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| Power Style Wellness Connections |
I Quit
I quit smoking yesterday.
I quit smoking the day before yesterday as
well, and the day before that, and all of the
days stretching back to last October.
I quit smoking today, too, and I plan to do
the same tomorrow and the next day and
the next. It's a process, this quitting thing, and
I’m under no illusion that I’ve got it conquered.
The desire still arises out of the blue,
sometimes, and it is a pungent, prickly, tempting thing.
How am I managing the quitting? Slowly, carefully, and with a hand-picked
arsenal of tools for defending myself from myself.
The first and most important tool for me was a drug called Chantix. I knew I
was on to something when I asked my doctor about it, and she said, “It’s a
miracle drug.” That’s what it turned out to be for me: a miracle. I was smoking
six to 10 cigarettes a day when I started the drug. In a week, I was down to
two or three cigarettes a day. A few more weeks, and I was down to two puffs
in the morning and two puffs in the evening.
I stayed on that plateau, on the very edge of quitting, for weeks and weeks
and weeks. Each time I’d take a puff, I’d think, ‘This is really stupid’ and stab
the cigarette out. Twelve hours later, I’d light up again, only to go through
the same mental rigamarole. And then, one day, I stopped. On the way home
from a photography class, I took two puffs, stubbed out the cigarette in the
ashtray, and knew that was the end of that.
Which brought me to my second tool: sleep. I went through a noticeable
depression for the first few weeks. Smoking, after all, was not only the habit
of a lifetime. It was also a means of escape, a steadfast companion, a private
ritual, and a dependable comfort. When everything else failed me, nicotine
was still there, ready and able to meet…well, not my every need, but at least
my need for a cigarette. I know I was depressed, because I began sleeping
10 hours each night, which may not sound excessive, but I also took a three-
to four-hour nap each afternoon.
My third critical tool was Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. Early on, the most
powerful urges to smoke hit around 10:30 at night. Instead of reaching for a
cigarette, I’d reach for the car keys, drive to the store, and buy a carton of
Stephen Colbert’s AmeriCone Dream ice cream. I’d go home, dip in, and eat
every last spoonful. Once I did this three nights running; now I only do it
every couple of weeks. You may call this gluttony, but I call it indulgence,
knowing ice cream is less addictive than nicotine.
The fourth tool — the most grueling, so awful that it nearly undid the whole
project — was rage. It wasn’t free-floating but, rather, localized on one
person, my compadre. Several weeks after my last puffs, he mentioned to
one of my daughters that I was angry with him.
She asked, “What did you do that made Mama mad?”
“I was breathing,” he said.
And it’s true. He was still his easy-going, contented self, but I was waking up
each morning loathing him for…well, breathing. My anger wasn’t real; it was
simply a function of cigarette withdrawal; and yet I couldn’t reason my way out
of it. This phase went on for 10 weeks, and miserable weeks they were, not
just for him but for me as well.
Here’s the thing: I had to make the decision that my life 10, 25, 40 years from
now is more important than our happiness right this minute. In order to quit
smoking, I had to choose not to care who or what fell by the wayside.
Goodness, mercy, kindness — not to mention thank-you notes for Christmas
presents — all took a backseat to the cigarettes I wasn’t smoking.
Other things helped me along as time passed. Exercise was important: I
added another hour-long walk each day to the time I already spent outside
with the dog. And I found relatively safe places to practice excess, the kind
that smoking provides. For instance, in one week I purchased enough
vintage quilt squares on eBay to make more quilts than I’ll complete in a
lifetime. Another critical item was a mention I read somewhere in passing that
brain scans of alcoholics and drug addicts show they are physiologically
unable to refuse alcohol and/or drugs. They are, in these matters, incapable
of sound, or sane, reasoning. And so it is with me and cigarettes.
I want a cigarette, I’d think, followed by, I only believe that because in this
area I’m utterly bonkers, crazy as a bedbug, as a loon. I obviously can’t trust
a crazy person like myself to make this decision. And, with my spirits lifted, I’d
go on to do something else.
I also used a bit of sailing lore I picked up several years ago when I traveled
on a sailboat from northeastern Florida up the Georgia coast to Charleston,
South Carolina. We alternated two days of travel with one day of rest. Rest
days were spent on laundry, grocery shopping, sight-seeing, and planning
the next few legs of the journey.
The captain explained that once a decision was made about where to stop
each night, we’d stick with it. He said, “Sometimes when you’re out on the
water, you get to thinking there’s a better way. It’s a pretty day, or you’ve
made really good time, and you start to think you can skip the harbor where
you planned to spend the night and go a little further up the coast. Do you
know what to do in that case?”
“What?” I asked.
“Stick with the original plan, the one you made when you were dry and warm
and rested and had all of the information at your fingertips.”
So that’s what I did last October and am still doing today: sticking with the
original plan, the one I made when I was dry, warm, rested, and sane.
My friend Katherine, who quit smoking a year ago, asked me over the
weekend if I don’t feel better now.
“No. It’s still too hard,” I replied. But here’s what I didn’t say, the really crucial
thing to remember about quitting smoking. Once upon a time I was an
ordained minister. I pastored a church for three years and in that time,
conducted funerals for a number of lovely people, young and old. From my
observations back then, I can guarantee you that no matter how hard it is for
me — or for you, for that matter — to quit smoking, it’s far easier than dying.
I quit smoking yesterday.
I quit smoking the day before yesterday as
well, and the day before that, and all of the
days stretching back to last October.
I quit smoking today, too, and I plan to do
the same tomorrow and the next day and
the next. It's a process, this quitting thing, and
I’m under no illusion that I’ve got it conquered.
The desire still arises out of the blue,
sometimes, and it is a pungent, prickly, tempting thing.
How am I managing the quitting? Slowly, carefully, and with a hand-picked
arsenal of tools for defending myself from myself.
The first and most important tool for me was a drug called Chantix. I knew I
was on to something when I asked my doctor about it, and she said, “It’s a
miracle drug.” That’s what it turned out to be for me: a miracle. I was smoking
six to 10 cigarettes a day when I started the drug. In a week, I was down to
two or three cigarettes a day. A few more weeks, and I was down to two puffs
in the morning and two puffs in the evening.
I stayed on that plateau, on the very edge of quitting, for weeks and weeks
and weeks. Each time I’d take a puff, I’d think, ‘This is really stupid’ and stab
the cigarette out. Twelve hours later, I’d light up again, only to go through
the same mental rigamarole. And then, one day, I stopped. On the way home
from a photography class, I took two puffs, stubbed out the cigarette in the
ashtray, and knew that was the end of that.
Which brought me to my second tool: sleep. I went through a noticeable
depression for the first few weeks. Smoking, after all, was not only the habit
of a lifetime. It was also a means of escape, a steadfast companion, a private
ritual, and a dependable comfort. When everything else failed me, nicotine
was still there, ready and able to meet…well, not my every need, but at least
my need for a cigarette. I know I was depressed, because I began sleeping
10 hours each night, which may not sound excessive, but I also took a three-
to four-hour nap each afternoon.
My third critical tool was Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. Early on, the most
powerful urges to smoke hit around 10:30 at night. Instead of reaching for a
cigarette, I’d reach for the car keys, drive to the store, and buy a carton of
Stephen Colbert’s AmeriCone Dream ice cream. I’d go home, dip in, and eat
every last spoonful. Once I did this three nights running; now I only do it
every couple of weeks. You may call this gluttony, but I call it indulgence,
knowing ice cream is less addictive than nicotine.
The fourth tool — the most grueling, so awful that it nearly undid the whole
project — was rage. It wasn’t free-floating but, rather, localized on one
person, my compadre. Several weeks after my last puffs, he mentioned to
one of my daughters that I was angry with him.
She asked, “What did you do that made Mama mad?”
“I was breathing,” he said.
And it’s true. He was still his easy-going, contented self, but I was waking up
each morning loathing him for…well, breathing. My anger wasn’t real; it was
simply a function of cigarette withdrawal; and yet I couldn’t reason my way out
of it. This phase went on for 10 weeks, and miserable weeks they were, not
just for him but for me as well.
Here’s the thing: I had to make the decision that my life 10, 25, 40 years from
now is more important than our happiness right this minute. In order to quit
smoking, I had to choose not to care who or what fell by the wayside.
Goodness, mercy, kindness — not to mention thank-you notes for Christmas
presents — all took a backseat to the cigarettes I wasn’t smoking.
Other things helped me along as time passed. Exercise was important: I
added another hour-long walk each day to the time I already spent outside
with the dog. And I found relatively safe places to practice excess, the kind
that smoking provides. For instance, in one week I purchased enough
vintage quilt squares on eBay to make more quilts than I’ll complete in a
lifetime. Another critical item was a mention I read somewhere in passing that
brain scans of alcoholics and drug addicts show they are physiologically
unable to refuse alcohol and/or drugs. They are, in these matters, incapable
of sound, or sane, reasoning. And so it is with me and cigarettes.
I want a cigarette, I’d think, followed by, I only believe that because in this
area I’m utterly bonkers, crazy as a bedbug, as a loon. I obviously can’t trust
a crazy person like myself to make this decision. And, with my spirits lifted, I’d
go on to do something else.
I also used a bit of sailing lore I picked up several years ago when I traveled
on a sailboat from northeastern Florida up the Georgia coast to Charleston,
South Carolina. We alternated two days of travel with one day of rest. Rest
days were spent on laundry, grocery shopping, sight-seeing, and planning
the next few legs of the journey.
The captain explained that once a decision was made about where to stop
each night, we’d stick with it. He said, “Sometimes when you’re out on the
water, you get to thinking there’s a better way. It’s a pretty day, or you’ve
made really good time, and you start to think you can skip the harbor where
you planned to spend the night and go a little further up the coast. Do you
know what to do in that case?”
“What?” I asked.
“Stick with the original plan, the one you made when you were dry and warm
and rested and had all of the information at your fingertips.”
So that’s what I did last October and am still doing today: sticking with the
original plan, the one I made when I was dry, warm, rested, and sane.
My friend Katherine, who quit smoking a year ago, asked me over the
weekend if I don’t feel better now.
“No. It’s still too hard,” I replied. But here’s what I didn’t say, the really crucial
thing to remember about quitting smoking. Once upon a time I was an
ordained minister. I pastored a church for three years and in that time,
conducted funerals for a number of lovely people, young and old. From my
observations back then, I can guarantee you that no matter how hard it is for
me — or for you, for that matter — to quit smoking, it’s far easier than dying.
