cancel
Showing results for 
Show  only  | Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Share your quitting journey

N. O. P. E.

RoseH
Member
5 10 68

Hurricane Isaias Rakes the Bahamas on a Track for Florida’s East Coast...

If I am offline for a while, this will be the reason!  I live in a suburb of Jacksonville, Florida.

When I smoked, I would be out there right now, worrying and smoking...  But that will not be happening today!  There is light at the end of the tunnel for me.  And, you can be with me too!

N. O. P. E. stands for “Not One Puff Ever.”  Freedom from smoking is the best thing I ever did for myself!  Just put one foot in front of the other, each and every day, and do not buy, beg or borrow a cigarette, and you will understand true freedom!  Quitting smoking is the best thing you can do, for yourself, to improve your health and well being!  I feel totally complete, without a cigarette in my hand!

I wish you all a very happy and smoke free Saturday, and let’s all keep our beautiful quits, ok?

10 Comments
About the Author
I was 57 years old and smoking like a chimney in September 2003. I was also having medical problems and upon my doctor’s diagnosis, I knew I had to quit smoking. I was scheduled and admitted to the hospital in October 2003. I had a total hysterectomy and was recuperating, when a nurse found me upset in my room and she told me to try to calm down, and take a deep breath… I could not take a deep breath! In fact, I had to be put on oxygen immediately! I was terrified. A medical specialist was brought in, and that is when I learned I had COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease). My x-rays confirmed it, and the direct cause was smoking [since I was 15 years old]. I had double pneumonia as an infant, so my lungs were fragile, even when I was very young… I had to stay an extra week and they pumped steroids and antibiotics in my arm so I could breathe on my own, again. My nose got so sore with those oxygen cannulas in both nostrils. Hindsight is always 20/20. I should have never started smoking. However, peer pressure was awful when I was 15 years old. A few of my classmates dared me to light up and smoke one… I remember that first taste and how I coughed from the smoke. It was awful! But I wanted to “belong”, so I smoked until the addiction took hold of me! Back to the hospital room… I was terrified. I quit. I stayed that way for six whole months. My husband, Ed quit with me. We were doing great and then one day I said to him, “My life feels empty. Do you think we’ve got this quitting thing under control? Do you think we can have just a few a day? Before I could say another word, he was off in the car to buy some cigarettes… We both lit up when he returned, and I felt like my throat and lungs were on fire! I smashed it out and coughed! “I will never do that again!” But an addict’s lies are just that! Before long I was smoking over a pack a day again… The truth is that I had no idea how terrible the “addiction” to the drug Nicotine was. I smoked for another decade or two and each day I would tell myself that I would quit “tomorrow”. Don’t be as naïve’ as I was about this slowly killing addiction! Quit now! I would not be using two inhalers if I would have kept my quit way back then…