the past two years.

He earned $150,000 to $220,000 a year in recent years and borrowed heavily from family and friends to fund his habit.

The final straw came in January when he lost more than $60,000 in a month.

'That's when I knew I had to look for a solution, not the kind of solution where I went looking for money to pay my debts but a solution to my gambling addiction. I knew I had to surrender. I just could not beat the odds in punting.'

Group therapy and counselling aided by a gambling workbook - that teaches him the basics of budgeting and how to restrict access to money - have helped him remain 'clean' for the past six months.

He knows recovery will take time and that gamblers are prone to relapse. But he is determined to give it his best shot.

'Gambling addiction is like a flesh-eating bacterium that eats into your flesh bit by bit without you realising at first.' By the time you sense trouble, 'a big chunk of flesh has dropped off', he warns.

This article was first published in The Sunday Times.