So, I'll begin this post by saying that it's now been 19 days, and I'm not smoking. I'm beginning to feel almost comfortable in my quit. Breathing is much easier, though I still get winded easily with exertion. And I cough much, much less. I am still wearing the Step One nicotine patch, which contains 21 mg. of nicotine. I take it off when I get into bed to prevent the difficulty sleeping and the vivid dreams and nightmares I've experienced in past attempts when I tried to sleep with the patch in place. I do not feel desperate for a cigarette when I awake in the morning, although when I smoked, that was a big deal for me. So...small victories.
Back to my diagnosis of COPD. I would say that for the first year after that pulmonary function test (and a sobering follow-up appointment with my MD), I decided that a little shortness of breath didn't warrant such a major life change as quitting smoking entailed. That approach is what I refer to as "Clepatra-Queen of de Nial."
A few months later, my coworker at Schwab suffered a heart attack following one of our smoke breaks at work. It was a frightening and sobering experience. Because of a family history of heart disease, he knew what it was when it began, and came into my office for help, leaving his client sitting stunned in his office. I closed my office door and called 911. He sat across from me, sweating, struggling for breath, and trying stay conscious. At his request, I ran around desperately to nearby offices looking for an aspirin (which I never found--nobody has them anymore) and watching for the help that seemed to take forever to arrive. After about 20 minutes, he was whisked away to the emergency room and immediately into surgery. I stayed behind to close the office and notify his family and our off-site manager of the situation, and then went to the hospital to check on his condition before going home. I spent the rest of the afternoon on a float in my pool, shocked and unable to process the days events. Smoking,of course.
I really didn't think much more about the COPD diagnosis, but when I did, I got angry. I didn't want to think about it.
In the winter of 2003, I got a cold. As it progressed and got worse, my breathing became more and more labored. One evening I was laying in bed with my laptop, chatting online with a good friend, a teacher in Miami. I told her about the trouble I was having. It felt as if I had a pillow in my throat, and no air could pass it. I was terrified. She insisted I sign off and call an ambulance. I knew it was probably a practical suggestion, but the very idea terrified me even more. I did sign off, but instead of calling an ambulance, I called a local friend and asked him to please come over. When he arrived, I gave him a bag I had prepared with all of my remaining cigarettes (still cloves) and all of the ashtrays and lighters I owned. I asked him to dispose of them for me. I was done. Just like when I was a little Catholic girl growing up and I would get sick and make a bargain with God--please, if you'll just let me get well, I promise you I will become a nun--this time the bargain was with reality. Please, if this breathing crisis will just pass without a trip to the hospital, I will never smoke again!
I never became a nun. And although I did quit smoking that day, it wouldn't be the last time.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Monday, January 3, 2011
Life Choices and Changes
I'll try to keep a blog as a means of journaling my experience of smoking cessation for the gazillionth and final time. This is for you, Jeff, and for me, so I can measure my progress and keep track of the healing.
This journey began 44 years ago when I was sitting in a car in the school parking lot with my group of girlfriends. We were all seniors in a Catholic high school, and playfully rebellious. It was near the end of the school year, 1967, springtime in Fort Worth, Texas, and we were about to be forever free of the ties that had bound us to that strict but excellent institution. No more uniforms. No more nuns. No more attending classes in "A" hall where no males were allowed. (They were in "C" hall. "B" hall was where the "mixed" classes met-labs, art, science. It was all very hormonal.) I thought we were cool. One of the girls offered me a cigarette. My mom was a smoker. I'd never really thought about it, but the thrill of trying something that might be forbidden but wasn't illegal was exciting to me, because I was 17, like I said. So I took it. I lit it. I choked. But I thought I was cool.
What I really was, in very short order, was addicted.
I smoked a lot. Every day. Never thought about quitting. At least not for 10 years or so. I married 3 years after graduating. I had attended college for two years, and had worked as a flight attendant. Lots of people smoked. People on airplanes, even. Only when the "no-smoking" light went off, which was after take-off and prior to landing. Call me an original terrorist. My weapon, though I never knew it was one then, was legally taken on board, and joined all the others who also indulged. It was 1969.
When I met my husband, I thought he was a smoker because he smoked. It wasn't until we'd been together for quite a while that I realized he wasn't a smoker--at least not like I was--because he never actually bought cigarettes. He bummed them. He bummed mine. Back then, they were so cheap, who cared? I didn't. And since he wasn't an addict, he didn't either. We married in September, 1970.
When I was pregnant with my first son in 1972, I asked my Ob-Gyn if I should quit. He said that while it was always good to consider quitting, maybe pregnancy wasn't the best time to try. That was just what I wanted to hear. And it's just what I did. I did the same in 1974 when my second son was born, and again in 1978 when my daughter came. I breastfed the kids, often with a cigarette in my mouth. I did everything while smoking, because while I was awake, I was smoking.
I made my first attempt to quit in probably the '80's. My husband really wanted me to quit. It wasn't fashionable anymore, and I'm sure he was just tired of it. I know the kids were. They were starting classes in the schools teaching my kids about the dangers of smoking. I was glad they were. I didn't want the kids to start. I knew it would be next to impossible for me to quit.
But I went to an organized program called "Smokenders." As I recall, it was a good program. And I did quit. They had a graduation ceremony, and my family was proud to come and watch me matriculate. My instructor approached me about teaching my own groups of Smokenders. I just remember that when he did, I was already thinking about smoking again. That quit probably only lasted a couple of weeks. At first I'd just smoke in secret in the basement, when I went down to do the laundry. I'm sure the stink probably permeated the entire house, but at the time I didn't think so. And I didn't try to hide it for long anyway. I don't know how many cigarettes I smoked a day back then. No one ever asked that question, and I never thought about it. It was a lot, I'm sure.
I returned to college in 1984 and got my degree in 1987. At first I worked part-time as a tour guide in the public relations office of the local airport. It was a great, fun job, and allowed me to be at home when the kids were out of school. In January, 1990, I began working full time as a stock broker with Charles Schwab. I really liked the work. In 1991 I moved from work at the call center to their downtown Indianapolis office. It was a blast down there. I loved the work, the clients, and my coworkers. One of them was a woman a few years my senior, a widow, mother of 3, who regularly ran for exersize. In 1992, I quit smoking for real, and when I put on about 20 pounds and complained about it, she suggested I try running. I laughed. I have never been an athlete. Any exertion like running, playing tennis, ice or roller skating, and I damage an ankle. It's been the case since I was a kid. So, she said, try walking. Well, I figured, I could do that. It was spring. I began getting up early so I could take a walk before showering for work. I started with 15 minutes a day, eventually working up to an hour, and I loved it. I did it 5 or 6 days a week. After a year of that, and using the gym that was offered in my office tower, my running coworker suggested I try the upcoming mini-marathon. So I did. I remember seeing the applications and thinking "I can't do that. I'm not an athlete." And then I realized I was an athlete of sorts--at least for me. So I filled it out, and I was entered.
I finished the first mini near the end of the pack. I wasn't the fastest walker in the group, but it felt wonderful. And I made it a habit. My marriage was under stress at the time. The kids were leaving home, and my husband and I weren't connecting anymore. Walking was my salvation, my solitary time, my feel-good time. I did the mini again and again, five years in all. I made it through a separation, another attempt to make the marriage work, and eventually a divorce in 1995 without ever considering smoking again. It was an emotional time, a difficult time, and a time of great sadness, but smoking never seemed like the answer.
In 1997 Schwab was expanding, and planned to open an office in southern Indiana, in Evansville. I had wanted to manage my own branch, but hadn't really made any career moves to assure myself of the opportunity until then. So, when it was suggested to me that perhaps offering to open the new branch in Evansville might be an opportunity to do that, I decided to take it. I knew it would take time, but I was on my own at the time and thought it was time to stretch myself and learn some new skills.
I moved to Evansville in July of '97, and for about the first year, I did great. I had, however, set the stage for my own failure by then. I had become involved in a relationship with a man who was everything bad for me, but whom I believed was wonderful. I'm sure other women who've left a long marriage in their mid-40's, who wonder if they'll ever meet another man, will understand how sometimes you just project your needs onto the first guy you meet, the one who says all the right things. That was the relationship. By the time I realized how wrong I'd been, it was so far from over that I was devastated. I went out drinking with a girlfriend who smoked clove cigarettes. Because I'd never heard of them, I thought they were something other than my old nemesis. I thought they were candy. They weren't. They were addictive, nicotine tobacco. It was summer, 1998. At first, I only smoked a few. Then a few more. By the time I walked into the tobacco specialty store to buy a second pack (maybe a week later?), the little voice in my head knew it was the end of my first successful multi-year quit. But, since I was still thinking "clove cigarettes=different from the bad stuff", I didn't worry about it. I'd been hurt. The cigarettes and the booze helped.
I was in Indianapolis to see an Art Garfunkel concert with my ex-husband and my daughter one warm evening when my daughter, then a college student saw me smoking and laughed when I told her I'd "found these clove cigarettes" like some kind of idiot. She asked me unceremoniously (with a chuckle, as I recall) "What do you think is in them?" Frankly, I had no idea until then, but when she explained that they were just regular tobacco soaked in sugar & cloves I realized why I'd come to like them so.
The work in Evansville was a learning experience, and in May of 2000 when the office had grown to five employees, I was named branch manager. I loved the work. I had unfortunately again become a smoker, though, and had slowly stopped my regular exersize. A part of me realized that when smoking, exersize became much more difficult. I spent many hours in the office, and when I was at home, I played with my new puppy and worked some more on my laptop. A year later when 9/11 happened, it became a real challenge to retain our clients and grow new business. I got little support from management, so when an opportunity to move to an office in south Florida came in May of 2002, I jumped at the chance.
In Punta Gorda, I was in a small business development office with one other employee, a man my age who also smoked. Since our office operated on our terms, when there was a lull in client activity, he and I took smoke breaks together outside, and became good friends. We were both seasoned financial professionals, and the atmosphere was casual and professional. Most of our clients were retirees. I admired them. They were always busy, and really enjoying life. I lived for a while in a furnished condo, but eventually built a house with a pool, and settled in where I hoped I'd become a family vacation destination, and was loving life.
Meanwhile, I had noticed while living in the condo that sometimes I was experiencing shortness of breath when I went up the flight of stairs to my front door. It was especially true when carrying groceries, or one night when I'd bought a cheap but heavy TV at the local KMart and hauled it up the stairs. When I went for my annual physical, I mentioned this to my doctor. At the end of the physical he told me I was in good shape. I asked him about my shortness of breath, and told him I was a smoker. He said he didn't think anything was wrong, but that I needed to quit smoking. He said he'd have to do a pulmonary function test to be sure, so he ordered one.
That was quite a test. It took about an hour and a half. In a lab, the technician had me put my mouth over a hose and continue breathing normally. At his signal, I was to take a deep breath and then blow as hard as I could and continue blowing til he told me to stop. We did that exersize multiple times, sometimes with my nose clipped shut. I once saw Kenny G in concert, and I thought I would try an audition with him any day after that damn test. The technician was relentless. And at the end of it, he told me I was in awful shape. He told me I had COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) and that his results showed that I was already "so bad" that I could file for disability. I was pissed. At the tech. I couldn't wait to get out of there and have a cigarette. But so began my real education in WHY I SHOULDN'T HAVE TAKEN THAT FIRST CIGARETTE TO BE COOL IN 1967.
More to come.
This journey began 44 years ago when I was sitting in a car in the school parking lot with my group of girlfriends. We were all seniors in a Catholic high school, and playfully rebellious. It was near the end of the school year, 1967, springtime in Fort Worth, Texas, and we were about to be forever free of the ties that had bound us to that strict but excellent institution. No more uniforms. No more nuns. No more attending classes in "A" hall where no males were allowed. (They were in "C" hall. "B" hall was where the "mixed" classes met-labs, art, science. It was all very hormonal.) I thought we were cool. One of the girls offered me a cigarette. My mom was a smoker. I'd never really thought about it, but the thrill of trying something that might be forbidden but wasn't illegal was exciting to me, because I was 17, like I said. So I took it. I lit it. I choked. But I thought I was cool.
What I really was, in very short order, was addicted.
I smoked a lot. Every day. Never thought about quitting. At least not for 10 years or so. I married 3 years after graduating. I had attended college for two years, and had worked as a flight attendant. Lots of people smoked. People on airplanes, even. Only when the "no-smoking" light went off, which was after take-off and prior to landing. Call me an original terrorist. My weapon, though I never knew it was one then, was legally taken on board, and joined all the others who also indulged. It was 1969.
When I met my husband, I thought he was a smoker because he smoked. It wasn't until we'd been together for quite a while that I realized he wasn't a smoker--at least not like I was--because he never actually bought cigarettes. He bummed them. He bummed mine. Back then, they were so cheap, who cared? I didn't. And since he wasn't an addict, he didn't either. We married in September, 1970.
When I was pregnant with my first son in 1972, I asked my Ob-Gyn if I should quit. He said that while it was always good to consider quitting, maybe pregnancy wasn't the best time to try. That was just what I wanted to hear. And it's just what I did. I did the same in 1974 when my second son was born, and again in 1978 when my daughter came. I breastfed the kids, often with a cigarette in my mouth. I did everything while smoking, because while I was awake, I was smoking.
I made my first attempt to quit in probably the '80's. My husband really wanted me to quit. It wasn't fashionable anymore, and I'm sure he was just tired of it. I know the kids were. They were starting classes in the schools teaching my kids about the dangers of smoking. I was glad they were. I didn't want the kids to start. I knew it would be next to impossible for me to quit.
But I went to an organized program called "Smokenders." As I recall, it was a good program. And I did quit. They had a graduation ceremony, and my family was proud to come and watch me matriculate. My instructor approached me about teaching my own groups of Smokenders. I just remember that when he did, I was already thinking about smoking again. That quit probably only lasted a couple of weeks. At first I'd just smoke in secret in the basement, when I went down to do the laundry. I'm sure the stink probably permeated the entire house, but at the time I didn't think so. And I didn't try to hide it for long anyway. I don't know how many cigarettes I smoked a day back then. No one ever asked that question, and I never thought about it. It was a lot, I'm sure.
I returned to college in 1984 and got my degree in 1987. At first I worked part-time as a tour guide in the public relations office of the local airport. It was a great, fun job, and allowed me to be at home when the kids were out of school. In January, 1990, I began working full time as a stock broker with Charles Schwab. I really liked the work. In 1991 I moved from work at the call center to their downtown Indianapolis office. It was a blast down there. I loved the work, the clients, and my coworkers. One of them was a woman a few years my senior, a widow, mother of 3, who regularly ran for exersize. In 1992, I quit smoking for real, and when I put on about 20 pounds and complained about it, she suggested I try running. I laughed. I have never been an athlete. Any exertion like running, playing tennis, ice or roller skating, and I damage an ankle. It's been the case since I was a kid. So, she said, try walking. Well, I figured, I could do that. It was spring. I began getting up early so I could take a walk before showering for work. I started with 15 minutes a day, eventually working up to an hour, and I loved it. I did it 5 or 6 days a week. After a year of that, and using the gym that was offered in my office tower, my running coworker suggested I try the upcoming mini-marathon. So I did. I remember seeing the applications and thinking "I can't do that. I'm not an athlete." And then I realized I was an athlete of sorts--at least for me. So I filled it out, and I was entered.
I finished the first mini near the end of the pack. I wasn't the fastest walker in the group, but it felt wonderful. And I made it a habit. My marriage was under stress at the time. The kids were leaving home, and my husband and I weren't connecting anymore. Walking was my salvation, my solitary time, my feel-good time. I did the mini again and again, five years in all. I made it through a separation, another attempt to make the marriage work, and eventually a divorce in 1995 without ever considering smoking again. It was an emotional time, a difficult time, and a time of great sadness, but smoking never seemed like the answer.
In 1997 Schwab was expanding, and planned to open an office in southern Indiana, in Evansville. I had wanted to manage my own branch, but hadn't really made any career moves to assure myself of the opportunity until then. So, when it was suggested to me that perhaps offering to open the new branch in Evansville might be an opportunity to do that, I decided to take it. I knew it would take time, but I was on my own at the time and thought it was time to stretch myself and learn some new skills.
I moved to Evansville in July of '97, and for about the first year, I did great. I had, however, set the stage for my own failure by then. I had become involved in a relationship with a man who was everything bad for me, but whom I believed was wonderful. I'm sure other women who've left a long marriage in their mid-40's, who wonder if they'll ever meet another man, will understand how sometimes you just project your needs onto the first guy you meet, the one who says all the right things. That was the relationship. By the time I realized how wrong I'd been, it was so far from over that I was devastated. I went out drinking with a girlfriend who smoked clove cigarettes. Because I'd never heard of them, I thought they were something other than my old nemesis. I thought they were candy. They weren't. They were addictive, nicotine tobacco. It was summer, 1998. At first, I only smoked a few. Then a few more. By the time I walked into the tobacco specialty store to buy a second pack (maybe a week later?), the little voice in my head knew it was the end of my first successful multi-year quit. But, since I was still thinking "clove cigarettes=different from the bad stuff", I didn't worry about it. I'd been hurt. The cigarettes and the booze helped.
I was in Indianapolis to see an Art Garfunkel concert with my ex-husband and my daughter one warm evening when my daughter, then a college student saw me smoking and laughed when I told her I'd "found these clove cigarettes" like some kind of idiot. She asked me unceremoniously (with a chuckle, as I recall) "What do you think is in them?" Frankly, I had no idea until then, but when she explained that they were just regular tobacco soaked in sugar & cloves I realized why I'd come to like them so.
The work in Evansville was a learning experience, and in May of 2000 when the office had grown to five employees, I was named branch manager. I loved the work. I had unfortunately again become a smoker, though, and had slowly stopped my regular exersize. A part of me realized that when smoking, exersize became much more difficult. I spent many hours in the office, and when I was at home, I played with my new puppy and worked some more on my laptop. A year later when 9/11 happened, it became a real challenge to retain our clients and grow new business. I got little support from management, so when an opportunity to move to an office in south Florida came in May of 2002, I jumped at the chance.
In Punta Gorda, I was in a small business development office with one other employee, a man my age who also smoked. Since our office operated on our terms, when there was a lull in client activity, he and I took smoke breaks together outside, and became good friends. We were both seasoned financial professionals, and the atmosphere was casual and professional. Most of our clients were retirees. I admired them. They were always busy, and really enjoying life. I lived for a while in a furnished condo, but eventually built a house with a pool, and settled in where I hoped I'd become a family vacation destination, and was loving life.
Meanwhile, I had noticed while living in the condo that sometimes I was experiencing shortness of breath when I went up the flight of stairs to my front door. It was especially true when carrying groceries, or one night when I'd bought a cheap but heavy TV at the local KMart and hauled it up the stairs. When I went for my annual physical, I mentioned this to my doctor. At the end of the physical he told me I was in good shape. I asked him about my shortness of breath, and told him I was a smoker. He said he didn't think anything was wrong, but that I needed to quit smoking. He said he'd have to do a pulmonary function test to be sure, so he ordered one.
That was quite a test. It took about an hour and a half. In a lab, the technician had me put my mouth over a hose and continue breathing normally. At his signal, I was to take a deep breath and then blow as hard as I could and continue blowing til he told me to stop. We did that exersize multiple times, sometimes with my nose clipped shut. I once saw Kenny G in concert, and I thought I would try an audition with him any day after that damn test. The technician was relentless. And at the end of it, he told me I was in awful shape. He told me I had COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) and that his results showed that I was already "so bad" that I could file for disability. I was pissed. At the tech. I couldn't wait to get out of there and have a cigarette. But so began my real education in WHY I SHOULDN'T HAVE TAKEN THAT FIRST CIGARETTE TO BE COOL IN 1967.
More to come.
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