Hello to everyone and especially to those special ones. To the elders that took me under their wing and kept me going with N.O.P.E and Don't quit on my quit. I am so grateful for all the tools you gave me because I have certainly had to use them. Diana Joy I'm praying for you and your family. Thanks for your words I read tonight. A special hello to the freedom train conductors.....Thanks for all your encouragement for all my milestones. Mark , thanks for the shout out .....I need to consolidate accounts I think itsginas and nhandi are both me. 
I'm over 900 days nicotine free and its all because of you all. Quitting when I did probably helped save my life. A long tie ago when I was in the military (US Army). The military thought it was just scar tissue, or keloids in an old wound from when I served. 36 years later the lumps turned out to be abscesses and they bursted. After a couple days in the hospital laying up on 3 different heavy antibiotics, it was determined that I had to have surgery to close the whole the abscesses left open. Skipping forward after just 6 months I was then diagnosed with B Cell Lymphoma of my stomach. And then Bleeding Ulcers put me back in the hospital. I had to do 25 straight days of radiation to kill the cancer. 2 weeks of daily iron treatments, the pain and suffering was unreal. My platelets were 1750 and between the fatigue and skin infection I got on top of everything. I thought I was going to die. I was pushed harder than I thought I could endure. I remember saying to a friend that I didn't have all this medical crap happening when I smoking. I looked at my daughter smoking one day while in recovery and wondered if a cigarette would make me feel better. Still never losing site on how powerful nicotine is. All I can say is Thank God for the tools I learned from each and every one of you in this group and for helping me end my 44 year addiction of smoking. I always think of the group and I refer people all the time on Facebook if I read about someone struggling. My current status ....... I am over 900 days nicotine free!!!!!
As of March 5th, I'm cancer free, the military didn't back pay me to the 80's but they are paying me 100% temporarily until everything is healed this time. When I went back to work my job let's me telework 3 days a week, and I am looking forward to being able retire in 3 years
Sorry for the long post, I just needed to sign on and give some thanks and to check in.
love to you all in the EX Team
Gina
