Oneistoo's Quit Journal

[Oneistoo]

I really want to keep this in mind at all times:

 

 

If I have a problem, and then use nicotine, I now have two problems.

[Still winning]

I really want to keep this in mind at all times:

 

 

If I have a problem, and then use nicotine, I now have two problems.

Ain't that the truth!!

 

As I said somewhere else for JC. Facing this trigger today, gives it less power. So next time you face this same scenario, you will already know that you can NOPE through it without further ado. It takes the sting out of it after the initial time as your brain has a record of success. 

 

Well done cutting out the tabs (sorry, not familiar with the name) but are you drinking sips of fruit juice again now and for the next couple of days? The nicotine does something with our blood sugar levels so when you quit it...the levels go all skew whiff and it can make you more tired, anxious etc and feel dead like a crave!! Sips of any fruit juice every couple of hours will really help...I have no idea why lol. 

 

Great work today. 

[Oneistoo]

....are you drinking sips of fruit juice again now and for the next couple of days? The nicotine does something with our blood sugar levels so when you quit it...the levels go all skew whiff and it can make you more tired, anxious etc and feel dead like a crave!! Sips of any fruit juice every couple of hours will really help...I have no idea why lol. 

 

Yes, I make my own smoothies. Rice milk is great with any kind of fruit because it's naturally sweet. This way, you only need two ingredients for a fruit smoothie: A fruit (or berry) and rice milk. 

[Oneistoo]

The skin though! Isn't it amazing how quickly the skin recovers and starts to look fabulous? That's one of the first things I noticed a couple of weeks in after my improved sense of smell, taste and that my morning clearing of throat cough had gone.

 

I think I woke  up to a distinct change in the way my skin looks. That's welcome news. :)

 

I'm also experiencing some low-grade anger bubbling underneath it all.....I only have to THINK about a particular friend IRL who sometimes can be a bit annoying, and I get mad. I better stay clear of her in the forseeable future. Last time I saw her, I had just quit cigarettes (before this quit) and she upset me so much that I bought cigarettes on my way home and chain-smoked as soon as I got home.

 

There's nothing wrong with HER. I recognize certain aspects of myself in her, aspects that I don't particularly like about myself, and I react to them. That's why it is important self-therapy to learn to handle this. But right now I'm a bit too early in my quit to do this.

[Oneistoo]

I think the biggest deterrent to going and buying a pack of cigarettes and chain-smoking for "just one more day" and then quitting again is the fact that I have already spent eight days in withdrawal and I'm still not out of it. I took my last puff (or nicotine microtab) on Jan 14. 

 

Understanding how just one puff reawakens your addiction and puts you inside the insane withdrawal circus is a missing piece that I did not have in my other nicotine quits. Only with that understanding do you fully realize how much that one puff will cost you in time, effort and agony. This is information that I didn't have when the craving would hit in the past. Back then, I would go, "I want to, but I really shouldn't..." which is pretty easy to knock over with a "just one more" argument. 

 

Thank you, Joel Spitzer. 

[Oneistoo]

I just got home from the gym and I feel sooooo gooood! My body and mind are swooning in delight from the beneficial and natural chemicals that my treadmill run and circuit weight-lifting have released. 

 

:) :) :)

[Still winning]

Those natural endorphins are some "good stuff" right :)  

 

You sound so healthy generally, I'm so pleased the pieces of the puzzle are fitting together for you, you should not be a smoker with the rest of your lifestyle :)

 

Don't sweat the bad days oneistoo, embrace them! It's the "going through" the feelings that strengthens our resolve to hold on.

 

Re the friend, some people are just best avoided where possible if they are your litmus paper to the quit. Steer clear...loads of healthier and longer life to deal later. 

 

x

[Oneistoo]

Don't sweat the bad days oneistoo, embrace them! It's the "going through" the feelings that strengthens our resolve to hold on.

 

Marti, is it my imagination or did your smarty pants get vastly larger since I joined this board? I'm not kidding.....lol. 

 

Today, I'm struck by some mental stuff that earlier also could sabotage my quits. It's the coulda, woulda, shoulda that they also talk about in the Anonymous groups....utterly useless, but for me it's especially painful when it concerns those I love. They were errors in my judgment that I now deeply regret. I was simply too dizzy to think straight (a side-effect of my constant smoking/withdrawal mindspace?). 

 

Since there's absolutely nothing I can do to remedy my past errors of judgment (the loved ones in this situation have since passed on), the "test" in this case is to be able to go through the feelings without relapsing. 

 

If there's ONE big reason for me wanting to quit (besides the usual ones), it's to finally find out whether the fog in my brain is caused by smoking. I suspect it'll take more than a year without smoking before I will know this. And perhaps longer to know it for sure.

[Still winning]

I had a wonderful friend once upon a time, Nathan. We were lucky enough to re connect back in 2008 and he said something so lovely, it kinda stuck... no more woulda coulda shoulda, if I want it, I do it!!  It's actually on my quotes for facebook, no deep and meaningful, somebody's really real experience. 

 

I am generally smart enough for others, never myself, it's the way it goes huh :)

 

The most brutal of life lessons I've learnt is no rewinding. Just know we did the best we could with what we had at the time. Life is there to be grown, but we are made of stars so you'd expect no less.....I can be deep ;)  

 

Re the fog, it's a real thing. Month 4 you kinda come out blinking with the bright light...very weird, very wonderful. Look forward to hearing your thought when you get there!

[Oneistoo]

Re the fog, it's a real thing. Month 4 you kinda come out blinking with the bright light...very weird, very wonderful. Look forward to hearing your thought when you get there!

 

I'm thrilled! So it is true, I WAS in a fog (still am). I would be doing tons of brain games, trying to get rid of it. I felt it clouding my judgment, like I could never think straight. 

 

Thanks for telling me this. And yes, I'll be chronicling it here when I get to it. :)

[Still winning]

I'm thrilled! So it is true, I WAS in a fog (still am). I would be doing tons of brain games, trying to get rid of it. I felt it clouding my judgment, like I could never think straight. 

 

Thanks for telling me this. And yes, I'll be chronicling it here when I get to it. :)

You will feel it lift a bit week by week, So today isn't all there is... but yeah, it seems to hold on overall for a fair while. Adds to your crabbiness too. Not sure if it was a Joel or whyquit.com place I read approx 100 days and that sounded fair when I got there:)  Be good if you track too :)  No one said it would be easy to heal but that's what is happening...your body heals from the inside out and I assume it's some chemical reaction sorta thing...but am not a scientist to understand lol.

 

How you feeling today?  I don't remember reading about any treats you gave yourself, make sure you give yourself something even if it's a magazine that you wouldn't usually waste money on! It's a way of celebrating both the financial and mental gains...you gotta have spoils of war right!

 

x

[Evelyn]

You did very good - I used to be like that too - buy a pack, sabotage my quit (no matter I had a patch on) smoke 3-5 fags and then quit. Good you are picking up reality that one cig will not make you feel better but only worse!

[Oneistoo]

How you feeling today?  I don't remember reading about any treats you gave yourself, make sure you give yourself something even if it's a magazine that you wouldn't usually waste money on! It's a way of celebrating both the financial and mental gains...you gotta have spoils of war right!

 

I'm feeling fine! Just working on disassiociating just about everything in my life from smoking. Today I smoke-disassociated from a situation of traveling for an hour on public transportation to a foreign location in the suburbs (I'm not good at suburbs, to me they are an identical nightmare), including getting lost (a habit of mine in the suburbs) only to find out that my appointment HAD BEEN CANCELLED. Then I had to go all the way back home, and I have to duplicate the effort on Wednesday to get what I originally went out there today to get! I didn't feel like smoking, and when a thought about smoking came into my mind it was more like a reflex and not like a real consideration. The "I'll lose it all and have to start over again" consequence of picking up a pack is a good deterrent. 

 

HOWEVER, I'm not ready to treat myself. When I finish the last bar of chocolate sometime today I'll go on a three-day detox from sugar. After that, I'll think of something.... :)

[Oneistoo]

You did very good - I used to be like that too - buy a pack, sabotage my quit (no matter I had a patch on) smoke 3-5 fags and then quit. Good you are picking up reality that one cig will not make you feel better but only worse!

 

3-5 cigarettes would barely get me warmed up! I'd definitely smoke a pack straight, and perhaps two, and then if I could, I'd quit again. I had no idea that doing it this way kept me in a miserable state of strong withdrawal most of the time. Yes, it made me feel awful, both physically and mentally. 

[Still winning]

Maybe book a massage for after the suburb hunting stress :)

[El Bandito]

Good stuff Oneistoo!

 

Marti - this is you AFTER the fog has cleared???? ;)

 

And I echo the post on the size of your Smarti Pants....they are taking over!

[Oneistoo]

I think my chronic sore throat is getting better. It always seemed to kind of go away in the summer, but during winter it was non-stop. 

 

That being said, last night I ran at the gym and at a higher speed than usual. Afterward, I coughed, and stuff at deeper levels of my lungs must have loosened. 

 

Do you want me to talk about phlegm as well? JUST KIDDING!!!!

[El Bandito]

I think my chronic sore throat is getting better. It always seemed to kind of go away in the summer, but during winter it was non-stop. 

 

That being said, last night I ran at the gym and at a higher speed than usual. Afterward, I coughed, and stuff at deeper levels of my lungs must have loosened. 

 

Do you want me to talk about phlegm as well? JUST KIDDING!!!!

Its great to see it coming OUT though isn't it?

[Oneistoo]

Oho....another big smoke-disassociation today! I'm putting the finishing touches on the cover letter for a job application that's due tomorrow. Suddenly the tone and manner of my letter seemed all wrong. This is another situation where previously I would immediately march down to the store and buy a pack of cigarettes and then smoke them non-stop as I solved the problem. 

 

I actually thought about it for a while...but not with the same urgency I would think about it before. That's probably because I no longer have nicotine in my body. I thought about the saying, "If you smoke because you have a problem you now have two problems" and I just couldn't stand the thought of all the hassle that accompanies smoking a friggin pack of cigarettes just because it's a little tricky going for a while. 

 

You know what Miss Goodie-Two-Shoes here did? She worked on the document for  a while, then put it away to be looked at with fresh eyes very early tomorrow, and then she went to the gym for a run! Now, isn't that a healthy response? It's so healthy that I don't even recognize myself in it.

 

Another thing I don't recognize is my smoke-quit weight. Tomorrow starts my sugar detox. No more sweets! 

 

I'm really proud of myself and feel good. If I had smoked, I would have felt awful. Plus, I would have smelled. 

 

:)

[Oneistoo]

The smoke-disassociation continues. I got up after sleeping for only five or so hours, and finished my job application. So, in this case, I was both tired and confronting a difficult project (job applications always have some emotional involvement), which is prime fodder for my addiction triggers. And yes, the thought struck me that I could buy and smoke a pack of cigarettes. 

 

But as Joel says and I have also experienced myself, the cigarette is a fantasy-cigarette. What I want to get out of that cigarette does not exist. It's just like heroin junkies who forever are chasing the sublime experience they had during their first shoot-up, without ever getting it. And when I already know the downside to that cigarette, it just isn't possible to smoke. In my mind, it becomes distasteful. The question is then what to do with the gap that opens up where the cigarettes would have been. I'm unfamiliar with what happens when the cigarette is gone in situations. Since I stopped smoking, I've been filling out the gap with foodstuff. Now that that bridge is no longer so dearly needed, I want to see what naturally emerges. 

 

[Pippa]

A www - would love to say something profound - but you are already there sweetie ( besides Marty and the smartie pants are all over that , :-). )

 

How do you solve a problem ... cig -?? - no instead you went to the gym for a run !! Now you certainly can't smoke - it affects your ablilty to exercise and sun salutations suck if you are wheezing all through them ... Just say'n !!

 

Love reading you - you got this xx

[Still winning]

Ahhh that moment when you realize a cig will do nothing for you is a major breakthrough moment Huzzah!!

 

Pippa is right, this is fantastic to watch a quit unfold, I don't think any of us were clever enough to document it as you do!

 

Sorry about the job stuff, it's tricky isn't it. Good news you are dealing with things by giving yourself time. That is the bit we got as smokers I think, breathing (or non breathing lol) space. Great to walk away and come back to an issue with fresh eyes.

 

Hey why am I getting all the smarty pants comments...I only got nicknamed Smarti cause it rhymed with Marti lol.

[Oneistoo]

Now you certainly can't smoke - it affects your ablilty to exercise and sun salutations suck if you are wheezing all through them ... Just say'n !!

 

Sun salutations can be extremely challenging as a smoker, haha! I think it's the flow-movement between extreme opening and closing of the lungs. Many times I would have to pause at SS #6 before I could go on. It's just such an awesome stretch and strength exercise. :)

[Oneistoo]

Pippa is right, this is fantastic to watch a quit unfold, I don't think any of us were clever enough to document it as you do!

 

Sorry about the job stuff, it's tricky isn't it. Good news you are dealing with things by giving yourself time. That is the bit we got as smokers I think, breathing (or non breathing lol) space. Great to walk away and come back to an issue with fresh eyes.

 

Hey why am I getting all the smarty pants comments...I only got nicknamed Smarti cause it rhymed with Marti lol.

 

It's much better than a blog, IMHO. The way the blogs are set up in the different forum software is not very dynamic for an interactive journal. It would be good if there was an entire section at Quit Train devoted to journals, because it is great help for newbies and also to stay quit. On my other forum hang-out the diary/journal section is the most popular, and there are more than 2,600 journals.

 

It's fine about the job situation. I just graduated, so it is to be expected. :)

 

Your smarty pants.... based on your comment, I don't think you can see on your computer screen the same thing that the rest of us can see on our screens. A couple of days ago your smarty pants image changed in size to huge. :) That's why you're getting the comments, lol. 

[Oneistoo]

I've always loved old Hollywood movies, and I think it actually helps my quit to watch the actors smoke so much in those movies. There's a psychological word for that, I think, but I don't know it. Perhaps it's another form of smoking-disassociation....by repeatedly watching other people do it without doing it myself, I build up mental indifference. In this way smoking kind of is in my life just like the odd thoughts about smoking are, but I don't react to either of them.

 

Here's my Youtube video playlist with old Hollywood movies. My cut-off has moved up to 1940. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_UJI0LI4NiZWwgxaRUbsFkyEWQCCJI48