Tag Archives: quitting

Addiction

minesweeper failed with 98 of 99 bombs found
I hate minesweeper.

I can’t stop. Quitting smoking was easier than this. Once I move my mouse to the icon and double click to start playing, my entire night is wrecked, and so is my mousing hand. Seriously, I can’t stop playing. Even if I close the game and leave the computer to go do something else, for hours I’m still playing the game in my head. I see those goddamned squares when I’m talking to someone and all I can do is try to solve puzzles that don’t actually add up. It’s ridiculous how addicted I am to this.

The insult to the injury is that Minesweeper is so 1998. I think I’ll seek some counselling and maybe go to a Tetris clinic to get me down from this.

Destruction, Anniversary.

Three days ago, I had a dream where I was hanging out, drinking or whatever. Surrounded by friends. And I managed to smoke up an entire pack of cigarettes. With much aplomb. I felt guilt, regret. Then I woke up, took a breath. Realized that it was only a dream.

After all of this time, the craving is still there; the hunger for the smell; the feel of breathing through a column of burning tobacco; the clench of the lungs; the rush. The addiction. It wanes, it gets forgotten, but every so often it rears its head and smiles. This carries a special poignancy with me today because, offically, this is my second anniversary as a non-smoker. February 18th, 2004 is when I quit for good. Borrowing a turn of phrase from reformed alcoholics, I am two years old. I could say it’s my second life, but this life is exactly the same as the life I had before I started smoking at age 23.

Do I regret quitting? Yes, of course. It was my crutch, my fixation. The heady buzz smoothed away my anxiety. But I’m damned happy that I quit. I can breathe now. I can dream now. I’m able to see and feel the benefits of quitting. It’s the final end to one of my most despicable acts of self-destruction. May that part of me be forever destroyed.

Rest In Peace, Shawn the Smoker. October 1995 – February 2004

Day Whatever

Yep. The wagon has left me behind.

My will to quit has left me. Between last week and now I’ve polished off almost 2 packs of cigarettes. Not smoking as much as I used to, but I see myself ramping back up to near my old levels. I’m not too particularly impressed with myself, and so are other people. To anyone I’ve let down, I’m sorry.

I was doing good for a while there; actually impressed myself that I could do it. But this week has been stressful at work, things are going nowhere, I’m working hard, playing little, etc., etc., yadda yadda yadda [insert additional justification here]. I reached a point where my volition, my determination to quit, to live a different and better lifestyle just waned away, disappeared. Got tired of having no self-destructive outlet, no personal consolation.

If I want to quit and stay quit, I need to resolve these problems. For good, for once and for all. For myself.

Next time I make the renewed resolve to quit, I’ll be more quiet about it. My habit started quietly, and it should go out that way. I believe I erred by making a big noise about quitting, telling everyone I know, everyone I work with, everyone I hang out with, that I’m a quitter. Had to alienate myself from my friends to avoid temptation, and now there’s little to no support group. If I did it quietly, it’d be my little secret, and there’s a little bit of conspiracy in that which’ll keep me going for a short while until the next reason appears to stay quit.

I’m just glad I got to prove to myself that I could live without tobacco and nicotine for an extended period of time. I won’t die, I won’t lose my marbles. And I can do it again, renewed, if I could just find a way to release my internal agressions. Grr.

I guess if I had a sledgehammer at work I could take it out on some old pallets out back. I hear they’ve been saying some really nasty things about me.

Day 17

I’ve been having a hell of a time with the quitting. Between friday and saturday night / sunday morning, I had a total of 5 cigarettes. Five! That’s a quarter-pack! These smokes didn’t do much to give me a buzz like that one I had earlier in the week; all they did was give me something to breathe and exhale while I was working on my hobbies. There’s nicotine in my system again; the next day or two might be a little rough.

And now, after waking up from a long night, I feel like ass. Cruddy chest, sore throat, and dreams from hell. Today’s a new chance to strengthen and renew my resolve to not smoke.

It is evident to me that I can’t court with smoking and not get pulled back in. I am smoking a lot less than I used to, yes, but having small binges like this still classifies me as a part-time smoker. Could somebody give me a good swift kick to my ass, please? Thanks.

Days 13 through 16

Hey folks. Been a few days going, but I finally have a bit of time, energy, and attention to sit down and write a log.

Since, oh, Tuesday, I’ve been doing well with my lungs. I discovered Tuesday night, after an absconded cigarette which made my lungs clench and crud up, that for the prior two days I had been breathing clearly and didn’t even realize it. Had one hell of a head rush from the smoke, but the resulting crud made me regret. So, for the past few days I’ve been a good boy until about half an hour ago when I had a Fridaysmoke. I felt it was a suitable reward for a week’s worth of work done and a likely kickoff for the weekend.

My chest currently isn’t tight, or any tighter than it has been, but I know I might have some effects from it. And I’ll be damned, because I didn’t get a buzz like I did Tuesday. I’m thinking these 4-year-old specialty cigarettes I had saved and stored away are kinda funky. Should probably avoid them, and all other smokes, eh?

I have noticed, though, that when I’m working on one of the machines at work, my chest kinda tightens up because of the stretching I do to reach the top of the machine to load paper into a bin. Something about stretching my ribcage makes my cartillage and solar plexus tingle and feel kind of tense. It’s odd.

And it’s more odd still that now I really don’t think much of taking breaks at work. The thought never really occurs to me. Could I be on my way to being more productive? Heeeey. I’m just happy, so happy, that I can go through my day and not really think about smoking, or not smoking, any more. Doing that a lot less.

It’s all about rewriting habits. Change the habits, change the body. Change the body, change the mind. I like how that works.