MarylandQuitter

Corrections have been made the ticker are back up. If you previously created one, you'll need to create a new with the updates. :)

Hey, you smoked for 42 years! Why on earth would you think you can get past the addiction in a couple of months? Cut yourself a break, for Pete's sake. The physical dependence ends rather quickly but the mental side of the addiction is how we beat it or why we relapse. All of the things that cause triggers after nicotine has left your body are mostly mental. They can be memories, smells, a particular song, a ritual like smoking after dinner or with morning coffee, the first snowfall and the list can go on and on. It's going to take an entire year to experience the full cycle of life without smoking. For some the triggers are few and far between while for others they're daily. What were some of things that caused you triggers early on and how often do you get them now and what are they? One thing we know for sure is that the longer you stay quit, the less frequent they become until you can't even picture yourself smoking. It doesn't matter if your 1 week quit or 5 years. Please share your experiences, past and present regarding triggers because with that comes hope and confidence for those who are struggling on their journey of their first full year without smoking.

The physical dependence ends rather quickly but the mental side of the addiction is how we beat it or why we relapse... http://www.quittrain.com/topic/3317-group-discussion-wk45-hey-you-smoked-for-42-years-why-on-earth-would-you-think-you-can-get-past-the-addiction-in-a-couple-of-months-cut-yourself-a/?do=findComment&comment=89747

How do you feel about a friend who has to go everywhere with you? Not only does he tag along all the time, but since he is so offensive and vulgar, you become unwelcome when with him. He has a peculiar odor that sticks to you wherever you go. Others think both of you stink. He controls you totally. When he says jump, you jump. Sometimes in the middle of a blizzard or storm, he wants you to come to the store and pick him up. You would give your spouse hell if he or she did that to you all the time, but you can't argue with your friend. Sometimes, when you are out at a movie or play he says he wants you to go stand in the lobby with him and miss important scenes. Since he calls all the shots in your life, you go. Your friend doesn't like your choice of clothing either. Instead of politely telling you that you have lousy taste, he burns little holes in these items so you will want to throw them out. Sometimes, he tires of the furniture and gets rid of it too. Occasionally, he gets really nasty and decides the whole house must go. He gets pretty expensive to support. Not only is his knack of property destruction costly, but you must pay to keep him with you. In fact, he will cost you thousands of dollars over your lifetime. And you can count on one thing, he will never pay you a penny in return. Often at picnics you watch others playing vigorous activities and having lots of fun doing them. But your friend won't let you. He doesn't believe in physical activity. In his opinion, you are too old to have that kind of fun. So he kind of sits on your chest and makes it difficult for you to breathe. Now you don't want to go off and play with other people when you can't breathe, do you? Your friend does not believe in being healthy. He is really repulsed by the thought of you living a long and productive life. So every chance he gets he makes you sick. He helps you catch colds and flu. Not just by running out in the middle of the lousy weather to pick him up at the store. He is more creative than that. He carries thousands of poisons with him which he constantly blows in your face. When you inhale some of them, they wipe out cilia in your lungs which would have helped you prevent these diseases. But colds and flu are just his form of child's play. He especially likes diseases that slowly cripple you - like emphysema. He considers this disease great. Once he gets you to have this, you will give up all your other friends, family, career goals, activities - everything. You will just sit home and caress him, telling him what a great friend he is while you desperately gasp for air. But eventually your friend tires of you. He decides he no longer wishes to have your company. Instead of letting you go your separate ways, he decides to kill you. He has a wonderful arsenal of weapons behind him. In fact, he has been plotting your death since the day you met him. He picked all the top killers in society and did everything in his power to ensure you would get one of them. He overworked your heart and lungs. He clogged up the arteries to your heart, brain, and every other part of your body. In case you were too strong to succumb to this, he constantly exposed you to cancer causing agents. He knew he would get you sooner or later. Well, this is the story of your "friend," your cigarette. No real friend would do all this to you. Cigarettes are the worst possible enemies you ever had. They are expensive, addictive, socially unacceptable, and deadly. Consider all this and NEVER TAKE ANOTHER PUFF! Joel http://whyquit.com/whyquit/joelcigfriend.html

I was thinking about this earlier and thought a revisit might be in order. ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX-QaNzd-0Y

Hi Rosie and thanks for posting! Were you struggling while you were on Chantix or just since you've been off of it? Congrats on two months! Hold on because not only does it get easier, it also gets easy and then all conflict will go away. :)

No approval needed to comment on blogs from an admin standpoint but everyone who has a blog has the option to approve all comments regarding their blog. :)

I hope that everyone who is wondering what life will be like without cigarettes reads this.

Glad he's back home! :)

Happy Birthday!

Still more changes need to be made so I temporarily took it down.

If it makes you feel good, wear it. If it's comfortable, wear it. That's why I wear 20 year old flannel shirts and socks with my flip flops. Just don't care if people are jealous of my threads. :)

Fixes have been and I'll upload the new file this evening. Thanks for testing the tickers reporting the issues and being patient. :)

Say it once, okay, perhaps, but say it again much less over and over and it's sexual harassment. There are a lot of creeps out there and for a man to "fixate" like that sends a message to lucid folks like us that his lascivious intentions could be potentially dangerous to women. Stay away from the cretin.

Probably just how we imagine it. lol

It's like a bomb ticking and you have no idea when it's set to explode.

That was the exact reason that I started. Wanted to look tough and older than I was. Little MQ didn't realize that he was going to be smoking on/off for the following 28+ years. I knew they weren't good for me but I thought I was invincible and I guess to a point, a young punk is but when you get older everything catches up with you, especially smoking. If any lurkers are reading this, please do yourself a favor and quit now. Don't put it off because sometimes a year goes by before you actually make the commitment to quit. A lot can happen in year. Look at my ticker and all those cigarettes I would have smoked in the last year. I wonder what the tar from just 11,000 cigarettes looks like smeared all over your lungs not to mention decades worth. Quit now and let those lungs start the cleansing process. They'll reward you by giving you more oxygen than you've probably had in a long, long time. :)

There are still a few little bugs to be worked out like one date I know isn't working correctly, but it will all get fixes within the next day or two. The images will be saved as png instead of bmp too. A few little bumps but it's up and working. :)

Once people realize that quitting smoking actually makes you feel better, the more likely they would toss the smokes for good.

NOPE!

Joel's Halloween Fearfest https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IPynhryM2RY Halloween is a holiday where people try to scare themselves. It is a perfect holiday to address irrational fears people have regarding quitting as well as the frightening realities faced by people who smoke and do not quit. For those looking for blood and guts, some of the videos linked below will meet those needs too. What is really scary is that all of the stories and pictures related in those videos are real. Scaring yourself to death is really pretty hard to do. Smoking yourself to death isn't. Don't use fear to trick yourself into not quitting--treat yourself to a healthier and happier life by making and sticking to a personal commitment to never take another puff. Videos addressing the fears surrounding quitting smoking: The fear of failure https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_64R... The fear of success https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHhWS... The fear of relapsing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoWuS... Quitting smoking out of fear https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wpre... Everything you did as a smoker you can do as an ex-smoker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqlyA... Videos addressing to the scary effects of smoking with no gory pictures: "I don't want to see any scary pictures" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZgIM... Feel what it is like to breathe with emphysema https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf0ts... The Palmolive bottle demonstration https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVbUG... "I can't quit or I won't quit" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i22AI... The power of nicotine addiction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpYRr... Premature deaths caused by smoking https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5a7D... For those wanting to see the blood and guts kind of destructions caused by smoking: Heart and circulatory diseases https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Xt9v... Lung cancer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFNv8... See how smoking destroys your lungs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0EHB...

Joel's Halloween Fearfest https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IPynhryM2RY Halloween is a holiday where people try to scare themselves. It is a perfect holiday to address irrational fears people have regarding quitting as well as the frightening realities faced by people who smoke and do not quit. For those looking for blood and guts, some of the videos linked below will meet those needs too. What is really scary is that all of the stories and pictures related in those videos are real. Scaring yourself to death is really pretty hard to do. Smoking yourself to death isn't. Don't use fear to trick yourself into not quitting--treat yourself to a healthier and happier life by making and sticking to a personal commitment to never take another puff. Videos addressing the fears surrounding quitting smoking: The fear of failure https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_64R... The fear of success https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHhWS... The fear of relapsing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoWuS... Quitting smoking out of fear https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wpre... Everything you did as a smoker you can do as an ex-smoker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqlyA... Videos addressing to the scary effects of smoking with no gory pictures: "I don't want to see any scary pictures" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZgIM... Feel what it is like to breathe with emphysema https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf0ts... The Palmolive bottle demonstration https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVbUG... "I can't quit or I won't quit" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i22AI... The power of nicotine addiction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpYRr... Premature deaths caused by smoking https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5a7D... For those wanting to see the blood and guts kind of destructions caused by smoking: Heart and circulatory diseases https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Xt9v... Lung cancer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFNv8... See how smoking destroys your lungs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0EHB...