Quitting smoking blog

Quitting smoking blog - WEEK 6

Monday, 16 Jan 06

This sinusitis I have hasn't been much fun. My nose has been leaking even more than my toilet's plumbing. I've had the hot-and-colds and felt quite weak.

Experience tells me that if I don't smoke I get over these lurgies far quicker than if I do. So, even though my abstinence is probably the cause of the bug, it will also faciltate the cure.

I am now confident that I have the first stage of quitting sorted out now. Of course I still have pangs, but they aren't strong enough to call "cravings". Just small calls of habit. The next challenge is to wean myself off the lozenges but I'll just do that gradually so don't expect any dramatic results from the blogs over the next few weeks.

Dangers? My biggest danger now is complacency. I have to keep in mind that this isn't about giving up smoking so much as beating a nicotine addiction. As mentioned before, I'm now in the "methadone stage", that is, I'm only on the straight-and-narrow because I'm taking nicotine replacement products.

While I'd managed to give up smoking for a couple of years earlier this century, I was chewing (nicotine gum) at a clip that would make the average cow proud. My aim to to go one step further this time—to say goodbye to nicotine altogether.

Tuesday, 17 Jan 06

This morning I felt confident enough to see if I could manage without lozenges or gum.

The train was crowded (State Rail has cut carriages during the “holiday season” even though almost everyone is back at work) and I had to squeeze into one of those end seats. There was a guy sitting there, apparently asleep, with his legs spread as though he had balls like watermelons. His bags sat defiantly on the seat.

I said, “excuse me” as I tried to pass to reach a vacant seat opposite him and he looked blankly up at me without moving. Annoyed by his selfishness, I pushed through to the seat with attitude. If he hadn´t moved his legs in time I would have steamrollered them. I admit that I´m an ungracious commuter at the best of times. Being ADHD, I loathe being caught in slow-moving crowds; the boredom and claustrophobia drives me nuts. So I tend to rush ahead like a mad rat-racer to escape the crush. And I hate standing because it makes it hard to read, which renders even short train trips interminably boring.

Once I´d bustled past Giant Testicle Man I settled down and had to admit to myself that I badly needed a lozenge.

I´m gradually getting healthier but I´m still not feeling great. Whenever I have respiratory illnesses, the aircon in our old building at work makes me feel worse. I was getting dizzy and light-headed around midday so I left so I could have an afternoon siesta, after which I worked at home on a Powerpoint presentation for the boss.While I was working on the Powerpoint, I started getting some big pangs. Hey, but ah jes´ reached fer mah trusty lozenges, and shot them suckers down befo´ they got me (why am I suddenly talking white trash? *shrug*).

Obviously I still have a long road to travel before I´m free of nicotine´s iron grip.

Wednesday, 18 Jan 06

Mr Groin is supposed to be starting his sister's Juice-Fruitsalad-Voila! quitting program today but I'm not sure he's ready. That’s one thing I’ve come to realise—you have to be mentally ready to quit to be successful. The trouble is that you my not relaise whether you were ready or not until it happens.

It’s ironic. I never wanted to be one of those painful, holier-than-thou ex-smokers who absolutely HATES smoking. Yet having an intense hatred of smoking turned out to be what works for me. Not some mamby-pamby, dutifully manufactured hatred but an intense feral hatred with pointy fangs.

That hatred comes from realising at a deep level just how controlled by nicotine I am and how utterly cruel nicotine can be if I fail to obey its call. Funny how we persononify drugs. Like the old Lou Reed line in the old Velvet Underground classic, Heroin—“it’s my wife and its my life”.

In my case, nicotine is the abusive husband who everyone tells me is no good and that I should leave him, but I pathetically weep, “But I love him”, while nursing my wounded skin, lungs, teeth and emotions. Bugger that for a joke!

Still, I have no ill feelings towards people who still smoke; that would be hypocritical ... not that it hasn’t stopped plenty of successful quitters (how’s that for an oxymoron?) from doing just that.

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Thursday, 19 Jan 06

This lurgy is hard to shake off! Apart from being Snuffles the Walrus I'm fine when inactive, but even mild exertion leaves me exhausted, which is super-annoying when when you're a hyperactive crazy critter.

I've found that too many lozenges can make you nauseousand I have much more felt like having gums. Trouble is that I've had too many so now my jaw is sore again. This could all reach an ... interesting point, one where I have to deny myself more nicotine than is ideal at this stage.

It seems that tobacco was used very differently by indiginous people—as a hallucinogen. It certainly has given me visions of impotence, hopelessness, idiocy in my time.

Wikipedia tells us that: "it was often consumed in extraordinarily high quantities and used as an entheogen [you see God, apparently, or at least one of God's delegates]; generally, this was done only by experienced shamans or medicine men".

They would either drink a tobocco brew or snort it to reach the right level of concentration. I suppose smoking 20 little sticks of tobacco, after meals, with cups of tea and coffee, or while getting drunk wouldn't have worked as well.

Mr Groin didn't end up giving up with the juice method, as I suspected. Apparently he lasted two hours. I didn't pressure him about it because I know what it's like to replapse or fail to stop at all. I still think the important thing is not to give up giving up and eventually you reach the right mental space.

He said he couldn't get angry at cigs as I am because they're inanimate objects. However, he said he could get cranky at the way multinationals manipulate people by adding ammonia compounds to smokes to improve absorbtion of nicotine in the brain and keep people addicted.

Here's a list of the sorts of things tobacco companies do (from ash.org.uk):

• Additives make cigarettes provide high levels of 'free' nicotine which increases the addictive 'kick' of the nicotine. Ammonium compounds can fulfil this role by raising the alkalinity of smoke
• Additives are used to enhance the taste of tobacco smoke, to make the product more desirable to consumers. Although seemingly innocuous the addition of flavourings making the cigarette 'attractive' and 'palatable' is in itself cause for concern.
• Sweeteners and chocolate may help to make cigarettes more palatable to children and first time users; eugenol and menthol numb the throat so the smoker cannot feel the smoke's aggravating effects.
• Additives such as cocoa may be used to dilate the airways allowing the smoke an easier and deeper passage into the lungs exposing the body to more nicotine and higher levels of tar.
• Some additives are toxic or addictive in their own right or in combination. When additives are burned, new products of combustion are formed and these may be toxic or pharmacologically active.
• Additives are used to mask the smell and visibility of side-stream smoke, making it harder for people to protect themselves and undermining claims that smoking is anti-social without at the same time reducing the health risks of passive smoking.
  

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Friday, 20 Jan 06

My energy returned today; it looks like the lurgy has finally gone away, apart from residual nasal annoyances. I'll never know if it went away faster due to giving up smoking or not—you never do find out with these things.

As a result I was on hyperdrive today, happily jumping between tasks relating to various different projects at work—developing a logo, the (dreaded) database, codes of practice, a Powerpoint for the boss, and checking for events which may clash with a gig we're putting on at work this May.

I had a few strong pangs today between the frenetic activity. It was that Friday feeling. My subsconscious mind (or whatever) was really looking forward to relaxing after the week with a coffee & Baileys and a ciggie. Yet another trigger. Still, just about everything seems to be a trigger—waking up, eating, drinking, socialising, being alone, before work, work breaks, after work, weekends, breathing, existing ...

For those of you who are reading this (HA!), I won't be home this weekend so there won't be any entries until next week.

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Saturday, 21 Jan 06

Had an email chat with a fellow who runs a site (www.pcbypaul.com) which provides various freebies.

I’d used one of the clipart pictures from his site as a basis for the contraption in the David Lynch cartoon I did for my Xmas Eve. I’d previously forgotten to do a ‘toon for that day.
Anyway, he mentioned that he had tried to quit about a dozen times before. My response put into words what I’ve been thinking about quitting in a way that I think could be useful for some people in that situation:

Week 5 was the final axis point for me. Because relapses are so common-apparently 90% or so—I feel the trick is to not quit quitting, not to berate yourself for messing up, but just keep getting on the horse. If you refuse to give up giving up, from there I think it’s almost inevitable that you’ll reach a point where you’re so frustrated and cranky that the attitude needed to quit will come ... that’s my theory of the moment, anyway.

Had my usual munch at El Bahsa. Chatted with one of the owners about smoking. He said he enjoyed it and didn’t want to give up. He started at the late age of 24 while drinking with some smoker friends. There was a packet on the table and he just picked it up and smoked one. His friends were saying “No no. We’re hooked but you don’t need to start”. He replied, “Hey, you’re talking to Hassan The Man here!”.

But he still agreed that the real reason why he enjoys smoking is that it feels good to relieve the withdrawals.

A woman working there said that her father quit at age 24 because her mother told him that she wouldn’t marry him unless he stopped smoking.

Hassan then started saying you should never give up for a woman! Once you give in to a demand like that it’s like wearing her around your neck and then she starts squeezing her legs around your neck. All with a wry smile.

Hah! He would have been better off if he’d submitted to the good sense of the the fairer sex! Of course, if I’d said that, though, he would have just laughed. You either want to or you don’t.

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Sunday, 22 Jan 06

Saw the new King Kong with Maximus last night. 100 times better than the 1927 one. Just fantastic even I I bawled my eyes out in the last 10 minutes. Too long? The three hours went by “just like that”.

As we looked for a cab in George St we passed dozens of young people hanging around outside the nightclubs. Many were smoking.

Strange how these nicotine addicts can indulge in public with impunity because cigs are legal. Not that I condone prohibition—it makes drugs “cool”, feeds the black market and pushes addicts into criminality. I’d prefer that tobacco and other drugs be legal, and their abuse should be treated as a medical problem, not a crime. That’s my moment on the soapbox done.

Maximus and I played tennis in the afternoon and he said he couldn’t believe how much fitter I was now that I’d quit. From my end, I was still huffing like a hippo (and about as agile) after every long point. I was still sweating Niagara Falls. My head still tingled from weariness.

Maybe it was because I didn’t ask for a break. Maybe I was unconsciously running for more balls? After three decades of lung abuse I can’t see my fitness turning the corner “just like that”.

Dad is still sick but I could at least see him now that the lurgy has gone away. He has been a rabid anti-smoker for almost all of his life and was super-fit for his age until his heart operation last year, which has hit him for six.

The only time he smoked was during the few years when he was in the army, ironically, a time he says was the best in his life. As soon as he left the army he gave up the cigs “just like that”.

It’s nice to have my first full Monday to Sunday cigarette-free. I expect to keep a clean score sheet from now on. I am yet to get my act together with monitoring my NRT intake.

Maybe next week I’ll do it, “just like that”?

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Weekly summary

Week 7 -->