20 Years Plus A Day

I had my last cigarette on January 14, 2003.

I remember this because at the time I got paid on the 15th and 30th of each month.  I tied quitting to money as motivation.  January 15, 2003 was quit day.

Three weeks on the nicotine patch and the rest is history.  I had lived with smokers from birth and smoked actively for about 18 years, ramping up to a pack plus per day.  I had quit three times previously.  Twice for about 6 months or so, once for about 10 days.

The first quit was to please a girlfriend.  The second to win a bet.  The third was simply an attempt that followed a cold so severe that I hadn't smoked for three days.  None of these had a strong enough motivation to overcome the grip of addiction in the long term.

Money did it initially.  I realized just how much I was wasting and that the expense would have made it impossible to manage buying my house.  At current prices, I'd be spending around $5000 a year on cigarettes to feed my habit.  Motivation indeed.

I am fortunate in that I rarely have a craving but any time I imagine having a cigarette, all I have to do is remember the smell of the houses of smoking customers I used to deal with when I fixed phone lines.  I don't have a great sense of smell, but even the memory of that stench makes me want to hurl.

It's no longer much of a battle to keep the addiction at bay.  Most of the time I don't even think about it.  The recent kerfuffle about smoking inside in The Capitol Building in Washington D.C. reminded me that today was 20 years plus a day since quit day in 2003.    

If you smoke, quit.  Period.

Find your motivation, chew the gum, wear the patch, get away from smoking friends, change your smoker triggering behaviours and break the damned addiction.  

If you fail, DO IT AGAIN.

Here's to forgetting my 40th anniversary.