Taking the Leap

If you have read my blog before, you may have seen a couple of posts I did back in the beginning of January this year.  In these posts I was talking about the fact that I had decided to cut down smoking over the Christmas/New Year period and was trying to continue.

Well fast forward three and a half months and the state of play is a little different.  The cut down didn't work.  I did try and kept up with it for a couple of weeks after I had done the posts, but my heart wasn't really in it.  I found that I was getting stressed out by counting the number of cigarettes I was "allowed" each day in which turn just made me want to smoke more.

Back on my 20 a day habit again I soon realised that "cutting down" doesn't achieve anything.  What does achieve something is quitting completely.   I have been smoking since the age 14, nearly 20 years and over that period I have occasionally toyed with the idea of quitting, but have never carried it through.

The cutting down experiment had made me wonder if I could actually quit.  If I had the willpower to do it.  The added price on cigarettes was another factor.  The fact that I was spending around £180.00 a month on cigarettes was something I could no longer ignore.

So last Monday night I decided.  I would have a go and attempt to quit.  I decided "cold turkey" was the best approach for me.  I knew that it would be harder that way but I would rather speed up the process rather than dragging it out. 

Being honest now, if I was a betting person, I wouldn't have bet on myself.  I am not the best at willpower, especially with something I want.  My mum has even confessed that she didn't think I would make it.  Cheers for that!

The first two days were horrible. Climbing the walls, emotional wreck stuff.  Luckily for me, someone I talk to on Twitter told me about a book written by Allen Carr (not the comedian) called "Easy way to Stop Smoking".  I was dubious to say the least but at that point would have given anything a try.

The next day, the book arrived, was quickly read and amazingly, worked!  Now I'm not saying that you immediately stop all cravings and are feeling bright as a daisy, but damn close.  The book deals with the psychological addiction you have to cigarettes and explains everything in such a way that you don't have the need to smoke anymore.

I am now on Day 8.  I haven't smoked and after reading the book, I know I never will again.

So if you are thinking about quitting, buy the book.  He claims to have a 90% success and before reading, I was convinced that I would be in that 10% that it didn't work on.  Let's face it, you can pick up the book for less than the price of a packet of cigarettes these days so you have nothing to lose, and everything to gain.