~~What consumes your mind, controls your life.~~ Unknown
You know you are addicted to a substance if you try to stay away from it and it slowly consumes your thoughts to the point you can't function without 'giving in' to it. You know what I mean. You're in a meeting and it's taking too long so you start looking at the clock wishing you could smoke. And as the day draws on, the thought of smoking becomes larger and larger in your mind until you finally get a chance to slip away. Then with the very first puff, you 'relax' and think "Ah, this is what I needed".
Yep, you relaxed....until the next time you need one. And the next time. And it goes on and on and on. That cycle of living your life until nicotine screams at you that you "need" more to relax.
I hate that. I hate that addiction alters your thinking to the point you think you need the very substance that has the power to kill you. You crave poison. You 'enjoy' toxic chemicals. You befriend your killer.
I used to do it, too. It started changing for me when I began to understand addiction. It started to make sense and ultimately I quit almost seven years ago.
But it doesn't work that way for everyone. I work with those who have quit things like heroin, methamphetamine, opiates, and alcohol yet stayed tied to smoking as if their lives depended on it. And in their addiction, they refuse to even think about the illnesses...the cancers....the deaths attributed to smoking. They mindlessly light up over and over and over while refusing to consider what they are doing to themselves. And the professionals who are tasked with teaching them how to live in recovery? They smoke, too.
Nicotine is just plain evil...well, in my mind anyway. And what makes it worse is that it is legal to light up and legal to kill yourself that way. Tobacco companies need to be shut down and I hate that they make a profit over other peoples' illnesses and deaths. I hate even more that they are finding new ways to get money off of this addiction to nicotine.
I needed to vent today, I guess. I needed to come here and say please, please open your mind to the possibility that maybe you need to quit. That maybe you can quit. That maybe you are stronger than your fear of quitting. That maybe life is waiting just over that mountain and maybe that mountain is really just a molehill made bigger by that addiction that clings to you.
Let it go, please. Please. There is no good reason to smoke and there is every reason in the world to quit. Truly. Think about it. And knowledge is power so come here and read, read, read!! So many people here have written brilliant posts about how to quit, why you should quit, and what you can do instead. There are posts about life that inspire you and their are posts about loss that will bring you to tears. And in every word on this site, their is hope and love and challenge and motivation and answers.
Please use this site....use every part of this site...to gain knowledge about addiction and coping skills and quitting and, well, life. Because we only have one and I am NOT going to let addiction take that away from me. I'm hoping the same for you.
