As Mark Twain said: Quitting is easy; I’ve done it lots of times. But actually I haven’t. They say the average smoker has to try quitting seven times before they manage it permanently, and I’ve really tried exacty once. Maybe twice.
Still, I was smoking something like 70-100 cigarattes a week – 5+ packs – when I left Brooklyn in December, and now I’m down to 20 a week, maybe 2+ a day. But wow do I enjoy those two, even in minus 45 degree weather, and especially after a day teaching.
It really is a shame smoking is so bad for you, because it really statisfies something that nothing else does. I’m chewing the gum – which helps a lot – but there’s still so much missing. The lovely smell of burning tobacco, playing with fire, the oral thing, and even fiddling with this thing between your fingers. *sigh* But I’ve decided I am best off thinking of myself as a smoker who doesn’t smoke rather than as an ex-smoker.
Whatever it takes, as they say. For Betty it took a trip to the hospital and a case of atypical pneumonia.
Someday talk about how you started smoking. Always interested in that, socially, culturally, generationally.
I grew up in a house with two smokers, but also at a time when we were innundated with anti-smoking PSA’s on television. So we kids were damn nuisances trying to get our parent’s to quit (hiding smokes, tampering with ’em, refusing to “run in and get Dad a pack of cigs”, etc.)
Interestingly, out of 4 kids in that household, no smokers. My sister and I were in the PSA generation; my younger brothers were not but my dad died from heart disease long before they got to the age of starting. So I think we all had some anti-smoking brainwashing along the way.
I also think part of that is peer group stuff – I was not cool enough to be included in any group (and woefully clueless in terms of music, youth culture, etc.) so not a lot of peer pressure, social pressure, or opportunity to smoke.
Good luck, down to two a day is incredible – I suspect that moving to someplace where stepping out for a smoke raises the specter of frostbite makes not smoking a viable option.