Backsliding, how do you do?

No news is good news, right?  I wish that were the case.  The past month or two has been an incremental backslide of smoking, where one bummed cigarette on a night out has led me to purchase packs again.  I'm not really smoking during the day and am not back to my old habits entirely, but this slippery slope is apparent. 

I've struggled with writing this post for a host of reasons.  Obviously, it's difficult to expose your failures to others, and I'm upset to have disappointed the people that have offered so much support and encouragement to me over the past few months.  I wanted to be able to offer a sincere, reinvigorated effort at the end of the post, and I'm not quite sure I'll be able to. 

A lot of people I've spoken with throughout this process have emphasized not to beat myself up if I smoke, that it takes time for the new reality of not smoking to really sink in and the occasional cigarette is bound to happen.  Don't lose site of the goal.  Keep at it.  I'm not really certain this is best for me.  I don't think I can have just one cigarette, as just the one has become two packs in the past week and change.  Slowly but surely, I've reintroduced the nicotine in my system and now my body craves it again.  I purposefully left my pack at home today and have been experiencing withdrawal symptoms throughout the day.  I craved one on my walk to work; at 10:30am I got the itch; I'm craving one at this very moment since I've got a belly full of lunch.  That first cigarette I smoked in late December didn't bring me back to the withdrawal feelings in my "Day 2" post right away, but it certainly set me on the path I'm currently treading.  A "slip up" needs to be more than just such.  I was raised Catholic; I think maybe I need a good beating.

Recently, I saw an old friend with whom I used to chain-smoke during a certain period of our lives.   He quit cold turkey about five years ago and hasn't looked back.  He mentioned to me how personal smoking was to him, and when he quit he took pretty much the opposite route as I have and didn't tell anyone he was quitting until he had essentially quit.  Considering this has opened my eyes to another reason why this post has been so difficult to approach- a lot of my reasons for backsliding are really personal, emotional issues that I'm not entirely comfortable exposing to the world wide web.  So, we'll stick to generalities for now.

Well, how did I get here?

Sometime in mid-January, I stopped caring.  I was angry at myself and with someone else in my life, and I used that experience as a diversion from the smoking goal.  I used smoking as a coping mechanism for the anger and the pain I was feeling.  I used the confidence and reassurance smoking gives me to move on from the issue.  I do feel like I am over the hump and on my way to a more emotionally healthy place, but have become addicted again in the process.  My motivations to quit have waned, and now it feels like the cigarettes are a load-bearing pillar in my efforts towards emotional health.  The "smoking as healing" thing is a farce; it has to be.  Otherwise, smoking is just given more power, and I know that this is baseline- an addiction.  However, I'm having a hard time mustering up the commitment I had before.  I feel crummy, but all this pitiful self-doubt just makes me want to smoke more.  Wah.

It appears I am stuck, but it's up to me and me alone to un-stick myself. 

Baby Steps

I suppose it would have been pretty naive of me to have thought my 8 point plan wouldn't need amending at some point.  The intensity of my commitment has definitely waned over the past month, and my cigarette count since Nov. 5 is now up to 8.  Yikes.  Two were accounted for in my last post, five were over the course of the long weekend a few weeks back, and the other was on my way home from a concert earlier this week.  All were reliant upon the kindness of strangers.  To keep things in perspective and also make myself feel a little better, let's do some math.  Based on my previous rate of smoking (4 packs a week), since I quit on Nov. 5, there are 1,000 cigarettes that I haven't smoked.  WOW.  1,000!  That's nuts.  That does actually make me feel quite a bit better :)

Even so, I need to reinvigorate myself in this endeavor.  My incentives and disincentives aren't really working anymore.  I'm not blogging with any regularity.  I don't take any breaks at work.  I seem to think I can smoke casually; I can't.  At this rate, it's really only a matter of time before I start buying my own packs again.  I want to smoke right now.  And life has honestly been kind of shitty so far this year, so I don't feel strongly that I have any good reason to not smoke.  (Of course, that voice is just a sad justification.  I have plenty of great reasons to not smoke, and the success that I have had in quitting should be a huge source of pride in myself.)

SO, a few amendments.  When I came up with the plan, the disincentive was my favorite part.  In light of my slip ups though, I really just cannot bring myself to give more money to the AFA.  Screw the plan and my own small battle with smoking.  It's absolutely not worth it to financially support an organization who makes people battle for basic civic rights, acceptance and understanding.  The fight for equality is more important than my plan.  Also, you think I have $120 just lying around?  Please.  Instead of a disincentive punishment when I do smoke, let's allow me to make up the $40 I've already relinquished to hate.  Let's set some smaller goals.  If I make it through this weekend without smoking, I give $5 to Atticus Circle, a non-profit I just came across based out of Austin that educates and mobilizes straight people to advance equal rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) partners, parents, and their children.  It's perfectly applicable to me.  It's Texan.  It's named after Atticus Finch.  Perfect.

To better enable this, I'm going to start carrying the nicotine gum around again.  If Monday rolls around and I haven't smoked, I'll pick another charity and donate another $5 if/when I make it to next Friday.  If Monday rolls around and I have smoked, I'll shoot to not smoke until Friday and donate to Atticus Circle then. 

I feel good.  I feel great.  I feel wonderful.

Happy Friday, y'all.  Go Niners!