I was at the Smoking Cessation Clinic in St. Lukes-Roosevelt Hospital, and she was the nurse who was going to change my life.
She gave me some brief counseling and then introduced me to the nicotine patch. She was going to start me off on a moderate dosage and then change it as we went along, according to my needs. She asked me when I wanted to start. From some faraway place I seemed to hear my voice say, “Today!”
What? No. That can’t be right. That couldn’t be me saying that. I needed my cigarettes. These were stressful times. What was I going to do without them? We needed to take a more gradual approach to this situation.
This nurse was too gleeful as she showed me how to apply the patch. Suddenly, I didn’t like this woman. If I put on that tiny white patch, there was no going back. Everyone knows it’s deadly if you make the mistake of smoking a cigarette while wearing one of those things. I didn’t want my heart to explode or to turn into ash or any of those other urban legends. She assured me nothing like that would happen if I slipped up and smoked one cigarette while wearing the patch, but I didn’t fully trust her. Hadn’t she also been the one to tell me she was there to help? Now she was taking away my precious.
Ironically, I had one cigarette left in my pack. I ran from the hospital, and found a serene place to smoke it. I inhaled slowly, knowing this love affair was at an end. Ah, precious. I had been smoking for fifteen years. How did I think I was going to be able to stop?
I was able to get through the rest of the day but it was difficult. Late that night, I broke. I tore off the patch and ran from my apartment to the store downstairs. There, I threw myself on the counter, and I purchased my favorite brand of cigarettes.
Back at home, I put on some soft music, and I lit up. I inhaled deeply as the theme song to Titanic swelled. It was heavenly, but I had vowed to stop smoking. Disgusted with myself, I grabbed the pack and held it to the sky. “Why can’t I quit you?” I said in my best Jack Twist voice. I fell on the bed and cried like a thirteen year old girl who just found out the truth about Clay Aiken.
Okay, so it probably didn’t go down quite as grandly as all that. I tend to have a pretty dramatic memory.
The next day, I did recommit to quitting. I kept what was left of that pack after my chain-smoking session the night before. I said it was for emergencies, but it turned out I never lit another one of them. I was getting all the nicotine I needed from my trusty old patch, but I found that the physical act of smoking was just as hard to quit as the inhale itself. I needed that hand to mouth motion. I needed to suck on a filter. So, I walked around with unlit cigarettes dangling from my lips until I no longer needed them.
I was horrified as I began to realize how often a day I used to light up. I reached for my cigarettes first thing in the morning. I lit up after every meal. When shopping, I wanted to smoke after every store and I smoked en route to every single destination. I was an addict, but people used to look at me and say, “I didn’t peg you for a smoker.” Well, I had been. Now, I was proudly joining the ranks on non-smoker.
After a while, I started forgetting to put on the patch. When I’d realize, I’d panic and run to retrieve one. Eventually, I forgot to put on the patch, and I forgot to panic. I had successfully quit smoking. As time passed it became a challenge to me, a personal contest, to accrue as much non-smoking time as possible. I’ve heard that it’s harder to quick cigarettes than heroine. I’d done it, and I’m not the person with the strongest resolve.
When I pass by a smoker and it’s either intoxicating and tempting, or the most disgusting thing in the world to me. Go figure. My senses of taste and smell have returned and my smile is white again. When I stand next to a heavy smoker I think, Oh my God! Did I used to smell like that? Yes. Yes, I did.
The American Cancer Society’s Great American Smokeout was a few days ago. For two years in a row, I didn’t have to feel guilty about not quitting.
The craving never completely goes away. It will rise up out of nowhere and for no apparent reason. It turns out I will never be a non-smoker again. What I am is a successful former smoker, and that’s far better than a pack a day habit at $13 a pack.
I guess they’re not so precious after all.
