Trying to Quit the cigs HELP NEEDED!!

Thank you for all the support & ideas. I am hoping they can help me keep a good attitude too cuz I get to fight the food battle again. I am only 5 2 & over the last year put back on 50 of the pounds I had lost. So I have to get them off & then figure out how to keep them off. When you quit smoking, she is right in that you shouldn't worry about weight. If you can stop smoking, you can do anything. & We all know you can!!! Best wishes.

One more thing that helped me, when I had a craving, I would say to myself, I'll smoke tomorrow. I'll make it through today and if I want to smoke tomorrow, I will. Then tomorrow would come and it would be "today." And I'd start over. lol

Kara

After 20 years of smoking, I quit on 3/10/06.
Here's what I felt made it a success:
1. I planned for it for about 3 months prior. I was very mentally prepared by the time my quit date came.
2. I had a phone counselor. (I lived in NJ at the time and they offer free phone counseling - paid for by anti-cigarette company lawsuit money).
3. I used the nicotine lozenges when I felt a craving, but no patch. I also carried around a tin of cinnamon Altoids and popped one when I had a craving. Oddly, they did help a lot.
4. I used an anti-depressent, but not Zyban (which is actually Wellbrutrin), because I had really bad side effects from that. I basically believe that any antidepressant will do.
5. But the most important thing of all for me was the following website: www.quitsmokingonline.com. It's a 10-day course on how to quit, which is totally free. The button to go to the course is wayyyyy at the bottom of the first page. It really helped me to re-examine my thoughts about smoking and what it would be like to be a non-smoker again (for exp, would I really not enjoy myself ever again?).

I wish there was a "magic pill" to help people quit. But frankly, I believe that most of the work of quitting is purely mental. Every smoker I know who has relied on Chantyx or the patch or hypnosis or acupuncture or whatever, has gone back to smoking. Because mentally, they were still smokers. That's my two cents worth, anyway.

Good luck! You can do it.

Thanks again for all the support you really are a great bunch of sisters especially for an only child!LOL

Well here I am one week into the battle and things haven't gone too badly all things considered. I quit last friday at 3:00pm and I can't say it has been easy, but it has been do-able. I did have a laps on thursday evening and I felt awful afterwards. I smoked one ciggy but in the bigger picture, that's a lot better than the 140ish that would have been my usual weeks intake. This seems to be my "crunch time" especially since DH is home and he smokes also.

m0hii01 have to say that your tips have been particularly helpful, am eating healthier than usual and my bowels are loving it. I'm a regular first thing in the morning girl and this time that hasn't changed. YEAH!! This has been a great help with my early morning habit breaking. Drinking lots of water has helped but it's making me run to the loo at night. So we can't have everything EH?

Bookworm 50, I didn't think about trying to get the dates extended that sounds like a great idea. Cyprus is absolutely beautiful we were in the southern end of the island which is Greek Cipriot and the welcome and hospitality the Greek Cipriots extended to us was amazing. I would recommend it to anyone.

Well I'll end now but will check in again after the weekend and let you know things are.

Lilly68 U R NEXT! U CAN U CAN U CAN U HAVE> I know you can succeed.
My sincere thanks and best wishes to all

HUGS N STUFF
sally n mutts

I'm in the same boat and am hoping that not smoking the day before the surgery will start me on my way. Tuesday I won't want to smoke, probably not Wednesday either. So with the having to get up to go outside to smoke at home, I'm sure that will discourage me too. So I'm hoping that this will be the beginning of the end of smoking for me also.

Dearest Luckymutt and all the other sisters who are trying to quit,
You are doing great! Figure out what is working for you and what is not, and repeat the good stuff. What was the trigger that caused you to lapse on Thursday? If you can identify the trigger, see if you can figure out what to do if you experience the same situation again. In some cases, it is really predictable, like a cigarette with a drink, or for many people, a cup of coffee. Then, avoid those triggers like crazy. Change the circumstances, like if the trigger was an after dinner cigarette, do something else immediately after dinner, like take a walk, or move to a different room. One sister who I know had a problem with smoking in the car as she drove...it was the most automatic thing that she did, start the car and light up. She identified the trigger as starting the car, and found that she could use baby carrots as a substitute. She found that they gave her the satisfaction of holding something like a cigarette without the damage. She ate a lot of carrots for the first week or two, but she managed to break that particular trigger. It is also absolutely essential to look at a lapse as just a little slip, and go back to not smoking (not today, not ever) rather than a rationalization to just start back up at the same rate as before. It is not a failure, it is just a small lapse, and you are smart and strong enough to figure it out and avoid the situation when it happens again. For us right now, the stress triggers are probably the hardest...I find myself snapping at my DH for the stupidest things, but they are bothering me because I am getting really close to surgery and am wacky scared. Also we are without power right now due to the massive ice storms in the US midwest, and that is not helping. So I am totally supportive of anything that you can figure out to break the stress that does not involve addictive substances like nicotine. Use whatever works...exercise, reading, music, conversation with a friend who is supportive, a hot bath, shopping, eating healthy, ...or whatever works for you. Massive hugs to everyone.