Hi, everyone.
It's been the 1 st year in 30 years i have been smoke free. Thanks to all that helped me in this group. My experience has been one of learing about myself. That's the real challenge, yourself, your thoughts. Your brain will rationalize anything. Your brain, your thoughts will think of all kinds of ways to get you to smoke.
Also talking about smoking and how you feel, what your triggers are, just the feelings of feeling shitty and wanting one. Just like every other addiction you must face the reasons behind it. Smoking kept me away from others. Always went outside to smoke. Kept me from going places, cause the thoughts of when will i be able to smoke, where will i smoke, will i have enough for the trip. Smoking was a chain around my ankle. It was a way of handling emotions. Whenever i was stressed or fighting with someone any upseting thing i'd just go have a cigarette and it would give me a fix, the chemicals in them made you feel some kind of comfort, but in reality they kept me in a state of stress, becasue i wanted them all the time.
Cigarettes ran my life, they influenced decisions, they were always in the forefront. And of coarse there is the health isssue, well that really goes without saying. There's no one who could disagree with that.
I have been through some tough times with it. Cravings that hit you like a ton of bricks out of nowhere and they are scary. The battle with your own mind is a tough fight. I am so proud of myself for getting through it. You can not quit for anyone other than yourself, you must do this for you. Only then can you do it. You must find that switch in your head and flip it.
Don't let the demon win. You can do this for yourself, i know you can, cause i did it and you can too.
