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QUIT DAY.
Dandelion
London Veteran
OK. I have wanted to quit smoking for a long time now. I started when I was 25. At the time, I was looking for a stress buster, and decided (deluded) that smoking might help. I know it's stupid, but that's what happened. I feel ready to quit now finally. So, I've just put out my last 'pudding'. I've tried to quit in the past, and failed miserable. Now though, I feel slightly different, I don't really know how to explain it. I think meditation has helped, and the attachment to smoking has greatly lessened, but not completely diminished, but lessened enough to give me a better chance of quitting this time. I will let you know how I go. Share your stories of how much better you feel if you are an ex - smoker please! It will be helpful for me to read positive things about quitting. We are so bombarded with the (correct, but perhaps not always most helpful) notion of how difficult it is to quit, and I'm not sure that such negative psychology is helpful for me personally. It feels like setting yourself up for a near impossible task, and I think if you begin something thinking/expecting it to be near on impossible, then it actually might make you more likely to fail. But, that's just my P.O.V. I'd rather focus on the positive.
A fresher smelling Dandelion
A fresher smelling Dandelion
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My girls both started at 15. We have a lot of mental anxiety issues. They didn't ever see a parent smoke, then after a few years of them smoking I did the start/stop every other month. Really. So I will tell you that you CAN quit. Each time I went back I smoked less and for a shorter period.
What really helped from the meditatin practice was being very aware of my body. So if I did smoke I paid attention to the triggers, how my body felt before, the way my body felt during and after. No matter how many years you think it is making you feel good it really doesn't. I found out immediately I felt worn out, like instead of the nicotine rush I was just exhausted.
I personally did better without a big quit date, I just smoked less and less and then didn't buy anymore. Sometimes a huge trigger would get me started again but I always was a 'quitter'. So I can't tell you how long I have been quit because I don't keep track, I just have in my head that I am a non-smoker who sometimes struggled.
Lol.
I smoked socially as a teen and then switched to 2 packs a week sometimes 3 when my partner and I were dating...so between 17 and 23 I was smoking heavily.
I went through a few quiting phases. The longest one lasted 5 years. That was a long time. I think something kinda intuitively switched or a missing puzzle piece fit into place and I just gave it up. It was expensive and I was no longer around other people who smoke...so I'm more a social smoker.
Last year when I was in my bout of depression I call "the dark twisted kingdom "...well, look at that. It does sound better than "Alison went crazy."...okay, you can call them pudding.
Anyway I smoked for a month as I was coping with my mourning...something inside told me that the smoking was temporary and I stopped after the second pack, just like that.
Then like a month ago I was curious if I was addicted to smoking and I bought a pack and smoked it...but I haven't wanted another cigarette..this time around it was more of an affirmation of life, not coping, although I passed an anniversary.
Also the inhale and exhale reminded me of breathing practice in meditation. . . But I feel like the breathing practice has a sacredness to it that doing it through a filter almost desecrates or diminishes it.
So I can't tell you if I won't smoke again. I may at some point but I don't think about it. Don't think about it long term. Do it for a day, then another, and another.
All habbits need time to settle in. It took you some time to get addicted, it will take some time to get your body used to not needing nicotine. You could try coping with hot tea instead, walks, or burning incense. Your dad would want you to be healthy.
Do I really need to bring him in to scold your arse?
http://newbuddhist.com/discussion/7092/help-with-stopping-smoking
Hope it works for you this time!
the new line - for the new you - is that you don't smoke.
If people know you've quit, they'll try to tempt you.
if you say you're a non-smoker - done deal.... !
There will be hard moments- but truly- they don't last very long. While you give up, most of your life will be the same except without those tiny moments where you light up for that golden 'aaahh!' feeling. The only way to get that feeling is to be addicted, and after a few days of not smoking you won't get it and there is no turning back.
Remember, cigarettes contain Polonium 210, which is a radioactive element. The scary thing is not that you once breathed it in, but that you did so and didn't care to think about it.
Now you're free to breathe in the lovely spring air. 'hmmm!'
@Paradox - yep, smoking sure does rob oneself of control, I have certainly felt as if I'm at the mercy of cigarettes; very frustrating.
@etherea glad to hear it is going well. I never got drinking coffee whilst having a cigarette personally, but I have a good friend who quit smoking (and drinking alcohol, through meditating actually) and she initially missed having a cigarette with her coffee, but she's fine about it now. I too have always made my own, maybe I'll take up origami instead
Thanks @weighted hope you're doing ok
@federica - I don't smoke. I am a non smoker. (Think i'm getting the hang of this!)
@possibilities thanks for the links, I shall have a peruse this evening.
@ThailandTom thanks, I don't see the point in it either, I guess at some point the point was to 'de-stress' but in reality, inhaling all that crap doesn't actually change anything in your life.
@Lady_Alison I think I will actually take up proper puddings in place of these 'fake puddings' lol. I call them puddings because having a cigarette is what I have done after eating a meal. I'm glad that you didn't get addicted when you tried one recently. And yes, one day at a time, I agree.
@AMH YES! Actually, it does make you feel depleted of energy, that is so true. Sometimes, it's as if I can feel the cells in my body struggling. I know that sounds a bit mad.
I quit cold turkey and I do think that meditation helped prepare me for this. The cravings arise like thoughts do in meditation. You can obsess over them, giving them more power and hold over you, or you can... just acknowledge it and let it go. I spent a lot of time laughing at myself. Laughing at the craving. I found it really impressive, actually, that a chemical could cause such a strong craving in my mind. The addiction was so strong that the thoughts/cravings really did sound like me...but they weren't me. It was just the craving for a chemical. The things our mind can do.
There are alternative non-tobacco and nicotine free cigarettes, just fyi (Ecstasy brand, for one). For a little while, I would smoke one of these from time to time in replacement for a cigarette. They taste horrible, lol, but in a way... I think they helped me forget what a real cigarette tasted like. It's like smoking tea or something, lol. It made me wonder if cigarettes would be that horrible if I wasn't addicted to them too. I only smoked them when I wrote though. When I used to be a smoker, I liked to have a cigarette for a pause/reflection time to read over my work. Now, I don't do either... I just pause/reflect, lol. I don't need a cigarette for a break anymore.
Good luck to you Dandelion, but really, luck isn't what you need. All you need is a little willpower.
@lamaramadingdong nice one! "Cheers" *clinks china cups of tea with lamarama*
Hopefully husband will be intact.
My dad from what I am told use to be a chain smoker. On the new years even when I was a one year old baby, he decided to quite just like that, and he has never smoked again. He has become a health freak and to this day goes to the gym 4-5 times a day. That is maybe the only thing I admire in him apart from dedication to work. However, those 2 things, work and the gym have just cost him his last marriage and kids so...