Stopping smoking tomorrow

Crapaud

Ok. Day one's over. It's not been too bad despite the irritability. Haven't hit anyone or sunk my teeth into their skull. Maybe tomorrow, who knows. Got one of those money bags from the bank and stuck £20 in it. I'll do the same tomorrow all being well.

The plan of attack for tomorrow is to keep busy giving the flat a good clean. Already I can smell the stale smoke so I'll clean the tar off the woodwork and do the Shake'n'vac. This might take a couple of days, but I'm not going to put myself under any unneccessary pressure - it'll take as long as it takes.

markos1963

Never been a smoker so I can't help you but I wish you luck. I wish my dad had given up but he couldn't and two months ago I had to bury him after his fight with lung cancer came to an end. It's such a terrible addiction, My brother who witnessed my fathers death on the floor of his living room is STILL smoking so I know what a hold it has on you guys. I just thank my lucky stars that I have never felt the need to take it up.

Easyriding

Markos1963, I just read your entry and it made me so sad. I know we all have to die at some stage but does it have to be this way?

I keep telling my doctor that I'm going to give up smoking (doesn't help the high cholesterol)and I have a couple of times but I guess I'm now just deceiving myself.

Having survived cancer 14 years ago I should have quit then but death always happens to someone else, doesn't it?!

This thread has filled me with an inspiration and determination to do the right thing. I know this is a cycling forum but can we support each other in this - I'm looking forward to my cycling improving (God knows it can't get worse) and for life to be free of the chains of addiction.

Good luck to us all.

tomsdad

Just to add well done keep at it we are all with you

Crapaud

markos1963, sorry to hear about your dad.


That's day 2 nearly over. I didn't sleep very well last night, tossing and turning (mainly turning) until around 4, then slept in. When I did get up I felt fine for about 2 hours then restless and irritable for most of the day. Took my irritability out on the vaccuum when it overheated and packed in.

Concentration's totally shot to pieces. Can't seem to focus on one thing for more than a few mins, so decided not to work today (driving job).

My blood should now be carbonmonoxide free, depending on which website you believe, so I might go out for a tootle on the winter hack bike in the morning. I need to get batteries for my 2 computers and it'll save me a couple of quid on busfares. If theroads turn out OK I'll maybe have a blast out to Paisley on the main roads. I'll see how I feel in the morning.

mingmong

@Markos. Sorry to hear about your Dad.

@Crapaud. Live the dream fella - stay with it. I packed the 'coffin nails' up over 9 years ago after quite a few years heavy slog. The boundary is, as the chaps say, purely mental.

Best of luck.

Phil

markos1963

Thanks chaps for your kind words. I'm not bitter or judgemental about smoking, I have no right to be, not ever having smoked. They reckon that nicotine is more addictive than herion so any attempt to give up has to be applauded and supported. My mum managed it a couple of years ago at the age of 78!! so it is never too late to try!

2Phat4Rapha

Did I hear it right some place that the tobacco industry is the only one in the UK that kills 120,000 of its customers every year? No wonder they have to keep recruiting youngsters.

I never chose to smoke back in the early 60’s when I was around 12 I guess. Just happened because everyone else did it. Later even used to get boxes of 200 from the parents for Xmas. Jeez, imagine that now, social services would probably get involved.

My dad smoked until he was 65 and he only had one lung! (TB in the navy). But he gave up and lived until 94.

Be strong for now Crapaud, you won’t need to be for much longer. Everything is positive from now on. You are losing nothing other than your dependance on an industry that doesn’t give a damn about you. Claim your body back and soak up all the good will coming from this forum.

attica

markos1963 wrote:

Never been a smoker so I can't help you but I wish you luck. I wish my dad had given up but he couldn't and two months ago I had to bury him after his fight with lung cancer came to an end. It's such a terrible addiction, My brother who witnessed my fathers death on the floor of his living room is STILL smoking so I know what a hold it has on you guys. I just thank my lucky stars that I have never felt the need to take it up.

I'm sorry for your loss Markos.

I smoked through my fathers illness too, in fact the nurses at the hospice told me "now isn't the time to give up". Two years after my Dad died I decided it was time to do something, I rode the Bristol to London for Action Medical Research, still a smoker at the time! I've been cigarette free for about 3 years now, so it actually took me 3 years to get round to giving up.
Your brother needs time to process it all, don't hassle him to give up just yet.

Good luck to all those taking their life back at the moment, Make it stick, you won't regret it!

keef66

My mum was a sedentary 40 a day smoker for most of her life. We could never persuade her to stop, even when she got to the stage of having to sleep propped up cos her lungs were filling with fluid. Then at 63 she had a heart attack, and when she came round in hospital she told them she didn't smoke! Never touched another cigarette, but the damage was done and she only lived another couple of years before another, massive heart attack finished her off.

Dad never smoked (though he must have done a fair amount passively), cycled to work every day, and almost lived to be 92.

Nicotine is obviously powerfully addictive; my wife's friend became a widow in her early 40s; both she and her husband smoked, he was treated twice for different stomach / bowel cancers, neither could give it up, and a third episode of cancer killed him with terrifying speed. She still smokes.

Best of luck with the giving up Crapaud

Crapaud

Still off the fags and the dosh's beginning to mount up. It's one thing to see how much I can save on a calculator and another to see it building in real, tangible cash.

Sneezing a lot and I'm developing a cough. This afternoon I got caught out with one of these surprise sneezes - you know, the ones with no warning whatsoever - and hawked something up. I wasn't aware of it until I heard it land a split second after the sneeze. Not sure what it is, but it looks like a piece of lung. Presumably it's not; I'm sure I'd've noticed.

Haven't found today too bad at all. The weekend could well be the real test.

How's everyone else doing?

markos1963

Crapaud wrote:

Still off the fags and the dosh's beginning to mount up. It's one thing to see how much I can save on a calculator and another to see it building in real, tangible cash.

Sneezing a lot and I'm developing a cough. This afternoon I got caught out with one of these surprise sneezes - you know, the ones with no warning whatsoever - and hawked something up. I wasn't aware of it until I heard it land a split second after the sneeze. Not sure what it is, but it looks like a piece of lung. Presumably it's not; I'm sure I'd've noticed.

Haven't found today too bad at all. The weekend could well be the real test.

How's everyone else doing?

Keep it going, your body is telling you its the right thing to do and your wallet is showing you what bling you could buy with the saving.

Crapaud

markos1963 wrote:

Keep it going, your body is telling you its the right thing to do and your wallet is showing you what bling you could buy with the saving.

You're right! A new bike by the end of March or a Rapha wallet early 2011.

hopper1

You will develop minor irritations, like sneazing and coughs... These don't last forever. You'll probably go through a phase were your normal sleep pattern changes. You'll start to like drinks you previously didn't, same with food.
It's all part of your body adjusting to life without nicotine.
Stick at it, mate, just concentrate on the cash in the jar, and the feeling of getting fitter
Every lump you hawk up, is a little more room in your lungs for air :shock:

Sleepycol

Packed in myself last sunday after 25 years or so of smoking roll ups. Doing OK so far. Coughing & sneezing like you wouldn't believe. Sleeping badly also. However, I'm determned to succeed this time around. The smoking ban in pubs will help, though I still disagree with it.
Anyway, best of luck to anyone giving up.
Stick with it.

badly_dubbed

i also gave up on 3rd jan 2010 - mega dry itch throat coughing like crazy!

just keep telling myself its my body cleansing itself and is good

keep it up chaps!

badly_dubbed

hmm been over 6 weeks now

still not had one nor feeling like i want one how are you doing OP?

Crapaud

I managed 16 days this time. A ned with an axe - not a piddley wee hatchet - put paid to it this time round. The last time it was 'gangsters' and the time before that was another ned, that time it was with a Samurai sword.

I only seem to encounter these people when I'm trying to stop smoking. I'm beginning to think I'll live longer smoking.

holybinch

Quitting for the uptenth time as well.
Started when I was 12, how stupid.
Managed to stay smoke free for 5 years between 25 and 30. Then, new job, divorce, all good excuses to start again.
How stupid.
Gave up last year when started cycling. Did accupuncture, worked my arse off. Lasted 6 months, winter got the better of me, no more cycling, and chrimbo didn't help.

Started cycling again, and I find it's the best motivation for me.
Better than health, money or the gf's nagging.

2 days so far, it's hard, but it's harder to think that you're a recovering nicotine addict for life.

cee

i am in the middle of stopping (again and hopefully for the last time.)

my quit meter says:

One week, one day, 11 hours, 28 minutes and 33 seconds. 84 cigarettes not smoked, saving £25.43. Life saved: 7 hours, 0 minutes.

So one week in and going ok. still getting pangs at certain times of the day...but its getting less.

Maybe its been easier this time as I only started again in september, after 6 months off, and was smoking about 10 a day.....

what surprises me most about thesse stats is the life saved figure.....as in...if it takes 5 minutes to smoke a fag, then I have had an extra 7 hours in my life where I would have been smoking fags. 7 hours a week smoking.....thats a job. you should get paid for a shift like that!

badly_dubbed

badly_dubbed wrote:

im giving up also

best of luck

remember - all in the mind 8)

came across this.....im still off them, 3 years in janurary and never looked back!

anyone else still off them from the original posts?

markyone

I have never ever put a fag to my mouth so dont know how hard it is to have to give up.
good luck with it.

badly_dubbed

hard-ish

can go days with no cravings then something so simple happens and your climbing the walls.....

after 2.5years the cravings are non existent however....for me anyway, my uncle smoked for a year when he was in his teens and to this day (hes 50) says he could easily go back to them....

Smokin Joe

rake wrote:

im tucking into a richmond as i read this.

I've just put one of those out. Soon be time for another.

Bunneh

Other half quit at Christmas, had a few cravings but she's off them completely now. She's been out with friends who smoke but fought the urges. She smoked a bit of weed when we were in Denmark but that was it.

pinno

My OH and I used to smoke in bed but then we discovered foreplay. Ha ha.

How the f*ck do you stop smoking in Glasgow ? I can see the plume of smoke rising above the place from here, you smoke in Glasgow even if you don't smoke.

PS Cannot believe the number of smoking cyclists !! Shame on you. Get rid of the tabs. Lost my stepfather who smoked, after he smoked one of his legs off. Great guy, sadly missed. He got me to clean out his filter (remember those plastic things?). Did me a power of good.
Here's a thought. If you die from smoking, who are you leaving behind ? Do it for your kids, your wife, your brother, your sister, your husband, your cat, your hampster, your parrot...

msmancunia

I've just done my fourteenth day without today :-) You'd think losing both parents to cancer before I was 34 would make me see sense, but that stuff's a horribly hard habit to break.

Still - saved nearly £100 so far. Acting like a bitch though. Last time I tried to give up I kicked off about the OTT jokes on here and nearly caused a riot *blushes*

murf1480

Quit last year while I was in Afghan of all places! It just felt right haven't looked back since cant even smell them now without feeling sick.
To those of you are who are trying to quit just stick at it easier said than done I know but it really does get easier.