Share your quitting journey
I had a friend was a minimal smoker who quit a year before me and who wanted his older brother to quit. His older brother always replied, "yeah but you weren't a real smoker"
My friend knew his brother would be influenced if I quit because I smoked a pack a day or more and was a real smoker for 40 years. He asked me if I would quit. I said no. I had never even thought about quitting. Before I left that day he pressed me again and asked me if I would at least consider it. I said I would.
Over the next 4 weeks I started telling myself to wait when I wanted to smoke and at the end of that time I had gone from 20 a day to 5 a day. I never worked myself up or denied myself once in those 4 weeks.
I never got any feelings one way or the other because I was just "considering" it.
Going from 20 a day to 5 a day gave me confidence. I had proven to myself I didn't need to smoke just because I had the urge to smoke or thought I needed to.
That Friday afternoon when I went to get a pack, I said to myself silently at the cig counter, "this is your last pack". I never went into that place again. The following Tuesday morning, I smoked my last one and went and got the patch.
I forgot to put on my patch the fourth day and I rode it out to see what it was like. After all, the patches were at home which was only 10 minutes away so why panic? The next week I forgot two days in a row to wear a patch, I knew I didn't need them anymore. I put one in my wallet and promised if I ever got an overpowering urge to smoke, I would put that patch on and wait an hour.
I guaranteed my success with that promise.
"You don't need to want to quit but you must be willing to quit and decide to quit."
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