Dee's 2 Year Smoke Free Milestone

Greetings fellow travelers...

When I started this journey two years ago, I knew with absolute certainty that after 32 years of smoking I was soooooooooo tired of it. I’d had enough. I hated it, absolutely hated smoking with a passion that was quite fierce at times. This hatred not only fueled my quit but may have been my saving grace.

I didn’t know much about how to quit smoking then, but I’d heard plenty of horror stories about the withdrawals. I did know however, that you could use a nicotine patch or nicotine gum to step-by-step eliminate the nicotine from your body. My thought was, I don’t want nicotine in my body any longer than I have to, I want to quit NOW! Silly, silly me. I could have had help, but this was my first quit, what did I know? I found our forum by accident a few weeks into my quit.

The best thing about quitting cold turkey was that my brain was in such a thick enveloping fog, the agonies of the physical withdrawals were probably diminished. Heck, I couldn’t spend too much time worrying about the discomfort of the cravings anyway. I had to figure out major things like getting dressed and finding my way to and from work every day without getting lost, or assuring my boss that I really could concentrate on a project for more than two minutes at a time!

For the first 3 months quitting became my highest priority. My family and friends say it was actually an obsession. For three months, I felt mentally drained most of the time. I was either thinking about smoking, thinking about my quit, or feeling the mental urges to smoke.

After my desperate newbie pleas of “When will I know I’m OK” or “When will this get better” I’d told someone in a post that if my brain didn’t get some rest soon I would go nuts. At that time, my idea of heaven would be to go three days without mental craves or thinking about smoking. My quit elders told me “Girlfriend shut up and hang tough” (just kidding). It eventually happened.

Three days actually passed without an urge or me thinking about smoking and...I didn’t even notice it while it was happening. When I finally did I was shocked! This was a huge milestone and turning point. I had been working on a very complex project those three days and it had consumed me. Soon thereafter, the light bulb went on and I realized quitting smoking did not have to be a 24/7 war.

I’d decided I would not smoke again, so I simply had to face reality. The facts were, I was in the process of healing, there was a rebellion going on in my mind and body and the urges were going to come if I smoked or not. I could choose to battle them or relax and acknowledge them and let them pass. I decided to relax into my quit. This may sound weird but I actually began analyzing the cravings. I'd review what was I doing when they came, what the trigger was, and how do I avoid this one in the future. It eventually became a game for me - a challenge. I accepted the challenge and won. It’s been way over a year since I’ve had one of those slaps up side the head serious cravings.

Page 2 - "Cessation is a Process..."