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Share your quitting journey

Greetings/Separating from Triggers

erict
Member
0 3 4

Hola a todos!  🙂  My name is Eric, and I'm broadcasting live from the Arizonan-Sonoran border!  I'm glad to be here amongst all you lovely individuals as we go down the daunting path of breaking this horrible addiction to nicotine.  Message me, write on my wall, whatever, and I'l be there for you!  I promise!

My number one reason for quitting are the people I love most and want to live a long time to be with: my parents, my girlfriend Andi, and my students.  Second is to generally experience as much as I can without worrying about/getting a debilitating, possibly fatal illness.  Third is because I hate needlessly giving money to any one of those horrible death industries to fatten the pockets of people in the business of mass murder of our brothers and sisters here and abroad.  (Ever read/see "Thank You For Smoking"?  I'm looking at you big tabacco, alcohol, guns, fast food, etc.)  (Soap box returned to storage.)

So, I've set my quit date for May 23rd, and I'm going to beat this thing into submission!  I'm confident because I've tried this before, have quit for up to a year, but have kept going back--and I've learned from it!  Now I know I need to meticulously go through this plan and take some practical advice from people here to take care of my business.  So far, I've put a little of that advice in action.

After reading a blog post by Sky Girl recommending that I make a list of coping strategies dividing it into "Things I Can Do" and "Things I Can Put In My Mouth (Get Your Mind Out of the Gutter)", I did so and began using them to separate my triggers from the act of smoking the past couple of days.  My biggest trigger (which I figured out by doing the exercise in my plan) is arriving home from work.  Sort of a destressing.  Thus, in the past few days I've tried looking at my photos (doing) while drinking a glass of water (putting in my mouth); doing planks (doing) while also taking sips of water (putting in my mouth); and rapping to a favorite song (doing) while intermittently chomping on a few almonds or blueberries (putting in my mouth).  And guess what...THEY ALL WORKED!  I did smoke, but only after the separation, and the urge to smoke was diminished.  The next step will be to NOT smoke a cigarette here and there after the separation, to power through.  But I have to say, not bad for only joining a few days ago.  Time to keep the momentum going through that May 23rd quit date and beyond!

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