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Hello. My name is Kat. I turned 70 in April, and decided I would like to see 80, so it was time to quit for good. I have smoked most of my adult life, but did quit for 6 years, back in 2009. Also, in 2009, I experienced a severe enough cardiac event, that I had 3 stents placed in my heart. Coincidentally, that was 6 months AFTER I quit smoking. In 2015, I experienced a bad break up with a boyfriend ( sounds silly saying that out loud) and picked up cigarettes again. I am in a good place in life. I have a great guy, great kids, and 12 beautiful grandchildren. I recently had a comprehensive cardiology follow up and the results were mostly good, except for a very small area in my heart that is not getting sufficient blood flow. I am a retired RN, so I know that means one of my arteries is blocked enough to cause that. My cardiologist strongly urged me to quit smoking. For some reason, his passion and very serious tone got through to me. A week after he talked to me, I quit, ……cold turkey! Thankfully, I had been cutting down lately, so It seems easier than I thought it would. It has been 6 days, and I am feeling pretty O.K. I am having weird and very vivid dreams, and some cravings, but I am soldiering on. I look forward to contributing to this group, and getting help when I need it. Thanks for listening! KAT

At 65, having smoked for over 50 years, I still need help to quit. Hopefully, I will find it here. Thanks !

G’day NOPE .....Not One Puff Ever.... (replace Ever with Min,Hour, Day as required)

Welcome aboard so glad you came to join us!! Every day those lungs will feel better & better as they regenerate- taking a walk will make them smile I had some real odd dreams too for a few weeks but it's just another one of the weird ways our bodies transition out of a chemical state. Embrace your quit and never let it go again

Welcome aboard the freedom train. There is a lot of great support here. Read all the info you can on the train. Share your journey with us too!! Congratulations on your week quit.

Because sometimes they stir up the difficult memories and I am sure the loss of your husband was very devastating. So glad you have made the decision to quit. You sound like you have many wonderful people in your life to stay healthy and live life for. Quitting smoking is the best way to do that. Hang around and get to know us. This is a wonderful place for support and friendship. Stay committed and look forward to a life free of smoking. You can do this.

NOPE! Not today!

Hi, Dianne! I read your initial post and was worried about you. Glad you are hanging in! You quit on my only daughter’s Birthday! (I have 3 sons). Keep up the good work!

NOPE. ODAT. Freedom tastes so sweet - Peachfuzz

NOPE...

Hi, there. I am 70, and quit a week ago, today. My Cardiologist finally got through to me. I balked, at first, and even made fun of him, to my friends. But he got through to me. If I can do this, so can you…. Care to join me? KAT

Yay katgirl, one week down is fabulous! Sorry the sudden death of your husband is still so hard. Try to take it easy today. Deep breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth might help with your anxiety. Just try not to bottle it all up. Vent, cry or just write it all down to get it off your chest. We even have blogs here if you want to document your journey that way

Congrats, Gus! I hope to join you in 7 more weeks. Keep on keepin’ on!

Nope .

Welcome aboard Katgirl. There is no better place to get the support you need when you quit smoking quite like The Quittrain. So, grab a seat and enjoy the ride to a happier and healthier life.

Welcome Katgirl

Welcome @Katgirl! We are so glad that you found us and have decided to join us! There really is so much support that can be found here! From the videos and articles to the personal stories of a bunch of quitters,(now this includes you!) so much help can be found here! Stay close and I am so glad that you decided to come aboard!

Hello and welcome .... I'm your age too....so you are in good company .... Congratulations ....you are taking your life back .... You know the rule ...the only rule .... Never Stick Anything In Your Mouth and Set Fire To It ..... Glad you found us ...Take your time to look around the board ..get to know us all .. We are one big Family .... Lets get you to Freedom

Thanks for responding, ladies. It is nice to know that perfect strangers care and are supportive.

Welcome aboard our train full of quitters @Katgirl and congratulations on almost a week quit, that's awesome! Like D2 said above, we have a great group here and we love a quitter so lean on us as much as you need. We also have great articles about our addiction as well as a video forum if that's more your thing. And if you just want to get smoking off your mind but stick close to your support then head over to our Social forums. We have anything from music videos to games and even a health and fitness forum so be sure to take a look around

Awesome Katgirl. It's great that you've decided to quit and share it on this forum. Generally it helps when people stay close to this forum during the early days of the quit when they need most support. The people here realize you're going through one of the hardest things you've done in your life and will be able to offer you the right input and support having gone through the same experience themselves. Stay close here and please share your experiences as well as ask for any support you may need. Please create a ticker so you can see how many cigs you've not smoked. Also, there's a daily NOPE thread where we pledge to not smoke for just 1 day. We take it 1 day at a time.

So awesome to hear Dianne. Isn't it wonderful just to be able to take a long deeeeep breath without wheezing or coughing. You're doing great with the walks. It used to be a motivation for me to run 5 houses down the street without someone calling the paramedics on me (Hello, somebody appears to be dying on the street in front of my house). Please stay vigilant and guard your quit. It's when we start to feel slightly comfortable that the addiction ambushes you.

Yay @Gus, Congratulations on two months quit today! You bring so much to the train with your support and comraderie so thank you! I hope you do something special for yourself today

NOPE

Welcome aboard @Reynjoe, great decision to quit smoking and take your freedom back. I'm convinced that the support I received from fellow quitters who knew what I was going through at any given time is how I was successful and we want the same for you. No one knows better than us the ins and outs of quitting so you're in good company to get it done. Check out our whole site, theres lots of information here from educating yourself about our addiciton to giving your mind a break from the constant thinking about it in our Social forums. You can do it and we want to help

Hello and Welcome ... We can give you all the tools and the Knowledge ....and support you 100%.... First you need to believe in yourself ...you can Quit ...we all did ...and your no more hooked than we were . Take a look at the Main Smoking Discussion Board.... There is loads of great information there ,and tips to help you along ... We have a great bunch of Newbies who are traveling side by side ..why not join them .. Not time like the present to free yourself ..

Huge Congratulations Gus .... Your smashing this Quit !!! Thank you for the support you give to those who join the Train .... And slapping the sticks ...lol.... Yes Treat yourself to have so earned it ..

The Main Discussion Board is a great place to start .... Read all the posts pinned with green ....there you will find loads of good information.... Knowledge is power .... I'm sorry for your loss.... Glad your here .

Congratulations Gus,what an accomplishment. 2 months is great!!!!

NOPE!

NOPE

I don’t like to show weakness. I like to keep up the illusion that I am a strong independent woman, who can accomplish anything without appearing to need help. I did tell him about joining this forum, though.

@Gusyou are the one that should take a bow!!! You are doing great. You are so kind and have helped many already

Lets party

Congratulations Gus on the two month mark! The worst is over. Just keep at it. Best wishes.

Thanks everyone! Not just for the congrats but just for being here! You have all helped me in some way. I never thought when I joined the QuitTrain that it would actually be helpful. I never thought that I might actually look forward to checking in everyday! I never thought that my issues would relate so closely with some others that had gone through it. I never thought that I could be of help to someone else. But all of this is true. So very true. And other than crediting myself with the determination and the desire to quit, I owe my quit to y’all! Two months! I can’t even hardly believe it. Why that only leaves 10 months before I can say it’s been a year!!! I don’t know what the future holds for me, but I can truly say with confidence that it will not involve me smoking a cigarette. I do want to hang around and help others the same way that I have been helped. Participating in this forum has been the greatest ‘oh, why not?’ decision I have ever made!!! So everyone that reads this—TAKE A BOW!!!

Welcome aboard, @Katgirl and congratulations on 1 week smoke free. Keep up the awesome work. It is good to have you here.

NOPE!

I would.

Welcome @Katgirl! We are so glad that you found us and have decided to join us! There really is so much support that can be found here! From the videos and articles to the personal stories of a bunch of quitters,(now this includes you!) so much help can be found here! Stay close and I am so glad that you decided to come aboard!

Your doing great Diane. You are just breezing through this journey. Celebrate and enjoy you freedom. It gets better every day. You have got this girl!

One full week! Day7! Today is also the 7th anniversary of my husband’s sudden passing. He died of a massive heart attack. He was not a smoker. Nor was I, at the time. This will be a tough day for me. Not sure why anniversaries are so difficult. Still have that heavy feeling in my lungs when I first wake up, but feels a little better. I wake up a little nervous and jerky, and I am still having the weird and very vivid dreams. They seem to be anxiety driven, in nature. Not surprising, as I suffer from an anxiety disorder. It has plagued me all my life. My guy is very supportive and proud of me. That helps…

Nope!

You can do this!!! This forum is a great place to start. Lots of info and good people to help you in the journey!!! welcome aboard!!!

My anxiety has me by the throat today. That, and I am more emotional than normal, which I attribute to the anniversary of my husband’s death. It’s weird, because I am in a great relationship, and he is right in the other room, as I write. He is so cool. He seems to sense when I need to be left alone. I have been blessed with 2 great life partners in a row. We won’t discuss the first one…Life is good, and yet, today, I feel like crap…

Man people being sick and dying just bumbs me out big time !. so I chose to Live!

Hi-- I was ultimately able to quit, at 33, by situating smoking cessation in a broader enterprise of developing new sets of healthy habits and activities. I very consciously and actively attempted to cultivate a new persona: my thinking was that these activities (working out, eating/cooking differently) would give me positive things on which to focus instead of the thing I was seemingly denying myself. Moreover, this new persona might serve as a final line of defense during inevitable moments of vulnerability early on in the quit. Fortunately, this strategy worked for me. But the initial stretch was still extraordinarily difficult. Regarding the writing and intellectual work more generally, my experience was that quitting absolutely did affect my abilities in these areas. Perhaps that won't happen in your case (and it certainly doesn't with everyone), but it did with me. But I came to understand that I probably needed a recalibration of my relationship to my academic work and different writing processes if I were to have a healthy and satisfying professional life; thus, the struggles were actually illuminating and transformative. It doesn't mean they were easy or quick. But, in retrospect, things got better when I realized that I would remain quit even if things never got any better. This can be done, and it's the single most important thing you can do for your health and your spirit. Christian99 About 19 1/2 Years Quit

Day 29....currently suffering the thought of....no...wait wait wait a minute....mosquitoes never liked me before?? Always prided myself that I was not the one mosquitoes went after.....always it was my daughter and mom they go after as I sat around...walked around oblivious to their attentions.......well guess who back on the menu as a non-smoker......me lol dang it!

Hey Matthew, welcome to the Quit Train. I'm sorry you are having a rough time. I know you have an open mind and you would consider anything. I'm not in the USA so I don't know what you have over there but some of us need a proper cessation program, like a Smoke Ender's or Alan Carr. Reprogramming your neural pathways of having a daily habit with its array of associations (and in my opinion a much lesser degree of addiction) and for many of just cannot just stop with a flip of a switch and need a lot more guidance and tutoring. I hope you get what I'm saying. I wish you the best of luck. No matter what or how you have our support, one percent.

Robbie, you just expressed the value of this forum so beautifully. That's exactly what it is. This is a group of people that are hard to find in our lives. Btw, during my initial days, I wanted to tell every smoker I saw that they could quit, yes it was possible, there was no reason for them to keep smoking and spoil their health etc. I wanted to shout it out to every smoker - quitting was so big to me.