No ABC
If I´d been told by someone that after 17 months of not smoking I
still find myself craving cigarettes, I would have thought No
thanks! No quitting for me! Just too horrible prospects!
Now that I´ve come this far and having cheated myself one way or
another not to light a cig, I suppose it could be put this way: I
definitely do not want to start quitting again! Of course the first
few months were harder than the rest of the period. But really I
don´t know if the cravings will ever stop.
Maybe someone in the Forum does..
Ilkka
Finland
May 18th, 2003 at 9:18 am
llkka
Glad to see you found us - I am sure Steve will help you out cos he’s a very
clever guy.
Look forward to getting to know you.
Regards
Indi
May 22nd, 2003 at 1:14 am
I can offer my few cents worth…. For most quitters, no, cravings will
never stop. They’ll become very rare, and mostly pretty mild, but they will
crop up from time to time for the rest of their lives. This will happen
because they have never disconnected the association between some event(s)
and a cigarette response. Whether the cravings happen once a day or once a
year and how intense depends on the individual and the events they
encounter. Regardless of the frequency and intensity, what is unacceptable
to me is the lack of security within the quit. At what point might a crave
be so strong or so whatever that the quitter reaches for a cigarette?
Assuming that smoking is primarily a behavior and that behavior can be
viewed as the 3 step process of event/belief/response, then it follows that
a crave is a response to our belief re: some event. Using effective
behavior modification techniques, cognitive quitting is based on one of
those (Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy as developed by Ellis, Beck, and
quite a few others), we can change our responses by examining and changing
our beliefs. The events we encounter are usually …. life. Some of that
can be rearranged, but mostly it’s outside of our control. At the point
where we begin to disconnect the cigarette associations to events in our
lives, cravings begin to dissipate and eventually, if we put in the time
and effort, will disappear altogether.
as a side note: how long and how much effort needs to be invested in
order to effect the changes we want will depend on the individual. However,
I can assure you that if you put in a month’s work, 4 weeks, of studying
your past smoking behavior and of planning each tomorrow by writing out
ABCs and trying to be as aware as possible, at the end of those 4 weeks
your beliefs and consequent responses will be changed forever. What you
choose to do with those changes is up to you, but most people will carry on
with their lives comfortably quit.
Steve
www.cognitivequitting.com