"Still on Track"
Hi everyone, was out walking with my wife yesterday morning by the side of Botany Bay. This is one of our favourite walking areas and was such a beautiful day. The sun was shining, other people were walking, the planes were taking off and landing, fishermen were out on the boats....what i am saying is all was exactly as the last time me and the wife were at that place since i quit smoking. It then while walking "came" on me an urge to smoke because when previously walked at that place i have always done so with a cigarette in my hand.....(wife never smoked). I asked the wife if she had any peppermint lollies or whatever and after putting a lolly in my mouth the craving disappeared. The feeling for the urge was awful it made me kind of think "why you not enjoying the walk with a smoke like usual?" I began to feel like i had lost a best friend. I quickly turned around my thoughts by saying"breath in the fresh air" why breath in tar? and to top it all off......there was now a "No Smoking" sign in the area....beauty that completed my ambition to bring me back in focus. I then enjoyed the rest of the 3km walk with no more temptations. The consensus of this story is that some people like me will find the "habit" the hardest to break not the craving.......you somehow must kill the habit but not run away from it to some different locale or situation. That is my opinion. Hope this helps some of us on this site. Cheers.
Hey Johnnie, you made a good point. When I first stopped, in the first few days, I missed being outside in the morning sun with my coffee and listening to the birds so I took my mobile out with me and checked this site out. I was damned if I would let the nicodemon chase me out of my favourite part of the day. This site helped immensely. I could read a few posts, perhaps reply or not and then look around me and listen, then go on to the next post and so on and so forth. Be prepared, as any good girl guide would tell you. If you decide to be somewhere where you would have lit up, take some sugarfree gum or peppermint lollies with you to distract you. Then you will once again be able to enjoy that place but without the memory of smoking there. Well done, J, we need to remain vigilant -thank goodness for your wife having the lollies :)
So true and a very perceptive observation. The habit is a killer to break and the urge is just not so hard. But I know dearly-loved habits can be broken.