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Give and get support around quitting

missellen
Member

Fell Off the Wagon

Ugh. Well, I did it, I smoked. I pretty much knew I was going to. I fought it for a few days, but not hard enough. I didn't come here much, I didn't talk to anyone IRL about it, I gave myself a few half-hearted "pep" talks and then went and bought a pack.  

I knew I was giving in to the addict part of me and I DIDN'T CARE  -- that's what's so disturbing about it.  WHY didn't I care?  Why didn't I care enough about myself and my quit to fight it?  To come here, where I know there is overwhelming support?  To talk to my husband or my mom who are huge supporters of me and my quit?  I'm not entirely sure. I wanted to smoke is ultimately the bottom line.  I wanted to smoke and I didn't want to smoke, but the wanting beat out the not wanting.

So, after nearly two weeks of being quit cold turkey, when the nicotine was presumably all flushed out of my system, I smoked to beat the band. I smoked until I felt sick (on purpose). I smoked and smoked and smoked all on the down low, I might add. Not in the house, not around anyone, but in my car in a parking lot while it was still dark out in the morning--like a fugitive; a criminal. Because that is how I felt.

After smoking like a chimney, I threw the remainder of the pack and the lighter away. I went to the car wash and cleaned the inside of the car--cleaned the windows, the dash, vacuumed it out and sprayed it with sandalwood spray.

I stopped in the store and restocked up on cinnamon gum and lemons.  The hubby was nice enough to buy me m&m's and good and plenty and a very sweet card telling me how proud he was of me (um, can you say guilt) yesterday. I'll have to fess up when he wakes up.

I came home and threw my clothes in the washer and took a shower.

And now, here I sit, with a nice, tall glass of ice cold lemon water and feeling like a jerk. But, I can't allow this to lead me into smoking full time again. I can't. I won't. My gym bag is already packed up for the morning and I'm busy for a lot of today, so that will help. I have to go reset my quit day now. I'm now just about an hour into my quit.

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84 Replies
Cricket
Member

I sent a text to my teacher for the reference 

To the experiment.  Now you got me worried that I got it wrong!  (I am not for certain at what stage the person or persons were in regarding their smoking status)  What caught my attention was the effect of one puff.  The topic of the night was relapse prevention.  I will definitely return after I receive his answer.

Cricket 39 DOF

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I don't think it matters that you misspoke.

I'd like to know if ONE cigarette physically starts the process over like it was day one.

I already know that giving ones self permission certainly open one up the psychological addiction and permission to having more than one for most people.

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Giulia
Member

I'd like to see the veracity of that experiment also.  It gives us that much more fodder for the NOPE principle.

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eXactly

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Cricket
Member

Well... I DO know this.  I have been smokefree for 39 days. (Still on patch)  If I WERE to smoke ONE cigarette It WOULD send me back to day one at the very minimum because I would relive the ahh moment.  So now I am back to square one trying to put distance of time between my Association of cigarettes to awh moment.  Now instead of enjoying the freedom of success, I am moping for what I can't have.  Now I remember what I'm missing again.  Now I have to contend with that little devil on my shoulder telling me oh come on just a little bit wont hurt me.  So just saying  if the physical doesn't get you the psychological will.   not that the battle can't be won, you just have to work all the more harder than you would have had to.

Cricket
Member

Ok I heard back from smoking teacher.  The referance was from the material I sent him to

On whyquit.com  The Law of addiction.

The Law is rather simple. It states, "Administration of a drug to an addict will cause re-establishment of chemical dependence upon the addictive substance."

Mastering it requires acceptance of three fundamental principles:

  1. That dependency upon using nicotine is a true chemical addiction, captivating the same brain dopamine wanting relief pathways as alcoholism, cocaine or heroin addiction;
  2. That once established we cannot cure or kill an addiction but only arrest it; and
  3. That once arrested, regardless of how long we have remained nicotine-free, that just one hit of nicotine creates an extremely high probability of full relapse.

3. NOPE!!!!  NOT ONE PUFF EVER!!!

We need not guess as to what happens inside a brain that attempts to "cheat" and use nicotine during recovery. The evidence seen on brain PET scans is undeniable. Just one puff of nicotine and up to 50 percent of the brain's nicotinic-type acetylcholine receptors become occupied by nicotine.[77]

The effects of one, two and three puffs of nicotine on brain acetylcholine dopamine pathway receptors

During relapse, while the smoker's conscious mind may find itself struggling with tobacco toxin tissue burning sensations and carbon monoxide induced dizziness, well-engineered dopamine pay-attention pathways are recording the event and will make the resulting dopamine "aaah" wanting relief sensation nearly impossible, in the short-term, to forget.

missellen
Member

Thanks for posting this, Cricket.

Giulia
Member

Thank you!  "Smoking 0.13 (1 to 2 puffs) of a cigarette resulted in 50% occupancy of α4β2* nAChRs for 3.1 hours after smoking. Smoking a full cigarette (or more) resulted in more than 88% receptor occupancy and was accompanied by a reduction in cigarette craving. "  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2773659/   

"A single puff of a cigarette was the only amount of smoking that was followed by recovery of receptor availability within the 3-hour 50-minute time frame after smoking (Figure 2A-C), while the medium to high levels of smoking (one quarter of a cigarette to satiety) resulted in new steady-state conditions at 3 hours after smoking (Figure 2 and Figure 3). Smoking to satiety resulted in a profound decrease of radioactivity in all brain regions studied"

Cricket
Member

Your welcome, missellen!  I am praying for you, and I believe in you!  You will make it!  I just know that the impact of this lesson will stick with you until you are a elder and beyond!  The important thing to remember is there is soo much more going on in our minds and bodies when we take a hit on a cigarette.  Alot more than we can control, the best thing we can do is take care of what we CAN control, and that is weather we light that cigarette or not.  Just say no to drugs. No thank you I quit.  I love that I have quit.  I don't want a cigarette ever again and if I did, I still don't want it....so No.

karenjones
Member

Thanks for this Giulia, I read it all and found this quite interesting :  negative associations between cognitive ability and likelihood of smoking, and positive associations between cognitive ability and probability of quitting smoking.2   Interesting is it not.   tobacco is a nefarious thing after the death corporations got a hold of it in the 1970's and started putting additatives into it like formaldyhyed.  

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