Snotgurgle

I have a coworker who is a smoker. Occasionally she'll ask me if I still haven't broken down and smoked a cigarette. When I tell her "yep" (it's true), she says, "Why, you little sh*t!"

I know she's saying it playfully, and my reaction isn't really smug. I always add something about it being rough, etc.

She wishes she could quit, and has tried many times. I'm not judging her for it, because I'm still amazed that I was able to free myself from the lash, and stay so for this long. I remember she briskly walked through the office, announcing, "I'm gonna quit smoking! I've got the patches and everything!"

Of course within 3 or 4 days, she was right back to puffin' GPC's on her breaks.

She started smoking at an earlier age than me, and she's a grandmother in her early 50's.

I don't know, but I imagine there is not much motivation to quit at that point in life. Alot of people take the opportunity of having to quit when they're pregnant. The expectant father may take the opportunity as well, despite not having the direct imperative. It's almost like having someone with whom to make a pact.

Many resume at some point - even years - after the child is born. Others try to muster the motivation again when they become grandparents.

Well, this women has had 4 kids. Now 2 of those kids have kids of their own. One of those kids is coming of age, and will probably fall in the grand tradition of getting knocked up at around 17.

Maybe she'll muster the strength when she becomes a great grandmother before she turns 60.

But until then (getting to the real reason I logged in to type this entry), I will have to suffer the effects of hearing her cough.

I'm talking about a certain kind of cough, here. Not the loud, intense, violent hacking fits where you think the person is going to choke and die. We (ex)smokers have all had plenty of those. There are actually a few different classifications of coughs I hear from her lungs, but the one I'm focused on is like an almost-cough. It's not always that tickle in the throat, triggering a hacking fit. Sometimes...well really often actually...there is just a rising of phlegm in the throat. I can hear it.

If it was a dude, and it was outdoors or something, he would just hock up a big-ass wad of phlegm and spit a loogie with a loud, self-satisfying whhhh-thoop! But this is a woman in the workplace. So she does this kind of half-cough. I can clearly hear the phlegm gurgle in her throat. I can feel it gurgling in her throat. And then I experience a gag reflex. And it happens so regularly that when it's not happening, I occasionally just remember hearing it, and gag.

Ugh. But, see, I myself used to be a perpetual phlegm generator. I coughed all the time, and had plenty of mucus of my own to eject.

So, although I cringe and gag whenever I hear phlegm gurgling in this woman's throat every day, it is an effective reminder. It makes me roll my eyes, close them, and acknowledge to myself just how f'ing good it is to be free of smoking, however long my abstinence endures.

1 Year Anniversary!

Yesterday marks the end of the first year I have gone without taking a single puff off of a cigarette.*

Pretty amazing.

Equally amazing is that I still had a craving yesterday.

I'm convinced that I'll never be safely free from it's grasp. A lapse in vigilance could lead to an instant slip back in the giant ashtray.



* 7.5 months free of nicotine replacement products

I should be able to do ANYTHING now, Part 1

During my smokerdom (smokerhood? smokership?), at many points I thought about things I thought I should be doing to improve myself. Two examples are exercising (specifically swimming) and wearing contact lenses again.

I am far from being obese. Just a bit flabby. I would say I have a "beer belly," (although I've hardly drank any beer for the last few years), "love handles," and a "hank" (the fat under the chin).

A lot of excuses led back to smoking. I didn't have the lung capacity to endure a lot of physical exercise. Swimming seemed to me to be the ideal cardiovascular workout, because you seem to use most of the muscles in your body and there is no hard impact on your bones and joints like there is in running, for example. A big part of being able to swim is to deal with the breathing limitations. It's difficult to breathe during physical exercise, and one has to concentrate to develop some sort of new breathing pattern that is in harmony with the movement. Swimming restricts the breathing even more so, since at many points in each movement the mouth and nostrils may be submerged in water, or are about to be, or at least being splashed.

I used to wear contact lenses, but over time, I weaned off of them until I wore glasses full time.

My vision is so poor that I don't qualify for the reportedly comfortable soft lenses. I was prescribed rigid gas-permeable lenses. These are smaller than the iris.

When my eyes dried up, which was often, the lens would slip off the iris and lodge itself in the corner of my eye. These tiny, concave discs would stick in areas of the eye that are flatter than the curvature of the iris, allowing the sharp edges of the lens to iritate the whites and corners of my eyes.

Painful and disorientating and therefore dangerous, as this always seemed to happen while I was driving.

This worsened as my smoking increased in frequency. In order to smoke while I drive, I had to have the windows down. Smoke and wind drying up the eyes.

Even worse, I was going to bars more often. In those days, smoking was allowed. My eyes didn't stand a chance.

My god, right now it's so difficult to imagine hanging out in a place so filled with so much smoke, and enjoy myself. Honestly, even as a chain smoking feind, I was glad when they banned smoking in bars. It's so much better to smoke in a ventilated area. I'm sure for people who live in areas where it get rains a lot, or actually snows, it might have been difficult...

Anyway, the contact lenses spent more and more time in their sensory deprivation chambers. Soon enough, they were abandoned for good, as I upgraded to more sturdy frames for my incredibly thick glasses.

I haven't posted in a while, but I feel like I would just be posting the same content as my previous entry.

The cravings are still happening. It's almost like a resurgance. It's just part of the evil plan. "You're treating with the Devil."

This would be easier to understand if I had cheated at some recent point; snuck in a cig' here, bummed a drag there. But I haven't. No nicotine in any form.

A quitter just has to keep the guard up at all times...for the remainder of life, apparently.

Still Craving!

After 5 months I still get cravings. F**king still.

A couple times a week, I'll feel an overwhelming urge to grit my teeth and smash something, during which I realize that I'm having a craving for nicotine.

A few days ago, while waiting for my lunch, I had the gnarliest craving I've had in months.

Back when I was smoking (heh), I was in the routine of clocking out for lunch and going to the roach coach to order my food. Then I would light up and be able to smoke about half the cig' before my food was ready.

To be outside was to be able to smoke. Therefore, waiting until after I ordered the food put a teasing delay on my noon nicotine. Normally I would light up as soon as daylight hit my head.

So it was there, right after ordering my food, as I still do every week day, that this craving belted me.

All I can do is inhale deeeeeeep lungs-full of air, exhale....inhale, long and deep...exhale; feeling a reminder of the improvement in my lung capacity.

The Joys of Not Smoking: Jury Duty

Well, that's not quite right. There aren't so much joys of not-smoking. There's no joy in not smoking itself.

Joy can only be derived from not smoking in contrast to smoking; or rather being a smoker.

Now, during the quitting process, not smoking is actually excruciatingly painful, while smoking is the only and direct relief from that agony. The rewards of quitting smoking are very slow in creeping in, after months of anguish, in direct opposition to the immediate rush of relief when that first suck of smoke hits the lungs.

In this period* of abstinence from smoking, I've found myself in a few situations that really make me really appreciate the fact that I quit**. I've got to savor those feeling and ingrain them, because these are some of the things that will strengthen my mind in preventing relapse.

One shining example was...jury duty.

I had jury duty recently. Although it was nice to not be at my usual dead end day job, I was lucky to only have to actually show up to the court house for one day.

My assigned courthouse was in a community where even the rat holes have burglar bars. It is a 13 storey building, with 5 out of 6 very slow elevators operational. The stairs are off limits except in emergencies, and the user does not determine what constitutes an emergency. If a stairwell is entered, there is immediate, armed response.

It's not too bad at 7:30am, but after about 2 hours, the place is packed with all kinds people, none of whom are happy to be there. Many are expressing this, and may look at you as if you are responsible.

All of these people cram in the hot elevator waiting room, waiting for one of the tortoise-drawn elevators to return from it's journey around the sun. You've got power suited lawyers; drunk/stoned, tattood gangsters; entire families bawling post-verdict; police; junkies/tweakers; average joes, etc, etc, all trying to cram in this room to get on the next elevator. Since they seem to arrive so few and far between, it is necessary to pack bodies in to each car like sardines.

Needless to say, it is something anyone can die happy without having experienced.

Now, what about smoking? Well, if you want to smoke you have to go outside. Like on the balcony? The roof? What, no smokers' lounge? Nope. The only way is to deal with the elevator situation.

I can't imagine having to deal with that every time I needed a smoke. And I constantly needed a smoke. Well, actually I can imagine it. It just would have been torture, all day long. I would either be sitting in there jonesing like hell, dreading the attendant tribulation of the elevator journey. Or actually enduring it. After finally being down and outside to smoke, with all the nice folks hanging out there; by the time I got back up to the waiting room, it will have taken so much time I will be ready for another cigarette.

As I pondered, remembered and imagined all of this, the waiting room at jury duty surpassed comfortable and approached the luxurious.

--
* By this period, I refer to a time where the agony of withdrawel has subsided to a tolerable level, but I don't yet necessarily feel entirely invulnerable to relapse.

** I feel the need to clarify that when I claim to have quit nicotine, I say so with the understanding that I will be on a slippery slope for the remainder of my life. Just as an alcoholic is eternally addicted to booze, I am in danger of reverting back immediately and deeply into smoking at any time.

Update

I'm still going strong.

I'm still not taking nicotine in any form.

Go me!