Staying off smokes
Hello Everyone, My name is Kim. I have three Boys 19,11,9. I just
turned 40 not long ago and I have to tell you When you’ve smoked for
25yrs a pack a day and you can’t breathe Hellllooo it’s time. No
seriously, I believe everyone as their time. I’ve been trying to stop
for two year’s .I went for 6 mths at one point. Believe me You learn
something new each time u slip or relapse. Like for example when I
went those 6 mths I felt great !! Then I got soooo pissed off about
something that I picked up a smoke. Only to feel sick !! Yuck! I have
16 day’s today and I want a smoke so bad !!!!!!!!!! I was wearing the
patch only 14mg so I felt I was cutting my intake in half,which I
was.However I stopped the patch 3 day’s ago. Soooo now can u
understand where I’m at. I’ve been cold turkey for three day’s and I
feel like shit !!! Hope I don’t offend anyone But…It’s the truth.
My thoart is on fire,I have headaches, My emotions are running
rampant,which I believe might be at the expensive of my relationship
with my boyfriend. I’m sorry but for me once you get rid of the smoke
screen infront of you with those dam smokes. You start to see alot of
things that quite honesty you just did not deal with before. Oh hey.I
read this web site and it’s like true!! I’m really trying to
implement a new way to deal with anger,furstration,sadness. This
stuff is raw with no passive smoke seducing you telling you It will
all be okay if you take a drag and just relax !! What a lie!! Sorry
but you have been personally FIRED FROM MY LIFE. But.. Now what???
I’m not sure to tell you the truth !!! Kim
October 28th, 2004 at 1:37 pm
Hi Kim,
Steve
Welcome to the group. Start making lists of 1- reasons why you smoke
(just got up, starting the car, the phone is ringing, etc), 2- emotions and
conditions you experience (anger, fear, hot, cold), 3- what those emotions
and conditions feel like in terms of which muscles are tense, heat rate,
breathing (rapid,shallow, etc). You’re going to find that almost all
emotions and conditions are experienced in via the same muscle tension and
or breathing patterns. It’s not the physical experience that’s so different
but rather our mental interpretation that says this is anger and that is
sadness. Get started with that, and then ABCs, which are the next step,
will make more sense.
Terri, I agree with you that practising ABCs will help us learn to deal
more sanely with our emotions, but I’ve never seen anything that led me to
believe that nonsmokers had a leg up on smokers in that area. My experience
is that smokers and nonsmokers are equally functional or dysfunctional,
depends entirely on the individual. I do however, know a bunch of exsmokers
who have developed some remarkable abilities to work through whatever life
is throwing at them
October 29th, 2004 at 3:59 am
Welcome to the group Kim (and to others who’ve joined recently)
Carla
Ditto to what Steve said:-
I’m one of those - I quit 4.5 months ago. We were thrown into
turmoil a week of two ago when my hubby Phil lost his job
(redundancies at his firm). The shock/upset around this comes out
in physical ways, but I’ve learned how to interpret those feelings
differently and don’t connect them with smoking any more. This is
how I’m so sure I’m quit now
October 29th, 2004 at 11:22 am
Thanks Carla. This is exactly the sort of out of the blue situation
that too often can send a quitter back to cigarettes. If it was to be
labeled, we’d probably call this ‘bad stress’, something that quitters fear
as a trigger situation. Marion posted the other day about ‘good stress’
being a trigger. According to Dr Hans Selye, the most notable pioneer in
the area of stress, stress is neither good or bad. Stress is simply the
body’s response to any demand made upon it to adapt to change. There is a
book by Dr Selye entitled ‘Stress Without Distress’. The first several
chapters are an education in just what stress is, and isn’t. If you haven’t
done any reading about stress, it’s an eye opener and will likely have
considerable impact on your awareness re: your own stress and stressors.
It’s not a new book and can probably be found in most local libraries.
Steve
October 30th, 2004 at 12:30 am
Hi Pam, Thank You soo much for your support . Hopefully one day I’ll
have that much time, But for now it’s 17 day’s today and 4 of them our cold
turkey . Think I explained I started out on the 14 mg patch. Last 4 day’s
cold turkey Not good , Sore Thoart, Headaches, Defintley Brain Fog. It feels
good to know it’s normal. lolol I started thinking maybe I just smoked too
much pot when I was younger lololol. Since I gave all that up a long time ago
I thought I would give this up too. I know one of my great rationalizations
use to be wait a minute this is legal and everybody needs a vice of some
sort. It’s amazing how we start to bargain with ourselves that’s it’s Okay!
Now I truly realize it’s about not taking the first hit. Just like an addict
or acholic cannot just have one drink or one hit. Since we are Nicotine
Junkie’s we our not able to take one drag, puff, whatever you want to call
it. Just sitting here typing this about lighting up is making me nausea.
Yuck ! Sorry for talking your ear off. I’m still in that stage that I have
to stay busy!! It’s been working for me .I know now one reason I would pick
up would be if I was bored Look out !! Have to find new hobby’s. I think I’ll
start Aerobics. Thanks again Pam .
October 30th, 2004 at 7:45 am
Hi Steve, I meet you on Quit Net like a week ago and took your advice about
cog web,well here I am . I cannot thank you enough for your input and support
when we were talking on Q-net I thought to myself he is really
serious.lololol. I’m trying to drink those 2 liters of water I’m still not
there. I am however drinking one liter. I have a lot of issues with this
quitting smoking thing like some people say non smoker and personally feel
like we can never be nonsmokers it will always be X-smoker we did smoke and
for 25yrs I did. I strongly believe you need that much time for how ever long
your addictions was to mentally replenish itself. Maybe not as long But..it’s
a tremendous amount of work to recondition the thinking process along with
the emotions. That’s why I’m here. Since we are creatures of habit what do
we do now! lololol. So I did my homework ! I have the reasons, when do I
get my ABC ? Thank You Steve once again. I need all the support I can get.
Smoke Free 17 day’s. Kim
October 30th, 2004 at 2:59 pm
Steve, excess nervous energy ?? do i really come across that way . Okay but
remember i’m not being sedated. My body and emotions are like out of wack .I
need some time to SIMMER DOWN NOW ! lolololol Have you seen that on Saturday
Night Live. Too funny. Okay the answer to your question is .Arguing with
boyfriend,coffee in the morning, kids always stress. and last but not least
between 3 & 5 I’m totally BORED!! bye Kim
October 30th, 2004 at 11:36 pm
Hi Kim,
Oh goodie, hairs to split, and no one loves
It’s only when we add up what we’ve
I sent that last post off a bit prematurely. There are one or two more
points I wanted to touch on.
Nonsmokers/exsmokers
splitting them more than I. The thinner, the better :)) Here goes….
(from the Random House Webster’s College Dictionary)
“non- a prefix meaning “not,” usu. having a simple negative force, as
implying mere negation or absence of something (rather than the opposite or
reverse of it, as often expressed by UN-1) : nonadherence; nonpayment;
nonprofessional. [prefix repr. L adv. nn not]”
or ‘nonsmoker’ meaning ‘not smoking or not a smoker’ in the present
tense. So, anyone who isn’t smoking at the moment is a ‘nonsmoker’.
(from the same dictionary)
“ex- 2. a prefix meaning “former,” “formerly having been”: ex-member;
ex-wife.”
or ‘exsmoker’ meaning ’someone who used to smoke’, making all of us who
have quit, exsmokers.
I also once heard a SmokEnders moderator define it as: exsmokers are
still in the process of quitting and are thinking a lot about
smoking/quitting while, nonsmokers have moved past the active quitting and
don’t think of smoking or quitting at all. Personally, I thought that was
really stretching and bordered on being a total load of horse poo. So did
most of the others in that group.
I’ve got a feeling that bottom line on this is that it doesn’t make a
bit of difference, pick one that works for you and if someone tries to tell
you you’re wrong, tell them to “sod off, it’s nothing but semantics.”
(again from Mr. Webster etal)
“seomanotics (si mantiks) n. (used with a sing. v. )
1. a. a branch of linguistics dealing with the study of meaning,
including the ways meaning is structured in language and changes in meaning
and form over time.
2. the branch of semiotics or logic dealing with the relationship between
signs or symbols and what they denote.
3. the meaning, or an interpretation of the meaning, of a word, sign,
sentence, etc.: Let’s not argue about semantics.”
It’s as tremendous amount of work only when viewed as a totality. I’d
suggest NOT looking at it as a whole for the simple reason that we deal
with getting from smoker to ’someone who doesn’t smoke’ only one small
instance at a time. We lit up, not to the entire day’s stresses, but to
this moment’s stress. Dealing with this moment isn’t a tremendous amount
of work, it’s just a bit of work
done when we reach that point where we can step back and say, “I’m quit,
and I’ve pretty much dealt with enough situations to see that I can handle
this” that we realize we’ve done tremendous amount of work.
Our smoking habit was a simple behavior. Some event, either in the form
of some external ‘thing’ or some internal sensation would trigger
established beliefs/thoughts/dialogs as to how to respond to that event.
Based on those beliefs etc, we’d respond. So what we do now is start to
pick simple events that are part of our daily routines and examine the
beliefs we’ve historically attached to those events.
It’s late here and I’ve got to get some sleep as tomorrow is another
work day. Kim, I see that you posted a couple of good events i.e.
boyfriend, coffee, kids, boredom. Can you take each of those and make a
note of what emotions, what physical sensations accompany each? For
example, arguing with the boyfriend will create muscle tension. Where do
you feel that? Neck, shoulders, abdomen? Does arguing move toward anger or
frustration? How and where do you feel those? Get back to me on that and
we’ll have all the info we need to set up some ABCs that should help you
step around any associated smoking thoughts.
Steve
October 31st, 2004 at 6:51 am
Kim,
Excess energy is one of the major characteristics of the early quit.
Being 4 days off nicotine, it’s perfectly normal and expected. I’ve still
got the fingernail marks up the walls and across the ceiling as a reminder
of what I was like for the first couple of weeks. I think there’s even a
small dent in the wall above and to the left of the puter monitor where
some mouse that pissed me off met its demise. Did I mention that anger,
actually sudden and irrational rage, was my shadow for a while? Most
quitters will experience the emotional chaos. To what degree theirs will
involve rage or tears or any other emotion is what marks the individuality
of each quitter’s quit.
Physical exercise, strenuous and aerobic, is about the only sure fire
way I know of to take that energy down enough notches to feel comfortable.
And sometimes in the beginning, even that doesn’t work that well. Still,
some sort of physical activity is one of the most beneficial things we can
do for ourselves as new quitters. Try it as early in the day as you can.
Aside from being a tremendous weight control tool, it’ll help set the tone
for your day.
Steve
October 31st, 2004 at 2:46 pm
Hi Everyone,
I am still here reading posts. I have been in a major flare with my
rheumatoid arthritis so have not been “able” to post my wrist and hands are
very involved with this disease. This brings me to the “nervous energy”
issue. Prior to the flare, I would go for a walk, chat on line, do handy
work or something to take the edge off. I have been off Zyban and nic gum
for awhile. I admit I stopped both too soon, live and learn.
Well, I woosed out, I picked up another box of 2mg gum. I can live with
myself over that, as a ciggy was not an option. Somewhere in my “online”
surfing there was a list to read before you break your quit, the one line
that stuck with me the most….one puff….you have to turn your quit meter
back to zero. Turning my quit meter back would devastate me, as its a
permanent reminder of a moments slip, that would be a horrible sense of
failure, its a personal thing, I don’t expect anyone else to “get it”.
Great to see everyone doing so well. Welcome to all the newcomers.
Phil, your posts are always a delight to read.
Steve, I know you had to be the president of the debate team.
BTW when does the horrible indigestion/bloat/gas go away?
Karen N.
1 Month 2 Weeks 5 Days 19 Hours 50 Minutes 14 Seconds. Cigarettes not
smoked: 2033.
Memphis, TN
oboegirl@…
November 2nd, 2004 at 2:13 am
Many times, I just refer to myself as A Person Who Does Not Smoke.
Safe (yes, not typical for me, but what the heck, I don’t enjoy
confrontation on EVERYTHIING!!)
As far as the addict, no longer an addict debate: I am just now in the
past month getting to the point where I understand what Steve is
talking about as far as not feeling like I’m an addict any longer due
to this method of quitting the smokes. I guess it’s mainly because I
just don’t think of smoking anymore. Those people who are still
craving a smoke - of course they’re going to say everyone is still an
addict for the rest of their lives, they can’t have an idea of what I
feel like in this quit.
Clear as mud? Sorry, I really have trouble putting into words what I
mean.
- Cat (quit 10+ months)
November 2nd, 2004 at 11:29 pm
I meant to say the cogquit method is the most SENSIBLE and effective method…
not sensitive. Geez…
November 4th, 2004 at 8:15 pm
Cat,
<I also know that some people will ’slip’ after being quit for a while and
will immediately get back on the quit
horse so to speak and refuse to set back their meters
Each person has to do what is best for them, IMHO one puff the meter goes
back to zero. Each puff/slip there after the meter goes back to zero. I
think the reason I am such a butthead about this issue is I “quit” smoking
for 3 years when I lived In Southern Cal. It was a social issue, if you
want to date in CA best be a non-smoker. Well, in reality I never really
quit, I was a closet/controlled smoker all those years. I could go months
without smoking, a weekend, whatever the social event called for. But the
moment I was alone I would puff puff puff, so the joke was on me.<G
back to Memphis was riding around town with a friend, picked up one of her
cigs and have been smoking for the past 10 years. This quit is all for me,
I want to life my life verses go through life in a nicotine/drug induced
fog. Also I know now I have limited a lot of what I do around where I can
smoke freely. At my age this is BS, I want to travel.
<If you have not already done so, please think about what triggered you to
go back to the nic gum and have <some ABC’s ready for the next time that
event(s) happen.
I know the trigger, I was in so much pain. I hate pain meds, refuse to take
them unless its the only alterative and then I wait for hours longer. In
the past I would turn on the TV, get a soft drink and smoke the day away.
The “smoke the day away” was not an option, nor was any other method. The
best way for me to describe my RA, break every bone in your ankles, feet,
hands and wrist, then go about your day. <G
worked just something to refocus my thinking. I chew 1 pieces of 2mg gum a
day if that all. When this box is gone I believe I will be prepared for any
future “gum” craving. I am learning more reiki and meditation techniques
to help with my RA pain. If need be any mint gum will work. Its all that
oral, hand to mouth fixation part of the smoking habit.
<I can’t imagine what it must be like to not be able to type on the puter.
That would be like putting tape over my
mouth so I couldn’t talk!!!
I feel the same. It is extremely frustrating to be unable to zip out emails
and surf the net. I run a canine health and nutrition email list, this
requires a lot of typing. Two finger typing just does not work for me. <G
<Maybe avoiding gassy foods and alcohol will help?
Just about anything I eat will blow me up like a balloon. I am sure the
fact I am able to do a slight shuffle to and from the bed, sofa, computer
chair is my max exercise has a big bearing on the “gas” issue. Since my
limited mobility, I have also gained tremendous weight, which adds to the
stress, which adds to the RA flare, yada yada…viscous cycle.
< while back asking you if Trader Dick’s was still in Midtown? Use to work
there many many years ago.
Brain fart, yes I saw your note. I don’t know what happened to that bar. I
lived and partied in Midtown till last year when I sold my home. Moved
outside of “The Parkways”, broke my heart.<G
what I can find out.
Karen N.
Memphis, TN
oboegirl@…
Simply Schnauzer Net
www.simplyschnauzer.net