Post #460986 by Limbo Lizard on Thu, Jun 11, 2009 10:15 AM

I add my congratulations, Lucas - Bravo!

After reading over all the posts, I notice a number by people who have quit, then started back, or who constantly struggle against the "pull", and fear giving in. I thought I'd add this (long, sorry) post, about how my wife, Monica, did it - unsuccessfully, then successfully:

My wife quit smoking twice. She quit at 22, on sheer willpower. She still really missed cigarettes, years later, though. Then she started smoking again in her early thirties because she was miserable in her first marriage, anyway - sort of a my-life-sucks-so-who-cares-if-they kill-me attitude.
She got divorced, life was better, but she kept the habit. Then, she bought a book about quitting, from a book store clearance bin, read a little, then stuck it on the shelf. She kept flirting with it, but she was afraid to really read it. She thought she should quit, but didn't really want to - she LOVED smoking, and she didn't want the book to spoil something she enjoyed so much. Or, so she told herself.
Finally, she buckled down to finish it. The author advises you to keep smoking, while reading his book, and she did. Don't try to quit with willpower, or because you "know you should", he says. It usually doesn't work, and even if it does, you'll resent quitting, and always be a weak moment away from starting back. Well, by the time Monica was nearly finished with the book, she just up and quit. Bang. Didn't want to smoke anymore. Wanted to "divorce" smoking and send it packing, the filthy, lying, thieving bastard.
The book changes the way you look at smoking, by examining the psychology, the "lies" you tell yourself, the way nicotine deceives you. It deals with all the things you think you'll miss out on, your "pleasurable" daily rituals, if you stopped. Smoking a cigarette relaxes you, sure, but it's largely the nicotine withdrawal that creates the sense of anxiety in the first place! The author, Allen Carr, was a 4 pack/day smoker, himself.
Monica said reading the book was like having someone read her mind, and then lay out her thoughts about smoking in a way that made it impossible to ignore the absurdity, the contradictions, the self-deception. The author "personifies" the habit of smoking, and you end up seeing it differently - as a tricky two-faced deceiver, playing you for a chump, acting friendly and supportive to your face, then laughing behind your back.
Anyway, she quit in September, 2001 (2 months before we married), and she says this time, she never craves cigarettes, never misses them, even when drinking and socializing with a bunch of smokers. In fact, she has shared a cigar with me (I smoke