I’m not letting cigarettes kill me. I started smoking in high school, because I thought it made me look cool. Unfortunately it did not make me look cool, but it did lead to a lifelong smoking habit. I smoked away my twenties. When we are young, we think we are invincible, but, when I was about 26, my husband-to-be asked me, “What do you want me to tell our future children, when you die of lung cancer?” He was a never smoker. I was about to start a new job where smoking was not allowed, and, although I had tried to quit so many times, this time I really made up my mind to do it.
Day one: I just tried to go one hour without a cigarette. After that first hour I tried for another hour. Before I knew it, I had made it through the whole day without smoking. For me the biggest factor was making the decision and really meaning it, not just saying it. I did not use a patch or gum or anything like that. I just made the decision and put them down. After I made it a whole day, I was determined to make it through the next day, and the next and the next. One day at a time. After about a month I said to myself, “I am an EX-smoker!” It was the best decision I ever made. I did not touch a cigarette for 20 years.
I am now in my 40s. I have a friend who smokes. One day I decided to ask her for a cigarette just for kicks. I had stayed off them for 20 years. There was no way I could get hooked again. Guess what. I was wrong. Just one became just one a day then just two a day, and you can figure out the rest. Before I knew it, I was a smoker again. I had to hide it from my son, because I didn’t ever want him to smoke. Unfortunately he took up the habit himself despite thinking I was a non-smoker. He was 18, so I gave up the ruse. He couldn’t believe it. I felt like a terrible person, but I continued to smoke for a several years.
One day I made the decision to quit with my son. I did quit again for several months, and then I lost my dear son to a drug overdose, and I started back up. I wanted to die, and I figured that was a great way to speed up the process. I just didn’t care, until after being in the cardiac unit twice, hooked up to a defibrillator while they stopped my heart momentarily to fix the problem. I decided I really didn’t want to die after all. I gave up cigarettes right then and there and caffeine too, and I never looked back. I don’t crave them at all, but I do know it can be a slippery slope back into the nicotine addiction. I take it one day at a time, and I feel confident that I have smoked my last cigarette.