Jack Wittaker, who won $315 million from the West Virginia lottery in 2002, tells Time, “I wish that we had torn the ticket up.” Since winning, Wittaker’s daughter and granddaughter died due to drug overdoses.
Just eight months after winning, he was robbed of $545,000. “I just don’t like Jack Whittaker. I don’t like the hard heart I’ve got,” he said. “I don’t like what I’ve become.”
“He’s the last person I would have prototyped for going completely crazy but he did,” Don McNay, a financial consultant to lottery winners and the author of “Life Lessons from the Lottery,” tells Time about Whittaker. “No question it was because he won the lottery.”
He explains that many winners struggle with suicide, depression and divorce. “It’s the curse of the lottery because it made their lives worse instead of improving them,” he says.
Another major struggle that winners often face is saying “no” to friends and family who hope to join in on the good fortune.
Charles Conrad, senior financial planner with Szarka Financial told Teresa Dixon Murray, “Once family and friends learn of the windfall, they have expectations of what they should be entitled to.” He explained, “It can be very difficult to say ‘no.'”
Missouri lottery winner Sandra Hayes has managed to keep her head above water even after splitting a $224 million Powerball jackpot with 12 coworkers.
“I had to endure the greed and the need that people have, trying to get you to release your money to them. That caused a lot of emotional pain,” she told the Associated Press. “These are people who you’ve loved deep down, and they’re turning into vampires trying to suck the life out of me.”
The former social worker has avoided financial misfortune by maintaining her frugal lifestyle even though she no longer lives paycheck to paycheck. “I know a lot of people who won the lottery and are broke today,” she said. “If you’re not disciplined, you will go broke. I don’t care how much money you have.”
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