Quitting My Quit Meter

As I have mentioned before, I've got a Quit Meter installed on my computer to track my progress with quitting smoking. I'm about to transfer all of my important data off my PC and onto my new MacBook (yippee!), so I'm going to shut down the meter, but I thought I'd give one last update from it.

As of right now, it has been 2 years, 1 week and 6 days since my last cigarette. I've saved approximately $2,933 and I've not smoked 11,173 cigarettes. That's a whole lot of smokes and a lot of time. Every single one takes roughly 5 minutes, right? It's good to be reminded that I've spent all that time otherwise. Wow. Man, that makes me happy.

But I still want one. How fucked up is that?

When I said the other day that I felt like I was still in the process of quitting smoking, I meant it. Though it has been nearly one year and nine months since my last cigarette, staying smoke-free is an ongoing battle, and lately, I’ve been feeling particularly weak. I think it’s a combination of things, mainly, stress about my stupid plan, coupled with the temptation to sit on a porch in the summer sun and read and smoke the day away.

Occasionally, I’ll think, hmm, I could have a cigarette. Just one won’t do any harm. Just one will be nice. Then I remind myself that one is simultaneously too many and not enough. I was a chain-smoker. A pack a day, for nine years. There is no way I could have just one and be satisfied. Nope. Won’t work.

I saw this article this morning about having just one cigarette, and it definitely hit home with me. I remember my first cigarette. It was wonderful. I coughed, sure, but it felt like coming home. As stated in the article, that first cigarette was truly a “highly rewarding” experience. I loved it and I loved them. That’s why it is so incredibly hard to quit and stay quit. I have so many positive associations with smoking. I miss them.

Argh. My brain is tricking me. Just got to take it one day at a time. It is worth it.

Also, articles like this one piss me off.

Caffeine Is My Friend

I had a dream last night that me and a certain cute boy were dancing in the streets. Literally. Dancing in the streets. It was lovely.

Drove up to Ogunquit Beach this weekend with my family (man, do I love those babies). It was really nice. The sand was super soft and the water not too cold. I highly recommend this place, though the traffic getting there was kind of annoying.

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about my caffeine addiction. It’s not good. Not good at all. I am a slave to caffeine and have been since high school. I usually have a cup of coffee on my way to work, a cup once I arrive, sometimes another before lunch (usually not), and one after lunch. So, three to four cups per day, but in my defense, I do cap my day’s caffeine consumption around 3:30.

About two months ago, with the hope that I might give up coffee for a while, I started drinking green tea for my first beverage of the day and it has been a refreshing change of pace. Green tea is easier on my stomach in the morning and easier to make the night before in my tiny little apartment, also know as The Box (The Box warrants a separate blog entry, I think).

I know my caffeine consumption, specifically my coffee addiction, needs to be curbed, but…well, I don’t wanna and I ain’t gonna. It’s not fair. I quit smoking and I sometimes feel like I’m still in the (very difficult) process of quitting smoking, so I shouldn’t have to quit caffeine too. Damnit. So that’s that. That is how I am going to rationalize taking little to no action to wean myself off this delicious junk. I shouldn’t have to quit two of my favorite vices simultaneously. It just isn’t fair.

One of my coworkers (I would say “superiors” but he is in no way superior to me) just asked whether I mind it when he calls me “sweetheart”. I stood there speechless, trying to figure out how to say, “Well, I probably wouldn’t if you didn’t stare at my chest all the time.” Instead I said nothing. Way to go, me.

Coffee time.

Tootin' My Horn

When I quit smoking, approximately one year and seven months ago, I was really concerned that I’d gain weight. In all honesty, the potential weight gain had been one of the many excuses I’d employed over the years for continuing to smoke. When I was finally ready to quit the sickorettes, I figured that if I put on few extra pounds, that would not matter, so long as my lungs were repairing themselves. I used to cough a lot. A lot. It was really gross. Man, I do not miss that.

Anyway, I digress. I did gain weight – about ten pounds, to be exact. I chewed a lot of gum and toothpicks to keep myself from snacking mindlessly, but the number on the scale kept climbing. I recently read somewhere that smokers burn an additional 200 calories per day due to an artificial metabolism boost. So when I was still puffing away, my metabolism was deceptively fast. Plus, I smoked a lot more than I ate. I can’t even count the number of evenings I sat on my porch, reading and chain-smoking and then I’d realize I’d missed dinner, so I’d just have another cigarette.

Well, times have changed and I am so happy to report that I am finally, after a year of lots of ultimate frisbee and a lot less beer, back to my pre-quit weight! Woohoo!!! Dang. That feels good.

Oh, and I’ve been meaning to post a link to the quit meter that I so often mention in this blog. You download the program, enter your quit details (date and time of quit, number of cigarettes per day you average, cost of a pack) and each time you start the computer, a little window pops up, telling you how long it has been since you quit, how much money you have saved, how many sickorettes you’ve not smoked and how much life you’ve saved. It’s neat. Check it out.

Happy Thursday, friends! Have a lovely day and a safe 4th of July.

By Golly, I Think it is Time

Time for a show. Time for...the theatre! I am suddenly intensely feeling the urge to do something, anything creative. It's funny because on the other hand, more than anything, I want to eat until I feel I might pop and sleep until I can't possibly sleep another second. I am torn between hibernating and creating.

I can sleep. One of the things I am best at is sleeping. That may sound silly, but consider this. One weekend during my senior year, I fell asleep at 7:00 Friday night and woke up at 5:00 on Saturday afternoon. I slept for almost an entire drive from chicago to southern florida that same year.

I can do this now without much fanfare, but now I'm doing a lot more of the boozing, so it's not quite as impressive.

Anyway, I want things right now. I want to be busy. I want to create things, sleep a lot and eat everything that's not nailed down.

I could also go for a hug.

Peace out, yo.

P.S. Today I have officially NOT spent $1,500 on cigarettes! Woot!

Nicotine Recovery: Day 366

Yes, that's right. I have officially been quit for 1 year and 1 day and, can I just say, HOLY CRAP! I celebrated by buying myself a car! Sweet reward, eh? Tack it onto the heaping pile of debt. It's all good! I deserve it, damnit! So yeah. I did. I bought a car and it pretty much rocks. I love late night grocery shopping. I had forgotten how satisfying it can be.

Anyway, back to it. One year. What a weird feeling. What an accomplishment. I am so proud of myself. This has been the most difficult thing I have ever done and yet, the battle rages on. I still want a cigarette pretty much everyday, but I no longer come to that conclusion independently. It is always triggered by someone else's smoking, instead of coming from my own instinct. That's a good feeling. A great feeling.

It is getting easier and I am so glad I did this for myself. I remember the first couple of days and the horrible withdrawal and how I felt like as if a monster was trying to crawl out of my chest and attack anyone who looked at me in a funny way. I felt like I was exploding inside and the only thing that would fix it was a cigarette. It was awful. I never, ever want to go through that again.

It has really helped me to think about this process as a recovery from nicotine addiction instead of breaking up with my best friend, which is how it felt much of the time. I went to the doctor right before I quit and she didn't want to talk about my girly issues. Nooooo....she wanted to talk about smoking. She wouldn't stop asking me questions about how much I smoked and then she asked if I could imagine a day without a cigarette and I honestly could not. I then noticed that on her computer screen, under my name, it said "nicotine abuse disorder."

Disorder? Disorderly? Me???? I am an organizational freak and some would argue, a control freak. I saw those words and it really struck a chord with me.

It was the right chord at the right time I think. I am so thankful. So freaking thankful.

Happy day.

Tacos Are For Lovers

I haven’t posted in a while and figured since I linked to a couple of blogs today, I’d update. You know, just in case someone stops by to check the place out.

Well, let’s see…..the last time I posted was in July and it sounds like I was pretty miserable. I’m feeling much better these days. I moved to a new city on September 1st in the Boston area, which has been quite an experience. This city, we’ll call it Homeville, is the most diverse city I’ve ever lived in. The streets are filled with Spanish speakers mostly, so I am slowly picking up some new words and phrases.

I studied Spanish for one semester during my final year of college and have always wanted to learn more, so being in such close proximity to so many native speakers is really awesome.

Also, Homeville has some really tasty food. Mmmmm…..tacos. Tacos are my favorite food in the whole wide world. I could eat tacos for every meal. There is a little Salvadoran restaurant near my house and holy tacos are their tacos delicious! Me gusta mucho.

In other news, I am still off of the cigarettes. It has been ten months! Ten months. That is a lot of months, right?! It’s crazy. I think about the last ten months and how hard I have struggled with those evil sickorettes and am so incredibly proud of myself. I haven’t had a single cigarette in ten months. I can’t believe so much time has passed since I had my last one.

It’s weird though. I still want a cigarette pretty much every day. I hear that it takes a couple of years to stop thinking about them all together, and I am hoping that is true (or that it takes less time, naturally), but sometimes I feel like I will always want one. Forever. I hope that’s not the case. It would suck to live life constantly wanting a cigarette, don’t you think?

My birthday is in a week and I’ve decided that instead of celebrating that, I am going to celebrate my one year non-smoking mark, November 26th. I think I will invite my friends to go out to dinner with me. We will eat, drink and be merry and it will be fun. I think a one year mark is much more significant than a silly birthday, don’t you?

Anyhooters…..that’s all for today. Have a nice Wednesday!

I Resolve

I’m making resolutions this year. True resolutions. I’ve never really made a resolution before now because I knew that if I were to make one, I would have to pick quitting smoking. So, in order to keep smoking, I decided to just not make any resolutions whatsoever. It was easier that way. It was cowardly.

So this year, since I’ve already quit smoking (last Sunday was one month!), I am making some serious changes. I have three that I have narrowed it down to, but the list is actually a bit longer than that. Here we go.

1.) I will create and effectively implement a budget.
2.) I will have my credit card balance paid in full by December 28, 2007.
3.) I will be able to run continuously for ten consecutive minutes by June 1, 2007.

Other things I will try to accomplish this year are:

4.) I will start volunteering somewhere.
5.) I will really learn to use my camera.
6.) I will open and regularly fund a savings account.

There you go. I know the list is intense, but I think I can do these things. If I do nothing else, I will stay quit from the sickorettes and I will pay off my credit card.
The end.

Nicotine Recovery, Day #4

I’m feeling pretty good today. My throat just now started aggravating me at 4:40 p.m., so that’s interesting.

I cried my eyes out last night. Like a baby. More on that later.

I’m hanging in there.

Last Night's Dream

The entire dream is a blur, except a part where I was coughing and coughing and I started to hack up blue and black bits. Then blue liquid. My lungs were being flushed clean but it was a brutal experience.

Nicotine Recovery, Day #3

Wow. Day three already! I continue to impress myself.

So, how do I feel? Well, I am wicked antsy. Restless. Hungry. Irritable. I think those are all normal feelings to be having at this point in the recovery process though, so I’m not alarmed.

I am also incredibly proud of myself. I didn’t know I could do this. I mean, I knew, deep down, but I thought I was weak. That quitting would be the most awful thing I’d ever been through and it simply is not.

Last night, I picked up flavored toothpicks from the health food store and sucked on them until I got home. Immensely helpful. The walk was so much easier than the day before. I also had grocery bags with me, so my hands were full and busy, which also seemed to help.

Until last night, I was still carrying around my lighter and a pack of cigarettes with 7-8 left. I kept thinking that I would give them to the next smoker I saw. I didn’t want them to go to waste. But then I realized that no one should have them and I don’t want to contribute to anyone else’s habit anymore. I was an enabler for many of my friends for a long while and I will no longer be that person.

I’m not sure who I will be. I have vast amounts of free time now. I never realized just how much time smoking took up. Last night I rearranged my bookshelves, finally went through the box of papers I’ve been meaning to address, sorted my change to prepare for rolling pennies, and made dinner. On a Tuesday. Wow. What a concept.

The one thing that really upset me yesterday was that CM wasn’t supportive or encouraging when I told him I’d gone two days. He of all people should appreciate my efforts. I waited for his response and he basically came back with, “That’s good. You know, I don’t understand how it’s so hard. It’s like, when I smoked (for approximately 6 months or something—not NINE years), I just stopped. It’s all mental.” No “that’s awesome!” or “good job” or “I’m so proud of you!” He just manipulated the conversation so it was all about him again. Fucking jerk.

Anyway. I plan on talking to him tonight about how he hurt my feelings. We’ll see how he responds.

So yeah, three days. I just gotta keep on keepin’ on.

Nicotine Recovery, Day #2

It is the second day on my road to recovery. Today is a bit more difficult than yesterday, in that I want to eat non-stop and am super fidgety. I am taking Welbutrin to help me through this process and today was the first day I took the full dosage, so I think that is contributing to my jumpiness. I was taking one per day and am now up to two.

Last night was not a huge challenge, surprisingly. I went to the gym, busted my ass, and then headed home. I have to say, the walk home from the gym was the hardest part of my day. I wanted a cigarette so badly that I ended up buying a bag of salt & vinegar chips and munching them the whole way home. Once I was home I was fine. I managed to make dinner and chill out in front of the television for the rest of the evening.

I had trouble falling asleep last night, but once I did, I slept like a baby. My cough this morning felt different than usual. Less movement and harsher. Sudden and unexpected. I’ve been wheezing off and on since last night. My lungs are pissed.

I think the most surprising thing about this process is that it doesn’t feel all that difficult. I thought this would be the hardest thing I have ever done, but it’s not. I can totally do this. I’m not out of my mind with withdrawal symptoms. The world did not come crashing down around me.

I still have a few cigarettes which I plan on giving away tonight. I don’t need them anymore. I can do this.

Nicotine Recovery, Day #1

I had my final cigarette last night at approximately 11:00. It tasted vile after reading so much information about the chemicals in cigarettes. I kept thinking, “This is it. This is the last one.” Part of my brain was saying, “You know this isn’t the last one. Don’t be so dramatic.”

It is now 5:15 p.m., the next day. I am roughly 18 hours in---18 hours into my recovery from my nicotine addiction. In six hours I will have gone a whole 24 hours without a cigarette---the longest I’ve ever made it. After 72 hours, the nicotine will have left my system entirely for the first time in 9 years. 9 years. Oh dear god. How did this happen?

I tried quitting once before. Once. I was smoke-free for less than 15 hours. I originally set my Quit Date for November 29th, but decided to give it a go today, since I so effectively grossed myself out last night reading about the alarming facts and consequences of cigarette use.

I can do this. I feel fine. A bit jittery, sure, but all in all, I feel fine. My cough is starting to get pretty nasty, but I expected that. It’s usually nasty so I’m unfortunately used to it. I’m a bit antsy so I am heading to the gym after work to work off some of my pent-up energy. I’m hungrier than usual, so I picked up some sugarless gum and hard candies to keep my mouth busy.

I kept smelling my hands today and loving the fact that they smell of soap. And vanilla. They smell nice for the first time in so long.

I got on the train today without using my breath spray or my anti-bacterial hand lotion to mask the smell of the cigarette I would have typically smoked during my walk to the station. It felt freaking fantastic. I’m a non-smoker.