Life is what happens between cigarettes

I was a life time smoker. Like most smokers, I quit dozens of times until the nicotine devil laughed at me as it grabbed me by the throat once more. Years ago, I quit for 5 solid years until one night setting with a smoking friend listening to music and relaxing. I asked him if I might have just one puff for old times sake and BOOM. Went straight to the store first thing in the morning and bought a pack of those delicious, scrumptious, satisfying to the soul darlings and down the yellow (teeth?) brick road we went again.

Well, after all these years and dozens of tries it finally happened. I'll talk about how later but I finally was able to quit for good. After just a few days or weeks, I was amazed at how much time I had without having to stop and smoke about once an hour. That's when this wild thought came into my feeble brain.

LIFE IS WHAT HAPPENS BETWEEN CIGARETTES!!!

Let me prove that fact for all of you reading this right now. OK, I want to go shopping down at the mall or Trader Joe's or wherever on a Sunday. Wake up in the morning and it's time to have a smoke, take a shower and get dressed and it's time to have a smoke. Have breakfast and it's time to have a smoke. The drive to go shopping is going to take about a half hour at least so right before I leave, it's time to have a smoke. Then when I arrive at the store, I'll be shopping for a while so now I'm out in the damn hot parking lot standing under this little bitty tree panting like a banshee having a smoke. In the store to shop for a while and now back to the parking lot under that little puny tree having another smoke, sweating like a pig. Guess I'll have lunch on the way home, so drive there and guess what folks? Before I go in, again standing out in the parking lot like a damn idiot having a smoke I am. After eating is one of the best cigs of all, so it's time for another smoke. Of course as soon as I get home, it's time to have another smoke now isn't it?

So, lets go back over what I did that day just up to the point of getting back home from a simple shopping trip BETWEEN CIGARETTES. I got up, took a shower, ate breakfast, drove down to the store, went shopping, drove to the lunch place, and drove back home. Lets count the cigarettes. How about 10 just up to that point and it's only about 1:00 or 2:00 in the afternoon.

LIFE IS WHAT HAPPENS BETWEEN CIGARETTES!!!

Now each cigarette takes about 10 minutes out of ones time, so that's about 120 minutes out of the total shopping trip up to the point of arriving back home. Man that's a pretty good chunk of wasted time out of my life, now isn't it? After quiting, I could not believe how much more time I had in each day. The time factor is kind of misleading though because even other than actually smoking, your mind is always close to working out the details of the next cigarette.

What finally happened to make me quit was a potential health issue that came up in a medical exam in our family. That scared me beyond belief. All of the sudden the idea of actually dying over the stupid things became a real reality instead of just a far away thought. So that did it. I finally totally decided to quit. That's probably the most important and useful thing to happen to someone wanting to quit. To finally make the decision and mean it.

Now a few negative realities about quiting. Did I gain weight? Yup, no doubt. Probably something in the neighborhood of at least 20 pounds, which I am still struggling with after around 5 years have gone by. The fact is one's sense of taste comes back big time after quiting which makes food taste sooooooooo much better. This is a great thing and a crappy thing at the same time huh?

Do I feel better? Not really.....I guess I can breath a little better now and also don't have that little smokers cough I used to make excuses for. By the way, that little noisy, gurgling thing in my lungs that caused me to clear my throat every night several times when I first laid down in bed before sleep went completely away after only about a week. I was making excuses for that also. Oh.......I'm just clearing my throat...

Lets talk about the money.........HOLY CRAP!!! Do you realize that the damn things cost about $6.00 a pack now or around $60.00 a carton. When a couple both smoke around a carton or so a week EACH, that is about $5700.00 A YEAR!!!! What could most of us do with that kind of extra money just setting around?

OK, now my learned advice............DO NOT USE GUM or anything like lozenges, where you just pop one in your mouth every time you feel the need. I know a guy who has been hooked on gum now for FIFTEEN YEARS!!!!! The only thing I would recommend that worked for me and lots of other folks is the patch. One each morning, starting with the "Step #1 patch" for a few months, then stepping down to "Step #2 patch" which has less nicotine, then finally "Step 3 patch", which has very little nicotine.

OK, I'm done with my tirade about smoking now. One final note though. I thought for sure that I would die with a cigarette in my hand. There was no doubt in my mind. The only thing that saved me was that one important medical scare and my making up my mind to choose life over that fat obnoxious idiot, the nicotine devil himself.

I'm sure you've heard this lots of times but here goes again.

IF I COULD DO IT..........ANYONE CAN!!!!!




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Come on.......DO IT!