Cognitive Quit Smoking

Some of you heard me chat about this before but here I go again.
One of the best things about quitting smokes for me was getting so much
of my sense of smell back. Yes, the old snozzeroo is really working
nowadays. At first, the thrill of being able to Really Smell Again was a
bit conflicting. To be able to smell freshly cut veggies, the scent of
flowers, my skin after taking a shower, the earthy smell of my dog (ok,
there’s pluses and minuses to that one).
I quit in October. Two weeks later the State Fair came to town. Wow!
what a smorgasborg of odors!! Not in over 30 years had I experienced the
smells that I ran into at the fair. Cotton candy, sausage dogs with
onions and peppers, french fries, all sorts of different body smells
like cologne, perfume, sweat, and the bad odors like when I passed the
dumpster - ewww! those were really bad! But the good outweighed the bad
and it still does.
One of my favorite things to do is to go to the grocery store and hang
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Been here not too long ago - coming to the end of a week quit. As
some of you know, I lost my quit after a week, but jumped straight
back into it after smoking 3 cigs (which, incidentally, did very
little for me). It’s going well so far, and I’ve learned from
that ’slip’ - as they call it in some quitting circles Day 5
under my belt and moving forwards…
Many congrats to all those of you celebrating anniversaries - you’re
my inspiration. Have a great weekend one and all
Carla

Well, I’m certainly glad I posted then. Believe me, I understand completely
how you feel. I dare say most people on this board understand.
You won’t regret it, I promise. I still think one of the most important ABC’s
I worked on was the one I did when I antipated a huge blowup between me and my
family. Every time I look back on that night and how volatile our relationship
had become, I am convinced that those ABC’s prepared me to deal with a
situation that in the past would ended in a chain-smoking all-nighter pity
party. The night was still a bit bumpy but that’s all, bumpy. My quit
survived; I don’t think I even came close to losing it.
Good for you. You kept your quit, figured out the problem and now you’re
working on the solution (right?). In the past, you’d have said, To Hell With
It, I’ll just have a smoke and try to forget about it.
I wonder if you will look back in a few months and say ‘thank goodness they
wouldn’t let me be alone all the time.’ Let me know.
Oh, boy, I’m never going to live that down, am I? (more…)

Over at a Smoking Cessation forum I visit sometimes, someone
resurrected an old thread, where we were talking about stages of the
quit, and when smoking wasn’t really an option we seriously thought
about any more. This was me at 3 months quit, on May 24th 2001:-
Hi there
I’ve reached my 3 calendar month anniversary today (but really its
12 weeks and 5 days since I quit on Feb 24th).
I started a ‘quit diary’ 3 months ago, and add a few lines every
day. It’s just a private thing, but I had a read through it today to
see how things have progressed for me. At 3 months I can honestly
say I very rarely think about smoking or wanting to smoke. The only
times I think about it are if I am near someone who is smoking, but
even then it doesn’t make me want to smoke. Mostly the smell
irritates me, only occasionally does it stir up old memories of what
it felt like to smoke.
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Following a stressful day yesterday - and I thought I’d coped well -
I lost my quit today. Its taken a lot of courage to post this.
I’ll be back when I’ve refocussed and worked out where I go from
here.
Carla

Catmo wrote:
Congrats on coping so well!!!!! :))
And thanks so much for sharing your thought process……….
Hope you will also share if you find any cure for “brain
fog”………….
Jean

Shall try to move more - and eat less……. This will be easier with spring arriving………
But it is going to take a lot of walking!!!!!! Thanks for your response, Kathryn………
Jean

As some of you know I began taking anti-depressants in December. While on
the medication I was totally free of cravings. I thought I had beat the
addiction. I stopped taking them about a month ago and as the meds left my
system, the cravings came back with a vengeance. Now I’m suffering from
arrested development. All those months I should have been doing ABC’s but
the meds gave me a false feeling of freedom from my addiction. Now I
desperately need help getting back into Cognitive thinking.
Char

It’s coming up to 3 months since I quit, and I promised Steve when
we chatted on earlier on, that I’d update you on what’s been
happening with me.
Firstly, family life has been manic, and I’ve not been able to get
online very much in recent weeks. I’m not ready to leave the nest
yet though, and touching base for a chat to check things out and re-
focus is so important. In fact, I can’t imagine not being a part of
this group, even though I’ve been a bit of a silent member for most
of my quit.
2 teenage children that are giving me grey hair, plus being
menopausal (Steve told me about the chat a few of you had had today)
have given me a few testing times over the past few weeks
especially. I have to say though, that as fraught as life has been,
smoking is consistently an option I choose not to take. If I’m
honest it isn’t something that really appeals any more.
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…and the mists are starting to clear a bit! I’m getting a better
grasp now of ABC’s and developing some awareness to stand back from
situations and work out what it is I’m really feeling, and what’s
going to help. Thankyou Steve for all your support this past week Carla