Why?

[SimplySheri]

Real quick question.  Why do you/did you want to quit smoking?  I know...we all know...smoking kills, but we smoked through that information for years.  So, just wondering, why now?

For me, it was the image of my kids at my funeral.  Rather than simply mourning, they were saying "If only she had quit smoking".  Morbid, I know, but I didn't want their last memories of me to be ones of me alone with a cigarette on the back porch.  It was all it took to want to quit.  Then I read, "Quitting isn't rocket science."  Easy peasy...just don't smoke!!

How about you?  Why did you quit?  Or why do you want to if you aren't quite there yet?

[Daniela2016]

It was my son's words, about 1 year ago: "mom, time to stop playing with your life, you are not getting any younger, and I want to have you for a long time".

I guess once a mom, forever a mom!

[JACKIE1-25-15]

I was tired of the stigma. Tired wasting time. FEAR Of illness. Embarrassed that I was still smoking. Did not like the taste or smell or the smoke. Needed to be free spirituality.

[elvan]

I was embarrassed to keep smoking when I knew that it really made me look ignorant...ignorance is not something I want to convey.  I had tried twice in the months before this quit and then I got sick, really sick, gasping for breath sick.  The doctor wanted to admit me to ICU, I refused to go and did what I felt they could do for me in the hospital at home...I could not start an IV but I COULD hydrate myself and I could use the nebulizer every two hours and take the antibiotics and run a vaporizer and keep the phone next to me so I could call 911 if I felt that I wasn't improving.  That was it, I knew then that even if I have done so much damage that I may die from COPD, I am not going to feed the beast that is eating me alive.  I did not want to disappoint my kids AGAIN with a failed quit and I did not want to disappoint ME either.

[tjanddj]

I had a goal to become as heathly as possible and after several months of eating healthfully and reaping the benefits smoking began to make no sense to me anymore if I wanted to continue on my "Get Healthly Journey" so my next goal was to quit smoking and so I did and now I am reaping the benefits of quitting.

[MarilynH]

I always thought that everyone else would have smoking related illnesses but I would be just fine, naive I know but when my Dr told me that I have mild copd, it really scared me and I realized that I needed to quit smoking for my health and family, especially my grandchildren! 

[Giulia]

I wanted to quit because I knew it was a stupid, unhealthful thing to do.  And the possibility of lung cancer scared the quit out of me.

[crazymama_Lori]

was having increased leg cramps, dizzy spells and difficulty breathing, tired of hearing myself wheeze at night

[SimplySheri]

So it really is all about health, isn't it?  I am so glad we are all here now!!  Battered, maybe, physically and a little beaten emotionally, but here.  Love to you all!!

[Sootie]

I just got tired.........the health thing never made an impression on me....I always thought I'd be the one to elude the health problems of smoking (stupid!). I just got tired.....tired of the cost, tired of needing to make sure you "had enough" for wherever you were going; did I have a lighter? Then, of course, the constant figuring out where you were going to be able to smoke each day. If I went to a conference....I not only had to find my way there but ALSO....where would I smoke and when? How could I sneak out and how often? Would people smell it on me when I came back?

The whole thin just became too much of a daily burden.....not a pleasure at all.

[MePlus3]

The lost of my husband drove me to smoking and it drove me to quit. The thought of my kids losing both of their parent from something we have control over is devastating. He died from suicide and here I am killing myself slowly (or was) I want better. Better for myself and for my kids. Also I think it's time to feel all the pain I hid in a sickerette. It's time to face it so that I can get true Devine healing and not settle for the temporary false healing from smoking.

[ShawnP]

Well, I tried in the past and always failed. I got to be a repeated record that " I am going to quit" hours later, i was back to smoking. Drs wanted me to quit but, i tend to go against what people tell me. I joined the site by survey and didn't have the intentions of quitting UNTIL, i got a few comments on my message board and i didnt want to be rude, so i felt like i had to quit! i remember telling my friend Kostas on fb, " hey i joined this site and i got these messages asking me when i am going to set a quit date?" I didn't want to let anybody down so, i thought i would give it a whirl haha or and i can't forget the people at home and the neighbor telling me that i would never make it. Those words made me want to prove them wrong and i did!! In the end, health did play a part but it wasn't my intentions at first.

[Thomas3.20.2010]

The day I was diagnosed I set my quit day for 6 days later - the first day of Spring!

[mdmd4448]

I tried to quit two other times about five and ten years ago. Last year, I got a cough after a cold...turned out to be just bronchitis. But I went and had a lung CT I was so worried. I got it and got the result by email 3 days later. When I opened it, it said no cancer and no COPD. I cried for ten minutes. So...here is the UNsurprise:  the profound nastiness of the habit is such that it was still another ten months until I came to this site to get serious about the Quit.

mdmd

[YoungAtHeart]

I, too, had myself believing that if I ate a healthful diet, kept my weight at a steady small, and exercised EVERY day, I could negate the bad effects of smoking.

I was rudely awakened to THAT falsehood when a vascular surgeon informed me I had blockages in arteries to both legs, needed surgery to replace them.  He also informed me that he could make my vascular system 45 again, but if I continued to smoke, I would definitely get further blockages and would probably not be healthy enough for him to operate.  Left unsaid was the possibility of losing a limb!!! 

Isn;t it a pity it took that for me to quit?  But - I did, and on the first attempt.  I am extremely active and the thought of not being so scared me smokeless!!!

Nancy

[Ed55]

Several of you have nailed my feelings, but my attempt at originality:

I did not want to die from self inflicted afflictions! Most of all, I did not want to be the person carting an oxygen tank around, or the person turning off the 02 to have a smoke.

[JonesCarpeDiem]

      A friend asked me to quit to influence his older brother. He tried to put me on the spot and I would have none of it.

     As I left, he asked me if I would "consider" it.

      I told him I would "consider it."

      I spent a month considering it and telling myself to wait a little longer every time I wanted to smoke until I had proven to myself I didn't need to smoke because I thought I did.

      I bought my last pack, told the guy at the corner store I wouldn't be back and quit when the pack was gone.

[shashort]

I kept having repetitive pneumonia and bronchitis episodes. Had episode of pneumonia in February and couldn't catch my breath and with activity very short of breath.  Even after pnuemonia cleared breathing did not go back to normal.  And Truthfully had that nagging smokers cough that was so darn embarrassing and to think I am inflicting it on my self.

[Eric_L.]

Fear of dying, sex issues?, contributing factor to anxiety, shortness of breath, dream of having the stamina to run a couple few miles, tired of waking up and in withdrawal.

[TerrieQuit]

I was sick of being sick and sick of burnt everything and stinky, smelly everything I love my free life!

Hope your Labor Day was good, Seri!

Don't Quit on your Quit!

[TerrieQuit]

Sheri!