8 days strong
Hello everyone! I am 32 and I started smoking at 18. I smoked my last cigarette right before having a tooth pulled(6-25) and decided to use that as a platform to quit. I am using the patches and I am on 21mg. Although the patches help a lot, it's still very hard at times. My anxiety is driving me crazy. Also, I have never really had sinus issues but I definitely am right now, chest pains started today, but aren't frequent, coughing isn't terrible. The main things that bother me are the shortness of breath, anxiety, and dizziness. Please tell me it gets better lol. Thanks for hearing my story and congratulations to everyone! This is a tough battle!
Your positive attitude will get you through. It is a battle, one won in the mind. You need to read all you can here and elsewhere to learn about you and nicotine. You were drugged , addicted and brainwashed. We can set ourselves free. Here you will meet many who have and would never go back. So many rewards. You too will collect them in due time.
Well done for making it this far! I am on day 17 (I was vaping 12mg nicotine and quit cold turkey) and I suffer really badly from anxiety, once I quit my anxiety skyrocketed up until day 12. Since then my anxiety has gotten much better even better than what it used to be before quitting! I would suggest getting camomile tea I use this and it’s helped me a lot I have one 3 times a day, or even try CBD oil to help in the meantime. I also exercise everyday for 25-30 minutes, as your brain is adjusting to no nicotine replacing it with a natural drug also helps immensely.
Just please remember it’s all temporary.
Congratulations on your decision to stop smoking, as suggested it is a battle won through the mind, this can be worked on as you go along, plenty of reading, deep breathing (around 3-10 times) when you feel anxious, it is the unknown that makes you anxious; so learn a lot more on the addictive substance of Nicotine, and the attachment you have to it.
Thanks everyone for the support! It really means a lot!! Each day is getting a little easier!!
Keep at it. I get the anxiety and smoking thing....smoking was my 'anxiety cure' all my life, from the time I was a teenager.....and then I was 50 and being diagnosed with early COPD so I realised it was really impacting my health, which of course made me anxious, so I coped by smoking, because that made sense didn't it. So I had to confront myself. My parents both smoked themselves to death. I decided I wasn't going to do the same. I quit. It was very hard but my anxiety reduced - I realised a lot of my anxiety was about my inability to stop smoking, my feelings of failure, my fears.....At 32 you can probably avoid the long-term damage from smoking that I am now having to confront. Keep on quitting. I stopped smoking for 6 months when I was 30 but let a small crisis take me back to tobacco for another 20 years. Don't that do that! The anxiety gets worse. The feeling of conquering the cravings and getting through each day is so much better - the day you realise you haven't thought of a cigarette until after lunch...
Great going 'smokefree6=25
if you feel like your getting a little too much nicotine? You can cut those big 21mg patches in half and see how that goes. Its entirely up to you or discuss it with your prescribing doctor. Or pop another query on here. So many people have successfully Quit using the nicotine patch on this site,
To Nat
Your story is so similar to my relationship with (smoking) or (tobacco) and COPD so I'd love if you could write your own story, please.