The River Green

It wasn't just any ordinary anniversary. No, such a monumental undertaking would not be conceivable on any other anniversary and no gift to each other more appropriate. 14 July 2009- our 10th anniversary. I had smoked for 7 years before we became something worth celebrating.

My childhood was spent in a virtual haze of smoke; I remember always having been sensitive to the smell when my parents would smoke and it would waft into my bedroom as I was trying to sleep (even up to today, the sensitivity is present). Despite that fact, I began smoking not out of peer pressure, since none of my friends smoked, but, I think, out of longing. Having so much smoke around me at home made me an addict without my consent or knowlege. This unhappy realization came via a close friend, who noticed an ongoing short fuse, which he likened to what his mother felt after she quit smoking just the previous year. At first, I took the news quite well, but later I began thinking and for the next several months, I became acutely aware that he was correct.

Not long after my 16th birthday, I began working at a place where everyone smoked everywhere and my mood was becoming unbearable, even for myself. On the way home one random spring night, I stopped for gas (which was $0.99 per gallon at the time) and purchased my first pack of cigarettes (which was about $1.29 a pack at the time). They were Marlboro reds, because that's what I saw everyone else smoking at my workplace and figured it was the best place to start. I justified starting the habit by focusing on my mood swings and general anxiety when I left the house compared to the near calm while at home. Reason told me that it was just until I went off to college, or got a place of my own or a new job or whatever- basically I wasn't going to be smoking for long. In the beginning I had maybe three total all day long. As life began to pile more crap on my shoulders, it gradually became a half pack a day. I held at this level for maybe a year or two. For various reasons, the habit shot up to a pack a day and eventually grew into a slightly more than a pack-a-day habit with bouts of chain smoking and periods of relative smokeless days in between.

During our time together, Marieke and I had made empty resolutions to quit, usually at the beginning of the year, usually forgotten by Marieke's birthday- less than a month later. None came to fruition or had been given serious thought.

Late last year, we finally decided that instead of saying that we were going to quit 'on' New Year's Day, that we would quit 'in' the new year. We promised ourselves the time to think about quitting and actually consider it. We loosely decided that we would quit a week after Marieke's family went back home. As motivation, we made a list of things we could do with all the money we would save by not having to constantly feed our habit.

That was in May.

But we weren't ready. Then our close friend quit. We still weren't ready. In late June, we went to the store for groceries and reminded ourselves that we needed smokes. I said 'smokes or patches?' A comment that was meant with a glare.

We asked the clerk to fetch us a carton and Marieke surprised me with 'This will be our last carton.' It came as a shock, more so that she was actually committing to a time frame of some sort to quit.

After that carton was finished, we still weren't quite there as far as quitting, so we continued to buy single packs. Finally, after much debate, we decided that we would quit on the date of our anniversary and that it would be a gift to each other.

14 July fell on a Tuesday, a day we both worked. Before dinner, we ran some errands, including getting the patch. Not ever wanting to jump into something without looking first, we enlisted the help of a pharmacist at Target named Nicole. She explained the process and gave us some pointers. With box in hand, we headed to the candy aisle and stocked up on Swedish Fish, peppermint Life Savers, Twizzlers, gum, almonds, peanuts and gummy bears.

Dinner at the new Asian buffet just down the street from us was amazing. In the parking lot, while having our post-dinner smoke (which would become our second-to-last), I read the instructions for the patch. It said that we should clean out all the ashtrays, packs, garbage and butts out of everywhere we smoked and throw/put them all away. We started on the car ashtray and garbage. When we got home, those went as well. At 9:56pm, we sat ourselves down on the porch and lit up our last cigarette.

At around 10pm, we put each other's patch on after giving each other a preemptive group of apologies for what may come.

We then proceeded to eat nearly every snack we bought. Our teeth were aching by the end of the day. I tried to sleep the night, but the dog woke me up and I had to spend the next 9 hours awake, facing my cravings and desires to smoke, alone and in the dark.

I found that inserting a straw into the little hole in the peppermint Life Saver and then putting the whole thing in my mouth helped ease the initial shock of not having a cigarette in my hand.

The patch is a little itchy, but bearable. I have a tightness in my chest that feels like a giant cushion is resting square in the center of my torso. My heart is pounding and beating a bit fast. I've tried three times to go to bed, but each time I lay down, my head begins to ache.

I coughed for the first time since my last cigarette and the pain in my head was exquisite and emphasized itself with each heave. My nose hasn't stopped running since putting the patch on and I've sneezed fourteen times.

The withdrawal is intolerable. I am not tolerating it, I am wading through it at nose hight.

This is not something that I ever intend on putting myself through ever again. Therefore, as of this date, I am a non-smoker. That will never change.

Labels: I Quit Smoking