Wanna quit? I did, and I feel amazing!

[Stoid]

I know, I know, we’ve had 101 “I Quit Smoking” threads, most famously (of course) Satan’s. But they weren’t about ME quitting smoking, so I’ve started another.

And I wouldn’t have even bothered, except that it is going so well and I feel so good! I want to share these things with those who are still in bondage and perhaps offer some hope.

After spending years bitching at my mother that she was going to kill herself and blacken her lungs, I started smoking right after my 16th birthday, in June 1974. I was INSTANTLY a pack-a-day, having smoked an entire pack the first night I started to smoke. Since then, I have been mostly an-almost-2-sometimes-more packs a day smoker, and have only attempted to quit twice before, the first time succumbing in about 8 weeks, the second time, 2 years ago, succumbing within days.

So that’s more than a quarter century of smoking day in, day out, all day long, from the moment I woke until the moment I slept, hardly able to go the length of a movie without itching to have a cigarette.

Well, here I am, only 18 days in, and I feel fantastic. It has been incredibly easy from Day 1, and gotten even easier with each passing day. I barely even think about them at this point. I get one or two noticable cravings per day, and they pass immediately.

I’m free. I’m truly free and I know it in a way that I absolutely did NOT know it the other times I tried. I am NOT tormented by the desire to smoke, I am not going crazy. I’m happy and I feel really, really good. Better than I have in ages.

A wonderful realization I’ve had is about time. I used to spend so much time smoking and finding ways and times to smoke, and I don’t have to do that anymore, and it’s wonderful. I don’t have to rush from the restaurant, hustle it out of the movie theatre, get away from the party. I can participate fully in everything without having this THING draggin at me, pulling at me. Hell, I’d even get antsy making love sometimes, trying to get away to have a smoke.

If there are smokers among the dopers who really want to quit but feel they can’t or don’t know how, I’ll share some more of how and why its gone so easily for what seemed to be a “confirmed smoker” like me.

But in any case… I feel wonderful.

[Zenster]

Congratulations, welcome back to the real world. As ironic as it might seem, I completely respect smokers’ rights. They may smoke in designated outdoor spaces all that they want. As long as tobacco is leagal (as it should be), these rights are inviolable. Government subsidy is another matter entirely.

Most importantly, notice how you are so much more involved in the world around you? You do not need to duck out for a drag every so often. You are more productive and participate in a much better fashion.

Finally, speaking as a chef, perhaps you now appreciate the flavor of your food a bit more. Think how it is to someone like me, who is an accomplished cook, to know that you are actually tasting the food for once.

Again, congratulations.
PS: If you want some ideas concerning how to celebrate with good tasting food, please visit here.

[Stoid]

I need one. I’m feeling very neglected and unloved by my fellow dopers lately, I gotta tell ya. Seems like any thread I start dies instantly, as do almost any I contribute to within a post or two. I’ve got a deadly touch these days, and I usedta be kinda poppaler, ya know?

Anyway, yes, the participation thing is amazing, and not something I had really thought much about until I quit.

As for smokers’ rights, I am reverse-ironic. As a smoker, and as annoying as it was to ME, I alwasy respected the rights of the NON-smokers. even before, but especially after I tried quitting the first time. Even one day without a cigarette taught me how incredibly nauseating and nasty smoke that isn’t your own can be. I never felt it was my right to force others to deal with it, although I always appreciated their tolerance when I could get it.

Man, I remember when I was a kid my mom smoking everywhere. Movie theatres. Grocery stores…i vividly recall cigarette butts all over the follor of the grocery store! Even hospitals! How disgusting it must have been for those who didn’t smoke.

Right after I quit I had to go get an upper GI test. While sitting in the waiting room a fellow came in and sat down who had the most revolting stench of years of smoking on his person, it was stomach churning. His smell filled the entire room. It wasn’t the :just-had-a-cig" smell, it was that deep down, ground in kind of stink. YAR! But what really made it worse, and a great experience for a brand-new non-smoker, was his breathing. I don’t know if that’s why he was there, but it should have been. He was heaving and breathing like he’d just run 5 blocks, and it sounded wet and growly…perfectly vile.

A very good reminder for me about what I do not want to be doing.

As for food, Zenster, I have always had, even as a smoker, a very sensitive sense of taste and smell. That’s what makes me a great cook myself. It’s not such a good thing, though, considering that having conquered the cigs, I now have to address morbid obesity. Sigh…

But all this is about the fact that
a) I want to live to be very, very old.
and
b) I want to feel great when I do.

And it’s almost entirely within my control.

So there.

Maybe no one likes me anymore because I talk too much?

[Geek_Mecha]

LOL I thought this was gonna be a thread about people who were happy to quit their jobs.

Congratulations on quitting, Stoidela!

[boli]

Hey Stoid, nice to hear from you again. Congratulations on quitting smoking - it’s nice to hear from someone that isn’t tearing their hair out. I mean, I’m glad that it’s been so easy for you.

Actually, seeing your name pop up again makes me wonder about other parts of your life that you posted about long ago. I have no idea if you’re willing to speak freely about those situations (like your boyfriend and his problems), but know that I am curious and hope all is well.