Tobacco III

5 whole weeks have passed since I’ve finally taken myself up on actually making work of stopping to smoke.

It has been in the making for several years now, in that sense I’m not stupid, I know I shouldn’t. But the thing that prevented me from doing it, was lack of joy in quitting. I mean, need for/to, and logic alone is not good enough. For me. And I quite enjoy smoking, actually, and still do.

I enjoy it because I’m rewarding myself in that sense, every so often, I give myself a cigarette, it is a cheap, small and easy gift, poisonous none the less, but still. You can give yourself lots of them daily, relatively cheap, even now when governments have enormously increased the prices.

But in coming to gear-up to this deep dive I knew that this was one of the things I’d thought to at least try. And not some lame ass attempt, no -really- make an effort. And efforts like these take enormous preparation time for me. To change my life beforehand so, that there is nothing in the way of doing it. That nothing can intervene, because of self imposed limitations or external influences big or small. And in preparing as such, when something unplanned does occur (you know, life 😉 you do not have to forfeit, you just take the up or down as it comes, because your foundation is strong yet flexible (bamboo in quicksand comes to mind).

So here I am, not once have I strayed from the roster I set myself (as in, I have only deviated several minutes here or there, but the amount has not been increased (or decreased). Honoring my addiction, so when the time is there to smoke, you should really smoke, otherwise you’re making it so hard on yourself, you’re bound to fail. I cannot try and see whether I can stretch the time between cigarettes on a whim. Because the drawback/fallback will be high, and you’d have to start all over again. I’m not doing it to start over again. I’m doing it to succeed, so when it is time to smoke, I smoke, forcefully even. But the rest of the time I do not. And I don’t have to even. Sort of, more or less 🙂

And that is which is most remarkable. I’ve mentioned it in the sharing call yesterday. I should be -much- more agitated by it than I am. I smoked for 25 years ! Some 15-20 cigarettes per day, easy, and more on some days. And I would smoke whenever feeling uneasy, or uncertain, shy, emotional, cold, warm, after sex, before sex, after my single coffee in the morning, when there would be time to kill, when discussing with acquaintances. But I feel as if the preparation time, -and- the transmission of the genekeys, and all of it beforehand, has made my body&mind ready for it. We know what we are doing, we know what the deal is, and we anticipate the results.

But still (sure every roster change, makes a day or 2 of unease, and then I’m settling in it) I really really thought it would be much harder than this. Every time there is an unease I drink some water, and/or do a few push-ups, it is nothing really, but it really does help. Be with the unease, but honor it by seeing what you can do -with- it, instead of against it.
But also noticing, in full, that the unease of not smoking is much much smaller than when I -was- smoking (!!) I was much more nervous/unrestfull when I did smoke whenever and wherever, what an amazing contradiction. And since last monday, my nose opened up (eustachius tube), in I don’t know how many years (!) I can sleep with my mouth closed (!) Ok I do still snore… loudly and proudly 😉
And just going outside makes me instantly have a small cold, but that is minor/happy side effect.

Looking at the time and relaxing with the fact that it is ‘only’ 2.5 hours more before you can smoke again. So I’m not denying it totally, but not giving it myself neither when it is out of unease. The funny thing is, more and more when the time has come, I don’t really feel like it at that moment, because I’m doing something else. But as soon as I re-realize the time, I do honor the fact that I am addicted, and every 2 weeks the roster changes.

Starting to smoke every single hour for 2 weeks (to kick the habit itself of smoking whenever), and then every 2 hours for 2 weeks (which was nice in retrospect) it was fairly easy do-able. And then the big question, will I go for every 3 hours or will I double up, so every 4 hours. It took me some days to make up my mind, and finally chose every 4 hours because even though I want to honor my addiction, I also do want to quit, so have to make some effort in a relative short time, because it will take a while whichever I chose.

I have 2 packets of rolling tobacco left, which should see me easily through till next sunday when the roster changes. And not necessarily to 8 hours (I hear you think), because then another shift will take place, going from the act of smoking every xx hours, to taking ‘niquitin’ pills (2mg), with aspartame in it unfortunately (found out only after buying) but they do come highly recommended. So still debating in my head whether to stick with every 4 hours a pill or going to 8 hours.

I think day one of pill popping will tell me actually. Because the tobacco I smoke has 0,7mg per cigarette, so doing the math then every 8 hours 2mg would be good enough, but I have no idea of what quitting this third part of kicking it will bring (habit (light up when you want/feel like), addiction (nicotine and all the other garbage in it), and then there is the actual act of smoking))

Another thing I am changing, ever so slowly, is my diet. Recently I bought a 2nd hand magimix 3200 compact food processor (12 year engine guarantee (!)) and yesterday a 2nd hand Vita-mix blender. Tomorrow I go to a biological vegetable and fruit stand for the first time in my life, with recepies for fruit and green smoothies, but I’ll probably only start with fruity ones, because my taste buds overrule my healthy *uche* mind…