Thursday, September 07, 2006
Beware the flying crockery...
So, I've decided to stop smoking....This is my third attempt.
1) For my first attempt, I used the Allen Carr book. This is very good. I stopped for about 4 months by using this book. There's no sensationalist "you will die" talk, no being told off like yer gran does. Just very plain simple stuff. It was very good for understanding how addiction works - most smokers think they know, but don't actually.
2) Nicotine patches. Don't. Just don't. They are absolutely vile. I spent most of the time I used them feeling slightly toxic, I had missing bits of skin every time I removed a patch before going to bed, and I had the most disturbing waking dreams for the a large part of the treatment. You could argue that the horribleness of the nicotine patches is an incentive to stay stopped, but as I stopped smoking for 3 months using nicotine patches, I would suggest that if you're going to use a method that might fail at the end anyway, use the Allen Carr book (which explains in great detail why nicotine replacement doesn't generally work).
3) My last cigarette was Sunday night I think. I realised that I'd spent a lot of time analysing what smoking was about for me - about prayer, about addiction, about death, and so on. But in the end I realised that I probably just needed to stop analysing it and finish it. The analysing was hindering, not helping. Plus I didn't want to smoke past the age of 35 (I will be 36 in 2 months time, and have a Wish List with Amazon.co.uk, thank you for asking).
So that's it - I've dealt with it so far by just distracting myself - change the subject in my head, if I find myself thinking about it. Just think about something else. Although blogging about it probably won't help, so far I've found distraction by far the easiest method. A combination of distraction, and hurling objects at annoying people.
By the way, for those of you who are in regular contact with me, as part of my distraction programme, please try to avoid the "oh your doing so well" routine. Or any kind of "how's it going?" talk. It just makes me groan, and such talk will just make me think about fags again. You may mean well, but it's ultimately unhelpful.
I'm sure I may well have another fag one day, but I'd like to avoid the 10-a-day habit of the past 5 years. And if anyone else is reading this and thinking of stopping, the only thing I would say is: don't take my advice too seriously. Everyone has different reasons for starting, stopping, and continuing. You need to find the right method for you, and stopping usually takes a few goes.
Good luck.
