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Share your quitting journey

The first day is not the enemy

maryfreecig
Member
10 16 191

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On day one I read my first smobriety book. It was A Walk in the Woods and was written by Bill Bryson. Funny thing is, I chose it for its nature theme (Appalachian Trail south to north) but it turned out to be a comical story about a man and friend who were ill prepared for the big journey they were undertaking. So relevant to my situation. I learned later that I didn't need to know everything about quitting to quit.

I laughed  about their escapades on day one. The medicine worked if only for a half hour. I knew I’d come back to the book when each day when I got ansy. 

Reading books was a part of my quit plan--knew it before day one, hoped it would help. It did and I kept on reading. The picture above is my book collection over six years--primarily nature books. Walking was another quit tactic that I embraced fully and as I read more nature books, I started noticing parts and pieces of the natural world more and more--photographed and did pencil drawings of birds, trees, landscape.

The art was yet another part of my quit kit. They all tied in together and my experience grew richer and more important to me over time. But at first nothing occupied my mind more than knowing that something was missing and that I did not like it. There wasn’t anything that could replace the sense of security I got from smoking--not right away. But I was lucky enough to know (thanks to the wisdom of others passed on to me) that one step at a time was the way I’d make it out. No falling apart about the what ifs of tomorrow, next week, next month, next year. Here today had to be my focus. It was hard. Day one passed. Next day arrived, started the same--I had to keep going. 

 

If you are thinking of quitting, please don’t let feelings of being unsatisfied distract you from your commitment. Follow your plans--do whatever it takes, get and keep support. One day you will look back and know that day one was the sweetest gift.

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About the Author
Quitter Version 9.25 Years smober as of January 9, 2023. Age 64. Yeah! Well I made it through some pretty tough quit-smoking tangles, and now am happily smoke free. But the start of my cigarette quit was not glorious. It could have been with some other version of me (maybe my younger self--20 something) taking the journey. But, I had to quit with the version that was available back in 2013. I could not wait until I was entirely sure that I would quit, or until I was entirely happy about quitting. I had to grab the willingness that came out of the blue one day in September of that year and run with it. And so I did. Nicotine addiction is a puzzling addiction. I've heard many say that they just can't stop (some of these folks have serious heart or lung trouble). It isn't the kind of addiction that leaves you plastered as with alcohol or other drugs--so that once you sober up, you realize how overtaken you were by the stuff. Nicotine works different than that. It co-opts your person, while at the same time allowing you to stay conscious and even alert. It's kinda like those science fiction tales in which an alien attaches itself to the spine of an individual...and she has no idea of the danger lurking within. You really discover how you've been preyed upon once you try to quit. Then the evil nature of the alien comes to the forefront making quitting seem like a horror rather than a rescue from horror. Some may argue that the smoker understands the danger. I argue the opposite; most smokers begin smoking by the age of 18, and have hardly had enough life experience to understand what addiction really means, and so they are overtaken by a force far greater than they can understand. By the time the smoker really wants to quit, the addiction has blossomed and grown in a most grotesque way. No one deserves this addiction. Maybe, someday society will finally do the right thing and ban the sale of tobacco, leaving it up to the individual alone to grow, dry and smoke the stuff herself, though never allowed to sell it. I made it--as of today--but how I wish all smokers would find their way to quitting. https://quittinthesmokes.blogspot.com/