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Hello darling nicotine free creatures and those ready to be free. My anniversary...how many years? Twelve maybe. Forgotten as years of freedom expand but surely remember those first seconds that lasted forever turning begrudgingly into minutes before the next crave wave would hit. Craves did not capture me. I held my ground. But honestly, gave this, my quitting 'experiment' a year. If I didn't feel better after a year, I could always go back to smoking. Never would have surfaced sans nicotine had I not begun to learn about addiction, what addiction does, how to circumvent brain patterns. Information available on this site and others, Joel Spitzer's straightforward videos taking the voodoo out of it. I read voraciously as my understandings emerged as a reliable personal strength, learning what was going on in my brain, how to change. How to jump start clean endorphins by rewarding myself with joyous thoughts, sights, things. Life lessons applicable to many varied situations. I knew I would not smoke anymore; I broke the chains. After a year of nicotine free lurking, I joined QTrain to thank all the people that helped me unknowingly and pointed me towards needed materials. Being part of the community was rewarding, I count many as friends and think I helped some. Certainly, flooded the train with posts, sharing more information I drudged up. For newbies or those lurking, remember that freedom from addiction is well within your power. Yes, there will be gnarly times, but these will not kill you. Smoking will. And if not kill, make your living a slow breathless dying and for what? for greasing the pockets of corporations leaving your families bereaved? for indulging an addiction that robs you of Living? WTF ? You pay, if not with your life than with the quality of your life, the quality of your death! Those things are beastly HARD. But you know that, we all know that... some of you are ridden with guilt over it. STOP IT PLEASE! My purpose in this note is to inspire you to quit and hold on to your resolve because I KNOW your freedom is within your power. You CAN. You WILL. Beating addiction is temporarily difficult and profoundly rewarding in short time. Short Time. So, read up. Educate yourself. Know you are not alone. Realize you can choose Freedom in every breath, every day and bask in gratitude that you chose Life. Your Life. I smile about, my experiment in quitting for a year to see how I liked it. It is the best thing I have done for myself, hands down. There will be no going back as NOPE etches deeper into my grey matter. NOPE. Not One Puff. EVER. Never ever Never.

Penguin Quit Date: 19 October 2023 Posted Wednesday at 08:08 I was in the hospital for my first four days, which made my quit a lot less stressful, apart from the whole "collapsed lung" bit. That said, I slept a lot, and I watched TV a lot. I tried my best to keep my mind busy. When I got home, I threw out every little scrap of smoking paraphernalia I could find. After that, I ordered a big bag of candy--Skittles, if I recall correctly--and used those for my oral fix. I let them melt in my mouth, rather than chewing them, for the most part. Anticipate that you will not feel great, but if you can think of it as the sort of discomfort that heals you, I think that helps. Just like your muscles ache during a workout and that doesn't feel fantastic, but you know you'll be stronger in the long run, you can think of the headaches, insomnia, stomach upset, and anxiety as something to endure--or alleviate, if possible. If you are successful in passing through that gauntlet, the good news is that you'll never have to go through it again, so long as you stay quit. Every little discomfort you face on your quit will get less and less intense as time goes on. You may have minutes that feel like hours and days that feel like years. Those are the days where it's helpful to stay busy, to avoid stress as much as possible, and be on your guard against the temptation to smoke. Eventually, the days will feel more like days again, and the minutes will pass, and you will feel less and less inclined to smoke. Then, you'll come up on a "first," and you'll feel like smoking again, seemingly out of the blue. Here's an example for you: I recently had to go to the DMV to renew my driver's license. The last time I'd done that, I was a smoker, and I sat outside the DMV puffing away, waiting for my number to be called. This most recent trip, I had been quit for 16 months, but all of a sudden I felt like smoking again. Why? Because it was my first time in 17 years that I'd gone to the DMV as a non-smoker. You will experience a lot of those. First holidays. First family emergencies. First heartaches. It can be frustrating, but with each victory, it will be easier and easier to say "no" to those cancer sticks. "If you're going through Hell, keep going." The way out is through. Put in the time, endure the pressure, and claim your victory. If you smoke, you won't have to face the discomfort of quitting, but you'll still stink, you'll feel the physical effects of smoking, and you'll have that worry in the back of your mind about every little ache and pain and bump and blemish that crops up, wondering if your habit has finally done you in. If you endure the discomfort of quitting for a little while, you won't stink, your body will start to repair itself (however slowly), and over time, you'll worry less and less about those aches and pains, for the most part. Today's the day to make your choice, for today. Tomorrow, rinse and repeat. One step at a time, one hour at a time, one minute at a time, one second at a time. Link to original post: https://www.quittrain.com/topic/29166-quitting-today/#findComment-540156

Sazerac Quit Date: October 23, 2013, A Good Day to be Free. Posted March 24, 2018 Deep in the archives, I found another gem from, our friend, Cristóbal Cristóbal's Quit Days % Some people are amazed that even though they may have several weeks or months quit, that they still do not feel completely "normal", and continue to miss smoking. When this happens, figure your "Quit Days %" and then you will see why. The way to calculate this is: Number of Years Smoked x 365 = Smoke Days. Number of Days Not Smoked = Quit Days. Then, Quit Days ÷ Smoke Days = "Quit Days %". --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I will go first, to be the first example. I smoked for about 30 years. 30 years x 365 = 10,950 Smoke Days. As of today, I have not smoked for 5 years, 2 months, 7 days. This period of times = 1904 Quit Days. Then, 1904 Quit Days ÷ 10,950 Smoke Days = 17.388%. This is my "Quit Days %". In other words, even at more than 5 years since my last cigarette, as of today I have been quit for only 17.388% of the total time I smoked. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Now, let us take as the second example, a smoker who smoked for 30 years, and has been quit for just 4 months. These 4 months might seem like a very long time to the ex-smoker, but it is nothing when compared to 30 years. This smoker who smoked for 30 years, has 30 years x 365 = 10,950 Smoke Days. Quit time of 4 months = 120 Quit Days. 120 Quit Days ÷ 10,950 Smoke Days = Quit Days % of just 1.096%, of the total time the smoker smoked. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Smoking had a deep impact on us physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. A lot of the physical damage can be repaired in a time period of about 10 years, but some of it can never be repaired - the damage is done !!! The mental, emotional, and spiritual damage can be repaired much quicker, since all of us at one time were never smokers. None of us started life with a cigarette in the mouth !!! We all know how to live life as non-smokers, we just need to remember how to do it again. And time is what is needed for that to happen. It is my experience working with others, that how quickly one becomes very comfortable in these 3 areas depends on the person and also their understanding of nicotine addiction. The more a person understands the process of separation from the active addiction, it seems to me the quicker the good comfort levels of being a non-smoker return. What is important to understand, is that the first year as a non-smoker will be spent confronting triggers, many of them that are seasonal. Once you arrive at your first year anniversary, most people can say that they are making very good progress adjusting to life as a non-smoker. Cristóbal Link to original post: https://www.quittrain.com/topic/10007-cristóbals quit-days/

DenaliBlues Quit Date: 2/10/2022 Posted February 27, 2022 I’m a newcomer pinging in to say hello. I’ve been lurking on the site for a while, but I set up a profile today so that I could participate. Thanks for the experiences and the compassionate, nonjudgmental encouragement shared here. Reading the info and comments has helped me through some white-knuckle moments. My last smoke was 17 days ago. It was not a planned quit. I was having oral surgery, and at midnight the night before I learned that smoking through the post-op was a really bad idea. (As if all the other harms of smoking for the last 40 years were somehow a really good idea?! Yeah, go figure.) Anyway, I slammed into this quit bass ackwards… unprepared mentally, emotionally or physically. I didn’t have any tools to hand, and hadn’t thought through how to be intentional to set myself up to succeed. Just boom. But I’m trying hard to make it work. There’s more than just a dental emergency at play. I want this quit and the suffering it entails to count for something. I’ve been ambivalent about smoking for some time, have been living in denial about the consequences, and have let smoking control my life for too long. Cold turkey was not an option for me, personally. (Did that before, didn’t stick.) So I’m using the patch on a step-down system. I’m constantly fiddling with silly putty. Trying to stay busy. Doing a lot of wall pushups. Attempting to stay positive. Getting a grip on my triggers. Making lists of alternative things to do in those moments. Re-reading the science. Doing more wall push-ups. I’m struggling with feelings of despair and intense physical discomfort as my body adjusts to a lot less nicotine. But this week, on average, was a bit easier than the last. So maybe that’s progress? I think addiction likes to hide in the dark. It feeds on shame and distortions, and whispers false justifications to us. So I guess part of why I am joining this QT community is to fend off those shadows by reaching out for reinforcement, to try to fill my brain with something different. I need to banish that voice from the dark that says nicotine is my best friend (it’s not) and says that I can’t exist without my smokes (I can, and I have 17 days of evidence to prove it). Today I am grateful for having your voices in my head, instead. You are helping me to rewire. Thanks for listening and bearing witness in return. DenaliBlues Link to original post: https://www.quittrain.com/topic/17632-newcomer-check-in/