CanadaSue
12-21-2011, 01:11 PM
I posted a version of the rest of this in the Staff Room - essentially thanking the other staff for the great deal of patience they've shown me the last several weeks as I finally got serious with quitting smoking. It was pointed out to me that we are coming up to New Year Resolution time & many people may decide to quit smoking or drop some other destructive habit. It's never going to be easy - it's ADDICTION after all. It's not necessarily the substance but what it does for you & to you. When the end results of indulging that addiction are harmful or destructive... you've got a problem.
How, when, if you deal... NOBODY can make that call but the person with the addiction. You can't quit because "I can't afford it". You can't quit for your spouse, your parents, your kids or best friend. There are dozens of ways that leads to self sabotage & failure. Your spouse disappoints you somehow - you've given yourself a perfect excuse to light up. And... it's "their fault". The mind of an addict is a sneakful, nasty thing. We have blaming others & circumstances & life down to an art form. We have Masters degrees in Manipulation, Doctorates in Deception & Research Fellowships in Rationalization. We really don't life confronting ourselves or our own bullshit.
That applies equally to drinkers, smokers, gamblers, shopping addicts, hypochondriacs & Munchausen's By Proxy, overeaters, drug addicts & control freaks. Many of us with the addictive gene manage to combine two or more addictions. Over time, we become more & more unhappy. We don't look at the root cause - ourselves & our specific approach to life. Maybe that would be too logical, eh? After all if it was working for us, we wouldn't be unhappy, we wouldn't seek normal in substance or activity abuse.
Everybody who decides to get serious about their addiction will tell you a different story of how they finally broek free; what worked for them. This is mine as relayed to the staff in the last few days &I added a few details to clarify:
Thanx again - you guys & this place formed an important cornerstone of my Quit Plan. On an addiction scale of 1 to 10, I come in at about a 12. My family is riddled with addicts of all sorts & only a few have ever successfuly battled their addictions. I planned this one like Rommel planned campaigns. Reading, research & a ton of physical prep - from checkups & blood work to extra vitamins, improving my diet, extra fluids & extra walking - all well before my Quit Date.
I consulted with quitters - successful & not so successful. I talked to doctors, nurses, counsellors, therapists, you name it - if I thought they had something to offer - I spoke with them. I stocked up on a dozen or so different kinds of drinks & all sorts of foods, light, nourishing, easy to digest stuff & a huge variety because I had no idea what I'd want. I bought a lot og different gums - didn't touch them - artificial sugars & I don't mix & that was all I could find. Hard candy, lollipops & Jolly Ranchers helped me the most.
For any potential side effects I had Immodium, Pepto Bismol, Tums, Advil, plain Tylenol, Arthrotec, Gravol, (dramamine to you), ice bags, hot water bottles, flannel sheets, washcloths, towels, barf basin. I had clean jammies, easy to slip on comfy clothes, some light reading, a TV remote...
If it sounds like I was preparing for a major catastrophe... I was. I didn't know what to expect & I prepped on the basis of: "Plan for the worst & hope for the best." What I really wanted was 4-5 days of lockdown with food & water periodically shoved under the door, access to a toilet & access to a shower. Instead, there was still the small matter of life to be dealt with. The first few days WERE a bloody nasty, brain shrieking withdrawal process. I did everything BUT puke. I snivelled, cried, whined, threw a dozen pity parties an hour & kept reminding myself every minute I 'survived' was a minute closer to feeling I had control of my life again. Don't get me wrong - I had physical discomforts - nothing in my body wanted to work right but none of it was that bad. I didn't require any of that medication save for a couple of Dulcolax to deal with some constipation. I had an annoying but mild headache for a few days. I got the sweats, the shakes, my nose alternatively ran & dried up. Whether I did or not, I felt like I stank. But then again, every excretory process - I tried to look at as a good thing - all that nastiness finding different paths to leave my body.
Most of the discomfort, the 'pain' was emotional. I wasn't getting what I wanted so like every mature toddler out there, I snivelled & whined, thaknfully, mostly in my room behind closed doors. Every once in a while I reminded myself this was MY choice. All I had to do was take 6 minutes to walk to the store & buy cigarettes. I was choosing not to. I could change my mind in a few minutes. I just didn't have to do that right this minute. The minutes piled up, slowly, then more quickly. I hoped I'd soon feel less mired in mental misery.
Got there - finally. Two stinking lousy weeks gone & frankly, I have to look at the calender to remember what I did most days & other than appointments & items I'd written down - I don't remember much. My brain just checked out.
I learned a lot. Discomfort isn't deadly & fear isn't fatal. The monsters we create in our heads are far more debilitating than real issues but... they're only as life controlling as we allow them to be. I had placed nicotine as a God on a Pedestal. Over the past few weeks. I've learned to treat cravings as nicotine being a tantrum throwing toddler. When it flings itself on the floor, screaming & drumming its fists & heels, I pick it up & punt it into a room until it shuts up - a time out. What a refreshing change to know *I* am in control. I can give in to the pint sized monster or ignore it until it behaves. Funny that - hour by hour, day by day, the tiny tyrant gets smaller, less noisy & less powerful. I see it as a cartoon cigarette with bloodshot eyes & the temper is represented by the lighted end. I picture that now when I get a craving & I can smile. I don't have to take it any more seriously than that - an annoying, pesty little kid that's not yet housebroken. If I want to give it too much attention, it will become a monster. And any attention will always be too much. Like a Gremline never feed it after midnight. Actually, never feed it - EVER.
I learned & I had a glimmering before I quit, that putting down the cigarettes wasn't nearly enough, It was only a start. Addiction is only superficially about your substance(s) of choice. Behaviours, self view & self esteem have far more profound, more powerful roles. It all has to change.
It's worth it. I'm worth it. It's meant spending weeks & there will be many more weeks focusing on... me. I have to protect my very raw nicotine free state. I have to repeat positive thoughts, mantras, utterances... I have to think in positive images. I have to do things that are good for me. That means eating properly, drinking lots of fluid - way more than I had been. Avoiding negative people & those hell bent on sabotaging my quit - there are some around & they're no longer on my Xmas card list. Shit - that's meant avoiding most people I know - I didn't realize I was so surrounded by negative. It also means being polite, civil & respectful myself. I'm an adult, not a teenager with an age related 'licence' to behave badly.
Positive is good but change is hard. I'm fighting guilt every time I'm out on errands & linger to window shop. But I AM lingering & I'm looking at nice things I might want to buy some day. I'm trying to be kind to myself & genuinely treat myself with respect. Nobody is going to treat me with any if I don't come across as deserving of any & if I don't treat myself that way... then I don't deserve it.
I'm wandering in the desert somewhat - not sure where I'm going or how I'm going to end up getting there. Wherever I end up, it's going to be better than where I've been - I keep telling myself that. The journey scares me a bit - not even sure why. Fear of the unknown? No self confidence? But I'm stubborn. One foot in front of another. Stop only to catch my breath. No steps backwards - just forwards & maybe the odd shuffle sideways if I need to change directions.
Intellectually, I know this gets better. The 'high drama' of the acute withdrawal phase is over. Now it's the boring bit - the dull, flat weeks & months that follow while my brain rewires around the lack of nicotine. Dopamine receptors will heal up & start functioning normally & until they do, a period of tedious isn't going to kill me. I'll think of it as prep time for a gloriously healthy, happy spring.
I know positive physical changes are happening - I can already see & feel some minor ones & if those reflect a little of what's going on internally - it's all good.
It is bloody exhausting though or has been. I'm hoping by the end of week I won't feel like I'm going to fall over every time I hold still. I've not posted a whole lot - couldn't concentrate enough or simply felt too confrontational. I still am having trouble settling to any one activity for long & my emotions are all over the place. If I don't stop choking up over dumb coffee ads on TV, I'm going to strangle myself.
I very much needed the comfort of familiarity here. I don't think I appreciated how anchored that would make me feel during a very turbulent few weeks. There's more turbulence to come - I have some people & issues to deal with yet that will no doubt be upsetting. I will be very glad to have the community here for stability - even if I'm just reading.
I don't generally do 'New Year's Resolutions'. There's nothing magic about a specific date on a calender. For those looking to lose an addiction there's never a 'good' time. I spent years able to rationalize 'not now because...' for any date under the sun. Give me 5 minutes & could find a valid reason not to quit something on October 6th 2032. There's no 'right' or 'wrong' date, day or the week, month or year. If you're determined & committed to quitting something, don't let the calender stop you unless you have something huge coming up - business trip so vital your next promotion/raise hinges on how well you do; that sort of thing.
Other than that, don't even pick a date until you've researched what you need to research. Tlak to anybody who might offer advice or help, even if it seems negative. If your attempt involves a medication believe me, you WANT to kow potential side effects. Don't overschedule yourself the first few weeks. Don't announce it to the world but warn those nearest to you that you might be a tad... snappish.
Good luck...
How, when, if you deal... NOBODY can make that call but the person with the addiction. You can't quit because "I can't afford it". You can't quit for your spouse, your parents, your kids or best friend. There are dozens of ways that leads to self sabotage & failure. Your spouse disappoints you somehow - you've given yourself a perfect excuse to light up. And... it's "their fault". The mind of an addict is a sneakful, nasty thing. We have blaming others & circumstances & life down to an art form. We have Masters degrees in Manipulation, Doctorates in Deception & Research Fellowships in Rationalization. We really don't life confronting ourselves or our own bullshit.
That applies equally to drinkers, smokers, gamblers, shopping addicts, hypochondriacs & Munchausen's By Proxy, overeaters, drug addicts & control freaks. Many of us with the addictive gene manage to combine two or more addictions. Over time, we become more & more unhappy. We don't look at the root cause - ourselves & our specific approach to life. Maybe that would be too logical, eh? After all if it was working for us, we wouldn't be unhappy, we wouldn't seek normal in substance or activity abuse.
Everybody who decides to get serious about their addiction will tell you a different story of how they finally broek free; what worked for them. This is mine as relayed to the staff in the last few days &I added a few details to clarify:
Thanx again - you guys & this place formed an important cornerstone of my Quit Plan. On an addiction scale of 1 to 10, I come in at about a 12. My family is riddled with addicts of all sorts & only a few have ever successfuly battled their addictions. I planned this one like Rommel planned campaigns. Reading, research & a ton of physical prep - from checkups & blood work to extra vitamins, improving my diet, extra fluids & extra walking - all well before my Quit Date.
I consulted with quitters - successful & not so successful. I talked to doctors, nurses, counsellors, therapists, you name it - if I thought they had something to offer - I spoke with them. I stocked up on a dozen or so different kinds of drinks & all sorts of foods, light, nourishing, easy to digest stuff & a huge variety because I had no idea what I'd want. I bought a lot og different gums - didn't touch them - artificial sugars & I don't mix & that was all I could find. Hard candy, lollipops & Jolly Ranchers helped me the most.
For any potential side effects I had Immodium, Pepto Bismol, Tums, Advil, plain Tylenol, Arthrotec, Gravol, (dramamine to you), ice bags, hot water bottles, flannel sheets, washcloths, towels, barf basin. I had clean jammies, easy to slip on comfy clothes, some light reading, a TV remote...
If it sounds like I was preparing for a major catastrophe... I was. I didn't know what to expect & I prepped on the basis of: "Plan for the worst & hope for the best." What I really wanted was 4-5 days of lockdown with food & water periodically shoved under the door, access to a toilet & access to a shower. Instead, there was still the small matter of life to be dealt with. The first few days WERE a bloody nasty, brain shrieking withdrawal process. I did everything BUT puke. I snivelled, cried, whined, threw a dozen pity parties an hour & kept reminding myself every minute I 'survived' was a minute closer to feeling I had control of my life again. Don't get me wrong - I had physical discomforts - nothing in my body wanted to work right but none of it was that bad. I didn't require any of that medication save for a couple of Dulcolax to deal with some constipation. I had an annoying but mild headache for a few days. I got the sweats, the shakes, my nose alternatively ran & dried up. Whether I did or not, I felt like I stank. But then again, every excretory process - I tried to look at as a good thing - all that nastiness finding different paths to leave my body.
Most of the discomfort, the 'pain' was emotional. I wasn't getting what I wanted so like every mature toddler out there, I snivelled & whined, thaknfully, mostly in my room behind closed doors. Every once in a while I reminded myself this was MY choice. All I had to do was take 6 minutes to walk to the store & buy cigarettes. I was choosing not to. I could change my mind in a few minutes. I just didn't have to do that right this minute. The minutes piled up, slowly, then more quickly. I hoped I'd soon feel less mired in mental misery.
Got there - finally. Two stinking lousy weeks gone & frankly, I have to look at the calender to remember what I did most days & other than appointments & items I'd written down - I don't remember much. My brain just checked out.
I learned a lot. Discomfort isn't deadly & fear isn't fatal. The monsters we create in our heads are far more debilitating than real issues but... they're only as life controlling as we allow them to be. I had placed nicotine as a God on a Pedestal. Over the past few weeks. I've learned to treat cravings as nicotine being a tantrum throwing toddler. When it flings itself on the floor, screaming & drumming its fists & heels, I pick it up & punt it into a room until it shuts up - a time out. What a refreshing change to know *I* am in control. I can give in to the pint sized monster or ignore it until it behaves. Funny that - hour by hour, day by day, the tiny tyrant gets smaller, less noisy & less powerful. I see it as a cartoon cigarette with bloodshot eyes & the temper is represented by the lighted end. I picture that now when I get a craving & I can smile. I don't have to take it any more seriously than that - an annoying, pesty little kid that's not yet housebroken. If I want to give it too much attention, it will become a monster. And any attention will always be too much. Like a Gremline never feed it after midnight. Actually, never feed it - EVER.
I learned & I had a glimmering before I quit, that putting down the cigarettes wasn't nearly enough, It was only a start. Addiction is only superficially about your substance(s) of choice. Behaviours, self view & self esteem have far more profound, more powerful roles. It all has to change.
It's worth it. I'm worth it. It's meant spending weeks & there will be many more weeks focusing on... me. I have to protect my very raw nicotine free state. I have to repeat positive thoughts, mantras, utterances... I have to think in positive images. I have to do things that are good for me. That means eating properly, drinking lots of fluid - way more than I had been. Avoiding negative people & those hell bent on sabotaging my quit - there are some around & they're no longer on my Xmas card list. Shit - that's meant avoiding most people I know - I didn't realize I was so surrounded by negative. It also means being polite, civil & respectful myself. I'm an adult, not a teenager with an age related 'licence' to behave badly.
Positive is good but change is hard. I'm fighting guilt every time I'm out on errands & linger to window shop. But I AM lingering & I'm looking at nice things I might want to buy some day. I'm trying to be kind to myself & genuinely treat myself with respect. Nobody is going to treat me with any if I don't come across as deserving of any & if I don't treat myself that way... then I don't deserve it.
I'm wandering in the desert somewhat - not sure where I'm going or how I'm going to end up getting there. Wherever I end up, it's going to be better than where I've been - I keep telling myself that. The journey scares me a bit - not even sure why. Fear of the unknown? No self confidence? But I'm stubborn. One foot in front of another. Stop only to catch my breath. No steps backwards - just forwards & maybe the odd shuffle sideways if I need to change directions.
Intellectually, I know this gets better. The 'high drama' of the acute withdrawal phase is over. Now it's the boring bit - the dull, flat weeks & months that follow while my brain rewires around the lack of nicotine. Dopamine receptors will heal up & start functioning normally & until they do, a period of tedious isn't going to kill me. I'll think of it as prep time for a gloriously healthy, happy spring.
I know positive physical changes are happening - I can already see & feel some minor ones & if those reflect a little of what's going on internally - it's all good.
It is bloody exhausting though or has been. I'm hoping by the end of week I won't feel like I'm going to fall over every time I hold still. I've not posted a whole lot - couldn't concentrate enough or simply felt too confrontational. I still am having trouble settling to any one activity for long & my emotions are all over the place. If I don't stop choking up over dumb coffee ads on TV, I'm going to strangle myself.
I very much needed the comfort of familiarity here. I don't think I appreciated how anchored that would make me feel during a very turbulent few weeks. There's more turbulence to come - I have some people & issues to deal with yet that will no doubt be upsetting. I will be very glad to have the community here for stability - even if I'm just reading.
I don't generally do 'New Year's Resolutions'. There's nothing magic about a specific date on a calender. For those looking to lose an addiction there's never a 'good' time. I spent years able to rationalize 'not now because...' for any date under the sun. Give me 5 minutes & could find a valid reason not to quit something on October 6th 2032. There's no 'right' or 'wrong' date, day or the week, month or year. If you're determined & committed to quitting something, don't let the calender stop you unless you have something huge coming up - business trip so vital your next promotion/raise hinges on how well you do; that sort of thing.
Other than that, don't even pick a date until you've researched what you need to research. Tlak to anybody who might offer advice or help, even if it seems negative. If your attempt involves a medication believe me, you WANT to kow potential side effects. Don't overschedule yourself the first few weeks. Don't announce it to the world but warn those nearest to you that you might be a tad... snappish.
Good luck...