What is on this page were not in the cards I carried around when I quit smoking. But I've seen many of the Short Slogans and Thoughts below several times in the alt.support.stop-smoking newsgroup and elsewhere.
The "Some More Reasons To Quit Smoking and "Some More Thoughts To Help Stay Quit" are also things that weren't on my quit smoking cards, but later heard from message boards and chatrooms, or thought up.
(Many of these I picked up in alt.support.stop-smoking)
* Hang Tough, Don't Puff!
* The urge to smoke goes away whether you light up or not.
* Remember that if you do light up, the next urge to smoke comes much sooner, more often, and more intensely.
* When you give in to the urge to smoke, you are rewarding the urge. This is why the urges return more frequently and more strongly.
* A desire to smoke is not a command that must be followed.
* The NicoBeast's voice can't hurt you. Ignore it. Or analyze it. See it for what it is. Laugh at the tricks it tries to use on you to get you to have "just one".
* You can't brag if you take a drag!
* I'm A Puff Away From A Pack A Day.
( Even A Puff Can Blow Me Away )
* I had more (and stronger) cravings as a smoker than I do now (said after having been quit for 2 weeks). Remember all the times as a smoker when I couldn't smoke -- with certain people, at work, in public buildings, shopping, movies, etc.
* "I'm in relapse prevention mode" (said after having been quit for one week).
* Smoking is not an option.
* Smokers Don't Get To Smoke. They have to smoke.
* Don't Despair. Breathe the Air.
* Deep breathe until the urge passes.
* Relaxation breathing: draw air in the way you do with a cig (but without the cig)
* Just say to yourself, "But I don't smoke anymore"
* Think: "I'm becoming a nonsmoker" (instead of thinking "I'm giving up smoking").
* If we romance it, we chance it. (romance it -- i.e. if we entertain the thought of smoking and engage in "euphoric recall").
* Have a rubberband on wrist, and snap it each time you feel an urge. Or slap your face.
* Smoking is ludicrous -- it is having a bunch of burning plants hanging out of your mouth.
* When thinking of putting a cigarette in your mouth, think of putting something wet, slimy, and disgusting in your mouth instead. Or of biting down on a cold metal can lid.
* Smoking was our way (or excuse) for taking breaks. So continue taking breaks -- find something you enjoy doing.
* Remember this when I want to have "just one" and think that I can "get away" with it: Either (1) I'm in charge of the habit, in which case I don't have to have this cig -or- (2) Its in charge of me, in which case I must not have this cig.
* Get MAD at the cigarettes for ruining some aspects of your life. (Rather than "missing them" or immersing yourself in nostalgia or "euphoric recall").
* With each light or moderate urge, think, "oh, this isn't such a strong urge", or "this is a really light and trivial urge". "This isn't so bad". See light and moderate urges as "better than strong cravings". (I learned this technique sitting in the dentist chair thinking, ouch, but that wasn't so bad, not as bad as that scrape a couple of minutes ago...)
* I usually keep my statements to the beast much shorter. I say things like those listed below. Sure, you can beat the beast w/ logic (because the beast can't operate using logical thought processes). But I prefer to just beat up on the little buggar. --Social_Scientist (MaryAlice) at www.qquitnet.org
********************************
Go Away!
Bite Me!!!!
I'm Stronger Than You Are!!
Leave Me Alone!!!
********************************
* A Prayer (from Nicotine Anonymous Literature (c)):
Thank you God, that I have known
This smoke-free day to call my own.
And tomorrow this I pray,
Grant me one more smoke-free day.
* I'd rather be a non-smoker with an occasional desire to smoke than a smoker with a constant desire to quit
* Just remember, It is easier to stay quit than to have to quit again
From Blair's QuitSmokingSupport Newsletter, 7/21/03. www.QuitSmokingSupport.com
JUNKIE THINKING: "One Puff won't hurt"
RESPONSE: "One puff will always hurt me, and it always will because I'm not a social smoker. One puff and I'll be smoking compulsively again."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I only want one."
RESPONSE: "I have never wanted only one. In fact, I want 20-30 a day every day. I want them all."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I'll just be a social smoker."
RESPONSE: "I'm a chronic, compulsive smoker, and once I smoke one I'll quickly be thinking about the next one. Social smokers can take it or leave it. That's not me."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I'm doing so well, one won't hurt me now."
RESPONSE: "The only reason I'm doing so well is because I haven't taken the first one. Yet once I do, I won't be doing well anymore. I'll be smoking again."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I'll just stop again."
RESPONSE: "Sounds easy, but who am I trying to kid? Look how long it too me to stop this time. And once I start, how long will it take before I get sick enough to face withdrawal again? In fact, when I'm back in the grip of compulsion, what guarantee do I have that I'll ever be able to stop again?"
JUNKIE THINKING: "If I slip, I'll keep trying."
RESPONSE: "If I think I can get away with one little "slip" now I'll think I can get away with another little "slip" later on."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I need one to get me through this withdrawal."
RESPONSE: "Smoking will not get me through the discomfort of not smoking. I will only get me back to smoking. One puff stops the process of withdrawal and I'll have to go through it all over again."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I miss smoking right now."
RESPONSE: "Of course I miss something I've been doing every day for most of my life. Bud do I miss the chest pain right now? Do I miss the worry, the embarrassment? I'd rather be an ex-smoker with an occasional desire to smoke, than a smoker with a constant desire to stop doing it."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I really need to smoke now, I'm so upset."
RESPONSE: "Smoking is not going to fix anything. I'll still be upset, I'll just be an upset smoker. I never have to have a cigarette. Smoking is not a need; it's a want. Once the crisis is over, I'll be relieved and grateful I'm still not smoking."
JUNKIE THINKING: "I don't care."
RESPONSE: "What is it exactly that I think that I don't care about? Can I truthfully say I don't care about chest pain? I don't care about gagging in the morning? I don't care about lung cancer? No, I care about these things very much. That's why I stopped smoking in the first place."
JUNKIE THINKING: "What difference does it make, anyway?"
RESPONSE: "It makes a difference in the way I breathe, the way my heart beats, the way I feel about myself. It makes a tremendous difference in every aspect of my physical and emotional health."
From Blair's QuitSmokingSupport Newsletter, www.QuitSmokingSupport.com
60 reasons for NOT smoking!
I'd love to accompany this with a list of reasons for smoking, but I couldn't find one which weighed against any single one of the above list! - Piers Clement
* I will no longer be a disease carrier -- I will no longer infect or re-infect other people with this smoking disease. That is, I won't be the cause for someone to relapse or begin smoking by leaving a pack of cigarettes lying around. Or by leaving a partially smoked cigarette somewhere. Or by having someone bum a cigarette from me. Or by smoking, wakening the desire to smoke in someone who has recently quit. Or by example, making it look O.K. to young people to smoke.
Rather, by not smoking, I will be a good example to young people, and an example to people who are trying to quit smoking that one can quit and stay quit.
* When I leave my house, I will no longer have to worry about whether I left a cigarette still burning somewhere that might fall out of the ashtray. I don't have to worry that I might have dropped a still - smoldering cigarette ash on the carpet.
* I won't develop smoker's face. For you women out there who are obsessed about gaining 10 or 15 pounds by quitting (and men too), consider the lead on an article about Smoker's Face -- "The doctor could tell the patient had once been an attractive woman. But now, though only in her 50s, her face was etched with wrinkles, her features gaunt - looking with prominent underlying bones and her skin shriveled and gray with purplish blotches. Diagnosis: smoker's face"
From Smoker's Face -- An Evident Reason To Quit, by Jane Brody, Women's Health Digest, Volume 2 Number 3.
* I hate the fact that some big corporation is in control of my life. Its as bad as giving $4.00 a day minimum to the local Heroin dealer. And out of that $4.00, approximately 80% is taxes and that makes me even madder. The ______ federal government is just as bad as the Heroin dealer. -Shawn
* I can have the fan on, even blowing directly on me, without worrying about it blowing smoke and ashes in my face or out of the ash tray, and causing the cigarette to be burned up in 5 minutes
* Job Interviews, Future Jobs - pre-employment medical screening will turn up nicotine, whether it comes from the patch or from smoking. For urine tests -- 3 to 4 days (from what I've heard somewhere). For hair tests -- months.
Employers visualize smokers as people who can't control their urges, who stand outside the building in the cold and rain smoking when they should at least be near their phone, colleagues, and findable. And as people who are always trying to 'break away' to smoke, rather than thinking about the company's business.* Finding a partner will be more difficult - More than 80% of adults are NON-smokers. Very few non-smokers want smokers as partners. Even many smokers prefer non-smoking partners (easier to quit and stay quit if partner is a non-smoker). And non-smoking partners age more slowly and are healthier.Employers know that smokers have more sick days and ask for more time off for doctor's visits.
Employers know that the company's medical insurance cost -- which is based on the company's claims history -- will be higher with smoking employees.
annie:
1. smoking through bronchial infections each winter.
2. waking up all those mornings all those years vowing to quit, and never really doing it. And all the New Years Eves and birthdays when quitting didn't happen...
4. Running into people from the past (from high school and college) and being embarrassed that after all this time I hadn't quit
5. that feeling of dizziness which is really like being poisoned by carbon monoxide...
6. how uncomfortable i was as an addict on long train and plainrides...
Anita:
7. seeing your kids make faces when you ask for a hug.
gammy:
8. Telling your grandaughter she can sit on your lap, AFTER you finish smoking. (by then she didn't want to anymore)
RHA:
9. Knowing that you actually did smell like the smokers you have the most unfortunate experience of smelling!
JudyB:
10 .Being a slave to cigs in that you have to make sure you have enough to get you thru a certain time period/situation
11. Listening to yourself wheeze as you try to go to sleep. Yuck
Bob R:
12. Having to leave a reataurant to sneak a smoke when business associates or friends wonder why I had to go out in the rain
13. Fake the receipt of a silent page to excuse myself in a meeting that went too long
14. Thinking that I was fooling anyone
Rebecca:
15. Standing out in all kinds of weather just to have a smoke.
16. Waking myself up snoring.
eepers:
17. Driving a four cylinder ashtray!!!
willi:
18. Burning holes in my clothes, the car, the furniture, the carpet...
19. Having a cigarette in hand and the damn lighter ran out.
erika:
20. Burning my sofa, and thinking it was my self cleaning stove smelling.
Doug:
21. Having those telltale little holes on just the fronts of every dress shirt in the closet
22. Trying to put out the 1,000 degree little hot ash sitting there smouldering between my legs, making another hole in the front seat,at 70 MPH
23. Healing those burns on the fingers where the cig slid to the hot end because the filter end momentarily stuck to my lips
24. Trying to buff out the burn mark where the unbalanced cig finally fell out of the ashtray onto the desktop.
Phil:
25. Feeling like I was putting another nail in the coffin with each puff.
26. Watching my father stay enslaved by cigarettes and die of heart disease and feeling I must be insane to keep smoking myself.
tia tavlla:
27. That sickening desperation when you can't find a match or a lighter anywhere and you try to come up with any way to light up --I even tried a curling iron once!
28. Tossing butts out the car window and hating myself for littering
bugsey:
29. It's 9:00P.M., 18 degrees, snowing, you are comfortable on the couch watching a good movie and you suddenly realize you have 1 cig left.
La Weez:
30. Having a friend tell me that that cough made me seem so much older than I was. (meow- hiss!)
31. Coughing in the morning. Coughing during the day. Waking myself up coughing. And lastly, coughing when I got in bed. Somehow that last one really got to me. With a postural change, fer petesake?!?!?!
Pat:
32. Watching my father die from cancer. Knowing he got it from smoking and not being able to stop myself.
Pam J.:
33. Lighting the filter.
34. Throwing butts down the garbage disposal when I couldn't find an ashtray.
35. During the last month or two of smoking, feeling guilty or somehow inadequate everytime I lit up.
36. Listening to the guy who doesn't use contractions on side B of my Nicoderm CQ cassette. :-) (I know, this one doesn't really count, but if I had never smoked, I could have missed this irritation.)
Kathleen (Kathy):
37. Digging through an the old butt-disposal-sack I kept outside, and just about burning my nose lighting them to get a couple of puffs
38. In the desparate first days of previous quits, looking at other people's discarded butts with longing
39. Turning down my niece and nephew's request "to ride in Aunt kathy's car" because I HAD to have a cigarette and was too ashamed to smoke in front of little people who looked up to me.
40. Vowing,ABSOLUTELY, to stop after my (ex-smoking) husband's angioplasty, and failing. Vowing at least NOT to smoke in front of him, and failing.
41. Watching my daughter cry when she found out I had relapsed
42. Being unable to tell anyone that I was quitting again, because I could see they no longer believed me
43. No longer believing myself
(These are just a FEW...thanks for the chance to do this recall, sure helps cement this quit! I am never going back. )
Vince C. (Vincec):
44. Seeing the look of pity in my children's eyes when they accepted that I was addicted to smoking and gave up on nagging me to quit. - Vince, 1/9/99
* Just remember, It is easier to stay quit than to have to quit again
Links To All Major Pages On This Web Site. Plus Links to the Visibility Project, Quit-Meters, and My Email | |
|
* Index page and introduction to this web site at index.html (this page) * INTERNET QUIT SMOKING DISCUSSION GROUPS (chat, forums, newsgroups, mailing lists, etc.) at groupsa.html and groupsb.html * Quit Smoking Cards - Introduction -- Things to Tell Yourself When Strong Cravings Hit and Won't Go Away, Introduction, at cardsA.html * Quit Smoking Cards - The Main Cards and The Reasons To Quit List at cardsB.html * Additional Sayings, Slogans, and Reasons at cardsC.html * Quit Smoking Research and Web Pages. Also Some General Substance Abuse Programs, at research.html * Methods For Quitting Smoking at methods.html * Mental Conditioning To Resist Cravings -- Descriptions of Two Books ("Rational Recovery..." and "When AA Doesn't Work For You ..."), and Descriptions Of The Cards, at mental.html * A Tour of the Nicotine Anonymous Web Site at nicatour.html * Chat Rooms (web-based) listing at groupsa.html#Chat * Chat (real time meeting) details You don't need to read this page unless you want to get into special chat programs like IRC and ICQ. At chatguru.html * Online groups operated by Nicotine Anonymous members, at nicagroups.html |
* Articles related to quitting smoking, at articlesa.html. Also, articlesb.html Currently, there are only five articles,
(1) Smoker's Face -- An Evident Reason To Quit, and it is the most compelling article about smoking that I've ever seen. Besides premature wrinkles and skin blotches, it describes numerous other skin conditions that are worsened by poor circulation. (2) Health Benefits Of Stopping Smoking. This is a short list of the health improvements that occur in 20 minutes, 8 hours, 1 day, ... (3) Smoking Cessation - A Growing Array of Medications. This lists the pros and cons of the patch, Nicorette gum, the inhaler, nasal spray, and Zyban (4) Just This Once Excerpt: "If you find yourself planning to do something "just this once" watch out. It means you're about to compromise your own values. Whatever it is, you already know it's wrong." (5) 41 Tips For Gaining Freedom From Nicotine (6) Can You Hide Smoking From Life Insurance Companies? Factoid from article: nicotine and its breakdown products are undetectable after 72 hours (3 days). * Visibility Project -- Making Small 12 Step Organizations and Other Support Groups Better Known and Easier To Find, at http://geocities.datacellar.net/HotSprings /Spa/9595/index.html * Quit-Meters (free) -- Keeps track of minutes, hours, days, etc. that you have been quit. Silkquit is a recommended favorite. There are several other quit-meters at this site too. At http://www.silkquit.org/meters.html * Changes And Addendum. Lets you know what's changed, and what's new * Email me at: jalars (atsign) compuserve.com |
Various Other Links | |
|
* Twin Cities Nicotine Anonymous at tcnica.html * For problems of all types -- support groups and self-help programs. |
* Minnesota Help Resources - Where to find help for personal problems of all kinds such as addiction, mental health, family issues, grief, etc. At minnhelp.html |
(hits since April 25, 1999)
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