So after an extended hiatus, I return with a vengeance and ready to admit that I still feel I have nothing to add to the blog-o-sphere. Lots of things on my mind this morning though...oh where to begin?
How about my attempt to quit smoking?
So, as you may know if you follow me on Twitter, I am attempting to quit smoking, after having done so for the past 15 (give or take, off and on) years. If you do the math, that would make me 11 years old when I "started" smoking. I put quotations around that because, I mean, really, did I consider myself a full-fledged smoker at age 11? probably not. But I know I did smoke cigarettes quite often at that very young age. It wasn't until the weekend before high school graduation that I realized that I was not alone in the smoking world. It was brought to my attention that my best friend, Chris Wright had been smoking on the DL for quite some time. Not to get into the history of how me and Chris even became friends in the first place, over a cigarette on the bluff behind Lincoln st., but anyway, once I realized that I was not alone in being a young, of age smoker, it became much more acceptable in my mind. I realized later that after Chris quit in 2004, our friendship started to erode. I realized that smoking cigarettes was what we had in common and what we did together. Though this is not about me and Chris' friendship, there is a real tie there with the social acceptability of the whole thing.
I pretty much always had a friend that was a smoking buddy. It's what we did. Weather that was Chris, my brother, Andy, whomever. I don't have a smoking buddy anymore. I don't need one like I used to when I was younger. But now I just feel like a sad, aging man, who relies on that smoke to maintain some form individuality and youth. To be young, smoke and be bad ass. I look at how unhealthy other people around me are and look and scoff at them sometimes. This comes from being a vegetarian and me thinking this makes me better than others, which it clearly doesn't. I have that same sense of belonging with a vegetarian crowd, although that is a crowd in which I don't know anyone else that is in it. It's weird, but basically I am an addictive personality with need to feel like I belong to something. That's where it makes it hard to quit. The other reasons it's hard to quit is the obvious physical addiction to nicotine.
Withdrawals are so fucking weird to describe. I go to a one-track mind about needing a cigarette. That's how I spent Thursday. All I thought about was how I needed a smoke, and I needed nicotine. Once I got some nicotine in my system, it seemed to lighten a bit, but still, it was my main focus. Another hiccup (literally) is that I am using these nicotine lozenges. They taste alright, like a weak mint, but they burn my throat, stomach and make me feel like I have to burp, but can't. If I eat too many, they give me painful hiccups. So I bought a pack of cigarettes last night, because the lozenges are not the same as the real thing. I'm working on making the right decision to have a lozenge instead of a cigarette, but sometimes there's no changing my mind on what I want. I use cigarettes as something to do when I'm bored at work, which is most of the time, so trying to find something else to occupy my time is an issue. I have a feeling this is going to be a long, drawn-out struggle, and I may not be successful this time, and I understand that. That doesn't mean I'm not going to try 100% to get there. I'm not giving up by saying I know this may not work out this time. I hope that by feeling that way, it doesn't give myself an exit strategy, a fatalistic view of the whole thing.
I want to win.
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