The mind of an addict who is
actively feeding an addiction is an extremely complex entity that can be
baffling at times. Reality often becomes
so distorted by the need that it
almost borders on insanity. We need only
to look at the fundamental paradox of addiction to see the reality in that
statement. When we set aside our junkie
mentality, we see full well that our addiction is slowly killing us, yet we
continue to feed the beast on a daily basis.
Becoming an ex-smoker brings a whole new way of thinking
to the addict mind. Many of our thought
processes now revolve around new beginnings, emerging feelings and emotions as
well as realizations regarding who and what we really are. As we progress in our quest for freedom, each
of us slowly builds a solid belief system that serves as our foundation for
gaining control over our addictive personality.
Depending on the individual, this belief system can be based on anything
from spirituality to simple stubbornness.
Many ex-smokers
will follow the 12-step program, which was originated by Alcoholics
Anonymous. Nicotine Anonymous uses a
slightly modified version, but essentially both programs involve letting go of
your Earthly misgivings and turning your fate as an addict over to a Higher
Power. Other addicts, me included,
choose to look at the addiction through what can be termed as a reality focus. This line of thinking teaches us to look at
our behavior patterns by stepping back, taking an objective look at them,
analyzing them and then learning from our actions and the consequences that
follow.
Regardless of how the foundation is built, the end result
in the development of an ex-smoker is the same.
After the investment of months of time and energy our originally
tentative aspirations eventually evolve into very strong convictions. These convictions become so ingrained, in
fact, that they are almost prophetically shared with the world. Often this sharing of experience and
knowledge seems overbearing to the uninitiated and the person offering to help
is viewed as one of those ex-smoker
types. Nothing could be further from the
truth.
The ex-smoker who has been able to control his addiction
for several months finally realizes that it can be done, that actual freedom
from smoking is an attainable goal. A
strong sense of urgency is born of this realization and striving to share with
others who are struggling becomes an almost uncontrollable desire. This sharing is what a support group thrives
on, people with more time in the group coaching those who are just starting
out, holding their hands as they take their first tentative steps toward
freedom.
The urgency to share knowledge and experience often leads
to what is lovingly referred to as a rambling. Mostly written on the spur of the moment,
without an outline or editing or re-writes, these ramblings come from the
soul. They are pure, untamed emotion
that goes right from the heart to the keyboard.
Their purpose is twofold. Not
only do these ramblings give other group members an insight into the mindset of
someone who is further along in the fight; they also serve to strengthen the
writer’s resolve as well.
The following four of my numerous ramblings were composed
and posted to the support group during the first year of my quit. They have been instrumental in the
development of my life as an ex-smoker.
The Reality of my Addiction
We all know that
smoking is not only unhealthy, but also deadly.
Considering that we kill ourselves just a little bit more with every
single puff, it’s hard to understand, especially for the non-smoker, how we can
continue to light up day after day after day.
It’s only human nature for non-smokers to feel a form of outrage when
they see loved ones killing themselves.
Can we really fault them for nagging us to quit? I was a smoker for 26 years and that is all
I ever heard... It’s bad for you, you're going to die, why do you smoke, why
don't you quit etc…etc…etc…
Once we do
finally quit smoking and come to realize and deal with the stupidity of our
actions, it’s only natural to look for a scapegoat. Enter…the Cigarette Manufacturers… In my opinion, many ex-smokers tend to lay
too much blame on the cigarette manufacturers - those big bad companies who
tricked us and MADE US SMOKE. Yeah right... Ok, so information was kept secret
and for years we were told smoking is ok... The companies SHOULD take some
responsibility for making an addictive drug so readily available, but did any
of the manufacturers ever hold a gun to our heads and force us to smoke? I don’t quite see it that way.
As long as I can
remember, cigarette smoking has been considered unhealthy, something that
causes cancer. Did I stop? No, of course not. Now just think about that for a
minute... For 26 YEARS I knew that I was doing something to kill myself. At an
average of a pack a day I smoked close to 200,000 cigarettes in my lifetime.
That's just insanity that I can't see blaming anyone but myself for.
What I'm getting
at is this: The addiction is mine. I know I have an addictive personality. I
almost became a practicing alcoholic, but thank God I realized what was
happening to me while helping my sister through rehab and stopped. If I play
cards or go to the track, I usually can't stop until the wallet is empty. I am
an addict. I have surrendered myself to that fact and have accepted my
addiction for what it is, an addiction. Nothing more, nothing less. It is mine
and nobody else’s.
It is not my
dad's fault that I wanted to copy him as a teenager. It is not my friends'
fault because they exerted peer pressure for me to be cool. It is not the
cigarette manufacturer's fault for making cigarettes available for sale. It is my fault for continuing to smoke even
after knowing it would kill me. I quit a thousand times mostly for reasons that
were stupid and mostly lasted for hours, maybe a couple days. I had several
serious quits that lasted up to seven months and then picked up on a perfectly
normal day for no good reason. Having an addictive personality just plain
sucks. But if you have it you're stuck with it.
So… you learn to live with
it.
If you want to stay smoke
free you don't smoke. Simple.
You don't smoke no matter
what.
-
If the kids give you a hard time you don't smoke.
-
If you have a fight with your spouse you don't smoke.
-
If your boss is an asshole you don't smoke.
-
If another driver gives you the finger you don't smoke.
-
If a loved one dies you don't smoke.
We have all been
in situations similar to the ones above and they will tend to cause us to say I
'need' a cigarette. Bullshit! We don't need
a cigarette. That's junkie talk. We don't smoke - no matter what.
-
And if we get depressed because we can't have just one, so what? It
will pass.
-
And if we feel like we're going out of our freaking minds, so what? It
will pass.
-
And if we're sitting in a corner crying uncontrollably for reasons we
don't know or understand, so what? It will pass.
-
And if we get so mad we want to rip somebody's face off, so what? It
will pass.
Folks, I have been sometimes
been labeled as 'extreme' for my views, and if that's what people want to think
of me that's perfectly fine. My message though is this:
The addiction is ours and no
one else’s. Only we have the power to stay smoke-free. It really doesn't matter WHY we smoked, does
it? What matters is that we stop and stay stopped. The only way to do that is
by following these words of wisdom from Yoda in StarWars (of all people):
"Do or do not...there
is no try.”
Makes sense to me, and
remember, NO MATTER WHAT!
Peace!
Fight the good fight!
(Four months, one week &
four days smoke-free)
Time Line of a Quit - The First Year
Fighting our
addiction really sucks, doesn’t it? The fact that you quit though, thereby
undertaking one of the hardest things known to man/woman, shows that you
believe life to be more important than death. Otherwise you’d still be
smoking...
Quitting is
hell, no doubt about it. Nobody ever said that it would be easy, losing a life
long friend and all. It’s ok to go
through the grieving process, but you have to look at it for what it truly is.
You didn’t really lose a friend; you began a battle with an enemy. The only way
you can win is if you refuse to feed your addiction every day for the rest of
your life. We are addicts and will always be addicts - we just choose to NOT
feed our addiction.
...And it DOES
get easier. The time frame is different for all, but there are some fairly
general milestones you can pretty much count on.
1. During the first few days,
you have a great resolve and you’re determined to beat your addiction no matter
what.
2. After a week or so, you’re
over the physical addiction and you feel great.
3. About a week or so later
reality sets in and many people panic. “OH MY GOD - what will I do for the rest
of my life without smokes?” This is the hell part where all you can do is ride
it out, preferably with the help of fellow ex-smokers, because non-smokers just
don’t understand.
4. The dreaded three-month mark
- classic time for depression to set in. Nobody knows why, but it happens to
many of us. Again turn to friends here in the group for support.
5. The six-month mark - feelings
of freedom begin to emerge. You start to feel really good about being
smoke-free and truly enjoy being an ex-smoker. Here is where you need to be
really careful though and remember that you are still an addict. I myself quit
once for seven months and picked up on a perfectly normal day for no apparent
reason other than to enjoy just one.
6. One year - that was a major
turning point for me. Once I reached
that mark I could honestly say I had ZERO desire to ever smoke again. Sure I
still think about it from time to time, and I have one pet time when I wish I
still could.... For me it’s after I finish mowing the lawn.... Go figure! The point is it is merely a thought now and
nowhere near a craving. Nonetheless I still have to tell myself that it is an
addict thought. I remain smoke-free because I fight my addiction every day. I
never forget that I am an addict, and on a daily basis I choose to not smoke.
You too can do the same,
REALLY you can! It’s hard and it’s hell
and maybe it sucks big-time right now for you, but cliche as it may sound...
My Ideas about Rewards for
Quitting
REWARD # 1
When was the last time you
were able to REALLY smell a flower? As
an ex-smoker you'll be able to smell all the wonderful things nature has to
offer.
REWARD # 2
Wouldn't it be great to do stuff
without getting winded? As soon as 72
hours after quitting your bronchial tubes relax and you lung capacity
increases. Between 2 weeks and 3 months it will increase as much as 30%.
REWARD # 3
Your sex life is bound to
improve, because your partner won't feel like kissing involves licking a dirty
ashtray - trust me on this one... Back to lung capacity - an orgasm won't feel
like it's gonna kill you….
REWARD # 4
One of my personal
favorites... You will eventually stop coughing up crap that looks like it came
out of an unflushed toilet... If that's
not good enough to be a reward, this gwap
can be used as a deterrent as well.
Every time you cough up a nice black wad, spit it into a jar and save
it. If you get the insane idea that you
need to reward yourself with a smoke for not smoking a while, take a nice long
drink from the jar - might want to keep a scissors handy though… The stuff
tends to be a bit gooey…
REWARD # 5
You won't get
emphysema. If you're anything like me,
emphysema is just another word for just another disease. That's what I used to think until I read
"Anatomy of a Day with Emphysema" by my friend Bud Ellis Bud on my website: http://Smoking-Cessation.net. Trust me, life with emphysema sucks big time,
and you should do whatever it takes to avoid it.
REWARD # 6
After quitting, you actually
LIVE! No I don't mean you'll live longer - that goes without saying. For one thing you will gain more time each
day. At just one pack (not smoked) per
day and five minutes per cigarette, you gain an extra HOUR & 40 MINUTES by
not smoking. You won't be chained to
thoughts of smoking; you can concentrate on living! Family, friends, nature, hobbies... Just
about everything will become more pure, real and vivid when it's no longer
shadowed by the act of smoking.
Family Support… Or Not
The arrival of
Quit Day is a momentous occasion, not only for the smoker, but for his/her
non-smoking circle of friends and family as well. While the smoker usually awaits this day with
a varying degree of anxiety, non-smoking spouses and children lean more toward
excitement and happiness. This change in
your life strongly affects them as well.
From this day forth they won’t have to put up with something they
loathe. No more kissing someone who
tastes like an ashtray, no more stench in the house or the car, no more burn
holes in clothing or upholstery - of course they’re thrilled. More often than not, they will do whatever
they can to support your quit.
The first days
and weeks are filled with concern as well as joy for you, the ex-smoker. The passage of time not smoking is tracked in
days, sometimes even hours or minutes; one day, one week, two weeks, etc. are
often celebrated as if you had won the Nobel prize. Your non-smoking family becomes your
cheerleading squad that fills you with pride for your accomplishment and
propels you to make it just one more day…
They will usually understand that you get crabby and angry and they
generally put up with a lot of crap as you go through withdrawal. It is very important to have your family’s
support early on, and the more involved they are, the better your chances are
for success.
At some point
after the one-month anniversary has been celebrated, you will most likely see a
change in family support. Their
enthusiasm for your quit can fizzle to the point where you may tend to wonder
if they even care any more. When I
stopped smoking, that change started in the third month of my quit and came to
a head when nobody remembered my three-month anniversary. I couldn’t believe that the people who only
weeks before celebrated me as their hero
would forget to honor me for this big milestone. Talk about a roller-coaster ride of feelings…
Anger, despair, loneliness, doubt and more all came to surface during that
time.
There I was, in
the throes of fighting my addiction and to my family it was already over and
done with, a closed book, and a seemingly forgotten memory of the past. Fortunately, I turned to several online
support groups and quickly found that other ex-smokers were experiencing a
similar loss of enthusiasm by family members.
By comparing notes, we were able to determine that the most distinct
loss of interest is found in families where the spouse of the addict is a
non-smoker. This apparent phenomenon led
to a search for an explanation, because a behavioral pattern that transcends
race, religion and socioeconomic backgrounds and affects a quit so strongly
needed to be understood, so that newer ex-smokers joining the group could
effectively cope with its arrival.
I came to the conclusion that we cannot and actually must
not expect our non-smoker relatives to be continually supportive. Seeing as though they do not have the
addictive personality that we have, there is just no way they can possibly
understand what we are experiencing. To
them, the addiction is over once we physically stop smoking. They do not and cannot comprehend the battle
that we fight every day to control the addiction and keep from picking up. They just don’t know. Once we, as addicts, understand that the
ebbing of their enthusiasm after one or two months is brought on by an
inability to understand rather than a lack of interest, the importance of
support given by fellow ex-smokers becomes all the more apparent.
Only the addict can fully appreciate, understand and help
another addict. We know what it means to go through the lunacy of physical
withdrawal. We know what it means to
crave, to need that cigarette at 2:00 in the morning. We know what it means to desperately want just one. We know what it means to still be fighting
after months of not smoking. We know -
they don’t - plain and simple. Whether
you join a Nicotine Anonymous group in your local area or an online support
group, the best support you can possibly find will always come from a fellow
ex-smoker.
********
I will never be
a non-smoker.
I will always be
an ex-smoker.
I am a puff away
from a pack a day.
If I decide to
smoke again,
It will be my
choice, but this quit is for me.
This is my year,
and I am worth it.
