Replied by Tina (Toney River, Canada) on 03/19/2009
i quit smoking successfully after a 26 year habit. i can relate to how hard it is. i am 3 years smoke free and it was the hardest thing i have ever done. i actually had to use both the patch and the gum at the same time. i started on step two of the patch for twice the amount of time while chewing the quit gum as well. i grabbed gum at every craving. i changed my habits as well. as soon as i finished a meal i immediately did the dishes and clean up because that was when i would want a cig the most. i slowly weaned myself off the gum after i finished the patch and the will to as you said "stay around and see grandchildren" was a larger craving. i hope this helps and i wish you all the luck you need to win this battle.
tinaReplied by Joyce (Joelton, Tn) on 03/19/2009
Hello Candi, My suggestion is the same no matter how many years you have been smoking" QUIT NOW! Some published studies on quitting smoking, drugging or drinking found that the ones who QUIT COLD TURKEY were the ones most likely to stay quit.
The hardest part of quitting is making up your mind you really want to quit whichever problem you have. Once you make up your mind that you do want to quit, the rest is much easier.I quit twice, the first time I carried an open pack of cigarettes with me all the time (the same pack) and told myself that I was only quitting 1 cigarette at a time and if I started having a nicotine fit, I had an almost full pack in my packet. I threw that pack away after 6 months and no nicotine fits and stayed quit for l year and like a fool started back again. After smoking a year or so more, I quit again. It was fifteen years after I quit before I dared touch one. A friend was fixing to light one up one night & I reached and got it and said "Let Me", proceeded to light her cigarette, handed it back to her and said "My God, where's the cat" to which she inquired why I wanted a cat. My honest answer was "So I can lick it's tail and get this nasty taste out of my mouth" and have never feared wanting to smoke again. That was probably 30+ years or more ago.
Now to give you another reason to quit smoking. To obtain a better quality of life, health and well being. You probably know that your car engine wouldn't function to well if you blew smoke through it because it needs oxygen to burn the fuel that makes your car go. Well your body also needs oxygen to burn its fuel and it can't function very well when you replace part of your oxygen with tobacco smoke. That is why there is an increase in all diseases, including kidney disease, when you smoke. Lung cancer is just a small part of the damage to your body when you smoke. So start practicing good nutrition to give your body its fuel and giving it the oxygen needed to burn the fuel. You don't need luck here, you just need to cross out that t in can't and start saying to yourself and everybody else "I CAN QUIT SMOKING" and soon it will be "I did quit smoking".
