I started my quit (this time) on April 1st, 2018. My 40th birthday was a few days prior to that and I wanted to mark the milestone by quitting smoking, among other, less important things. I hadn't really celebrated many birthdays in the past two decades due to being a sniveling twerp under the imagined control of a jerkface ex husband, so I really wanted to "live it up" on my 40th. I also wanted to get a bit drunk to celebrate, so I didn't choose my birthday as my quit date because really, who was I kidding?
Anywho...without delving too much into my past, I will divulge that in the past 2 years I've gotten divorced, moved across the country and back to my hometown, worked 2 jobs,started school in an allied health program, started taking on more of a caregiver role to my aging parents (dios mio), and gotten engaged to a wonderful man I wasn't looking for.
Without further ado, here are some of the reasons I chose to quit (and permanently) this time:
1. It's freakin' expensive.
2. I've gotten so, so tired of the hacking cough. It used to be just in the morning, then it became an on-and-off all day long thing that was exacerbated by anything remotely resembling physical activity.
3. I'm in my fourth decade of life, with nearly two of those decades being partially wasted by the crap I've put my body through. I sincerely want to just live, breathe, and be content.
4. I feel like I'm in a good place in my life. Yes, I have stress. Yes, I freak out on occasion. I have, however, learned a lot of good coping skills and I have a much better system of support than I've ever had before.
I work in retail, which is a real PITA chock full of stressors and annoyances. One of the things that started bugging me back in December (when the quit seed was planted, if you will) was that my boss, a heavy smoker in her late 60s who is cranky, mean, stinky, takes 40 cig breaks per shift "because she works harder than anyone and she's the boss", etc...well, this woman told me, when I expressed my budding desire to quit smoking whilst stocking the shelves with NRT products, "Honey, you're just like me. You're a lifer, and you're never gonna quit." And then she almost passed out from a coughing fit.
So December...that's when I started really paying attention to my cough. That's when it really started bothering me. After it started bothering me, I came to the brain-jarring, soul-shaking realization that it bothered other people, too. Customers would come in and say, "Oh, no, you're still sick?!", or "Oh my GOOOODDDD, WHO is COUGHING LIKE THAT??", or "Stay away from me, sweetie, I can't afford to get sick!" I got tired of saying, "I'm not sick, honest!", or "It's allergies" (lol what?) and I started saying, "I'm not sick, I just smoke like it's my job." Because I did. Nearly every time my smoker boss went out for a smoke, she'd come in and say, "Your turn, Jen", and off I'd go like a good little idiot. Sigh.
I can't change any of that. I did take a good long time to consider quitting. In January is when I decided to do it around the time of my birthday. I asked the pharmacist at work for all of the smoking cessation literature he had to offer, and he spoke to me at length about my options and what have you. I visited this site but didn't sign up because I wasn't sure how to interact with anyone as a current smoker at the time. Anyway, I've written a novella here, so I'll shut my cake hole in a sec...just, I see a lot of amazing posts, comments, information, and encouragement here and I'm happy to be here and hopeful for the future. Thanks for reading, if ya made it this far, and if it made you sleepy let me know so I can patent this post and start selling it next to the Unisom.
