Grats GDA on making it to year 2!
I recently quit myself after having smoked for almost 10 years -- one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, but I already feel great. I was one of those people who was ashamed of my smoking -- my sifu knew I smoked and when he occasionally could smell it on my clothes or breath, he would give me hell and I would feel like I was letting him (and more importantly, myself) down.
Both of my parents smoked when I was younger, as did my brothers. There was a time in my teens when the whole family was smoking. My parents had quit for years and picked it back up -- it always worried me a bit that I would never be able to kick the habit because of something my mother told me. She had quit for a period of 7 years, and one night gave in and indulged herself. She said that it seemed to her like she had never quit, the cravings came back that fast, and it took her several years before she quit again.
I was the last one in my family to quit, and what it took for me was my mom going through breast cancer. She had a dual mastectomy and is a survivor, but going through that really hit me hard. My mother does have a genetic predisposition to cancer (her father passed away from it when she was 14) and who is to say how much her smoking was a factor in her own disease, but obviously something like that will make you reevaluate your choices and lifestyle. I wish I could have quit before going through a traumatic event like that, but I guess for me it took something life-changing to realize how short life can be and how I had taken my health for granted.
I feel grateful to have gotten over such an adictive habit, and I feel like mustering up the willpower and fighting the impulses have affected me positively in other areas of my life too -- I have decided to pursue my Master's degree again after years of putting it on hold and working in a career that has paid the bills but doesn't fulfill me mentally. Quitting smoking seems to have been a catalyst for me to address the other areas in my life that I was complacent in -- I'm eating better than ever, I go to the gym 5x a week faithfully, sleep has improved, and I even curtailed my social drinking which was close to getting out of hand too.
To anyone who is trying to quit and just hasn't been able to -- never give up and keep focused on the benefits of quitting -- heck, at the prices of smokes these days, it's just on a financial basis to justify not quitting. One thing I did which helped was to save a percentage of the money I would have spent on cigarettes and then use that to periodically reward myself with something fun -- in my case, I took a vacation to London. Other than the obvious health benefits, it is a psychological boost to have a reward like that for your "good behavior".
I will never look down on smokers anymore, as I think it's a bit hypocritical considering I once smoked like a fiend, but neither will I ever stop giving friends and family encouragement to quit.
*Wow, this was kind of a sappy post after re-reading it, sorry for the length too*
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