I think that may be my first apropos use of the term "___Fail"... made popular by our internet culture. It feels good, even though the reason doesn't so much.
Welcome to day 3. The day that I thought things would be going better and where I wouldn't be feeling so much like CRAP... The day where I was wrong.
Over this weekend I decided a few things.
The first - I am going to call the doctor to find out about Chantix or another quitting AID first thing Monday morning.
The second - I have a really hard time when my routine gets shot to hell... which, actually, includes my pervasive smoking habit.
The third - Quitting sucks. Did you know that? So does smoking, I know... but man... just the process...
The fourth - I decided to have a cigarette. I have had 1 now during my first three days of quitting. And damn. It wasn't as great as I remembered. I actually got a little bit light headed. I'm pretty sure that it was MOSTLY psychological... but I guess I wasn't smoking all that much before... either way - important lesson for the kids... I am not perfect.
This does not mean that I'm not quitting. It does not mean that I'm going to smoke every day or every time I think about it. (If it did, I would have had about 200 cigarettes this weekend, not 1). But - it certainly did hurt my pride.
That was part of the reason for writing this blog - to hold myself accountable to myself and everyone who feels strongly about smoking and the potentially negative effects of cigarettes. And man - I was SO excited to write about it! (excited probably the wrong word... embarrassed, sad, disappointed, and a number of others are much more likely culprits)
So - that's why the 'funny' title... but I'm still on the path. Never fret, my friends, I will do this. But I want to be up front with you about both my successes AND my failures.
Alright - on to the fun part -
Today I want to continue my story of when I started smoking...
I think I left off talking about how I started because of a play that I was in. That wasn't the part that was difficult. It was actually easy at that point, because it didn't taste good (until the show was nearly over, at least), and I was only smoking about 3-4 cigarettes a day. Say what you will about the medical evidence, I'm just not sure that 3-4 cigarettes a day will ever be an amount that will kill someone. However - the problem is keeping it at that number... This is neither here or there... so - BACK to the story.
A few weeks after the show closed I was faced with a conundrum. Should I continue smoking, something that I had always reviled (but was starting to enjoy) or should I continue to hide it. At this point, telling my parents was something that I just wasn't okay with doing. Telling my girlfriend (at the time, who shortly after became my fiance, and then my wife) was slightly easier, but she had grown up in a house where smoking had been prevalent, and it drove her crazy.
SO - though I told Jen that I was smoking, I told her that I would quit. I don't think that I intended it as a lie that first time... I think I truly intended to quit. But now, almost 11 years later, it seems that I obviously didn't succeed with that one, huh.
A few months went by, and I generally tried to NOT smoke around anyone. I was still living at home, so basically I could smoke in the morning before I went to class, I could smoke AT school (WSU), and then I could smoke late in the evening after everyone went to sleep. I did this for a while, and at some point realized that I was, actually, lying to just about everyone about it... but though I had come to this realization, I also didn't know what to do about it.
A few months later, I moved out on my own, and then it got worse. Because then I wasn't waiting for anyone to leave the house in the morning, I wasn't waiting for anyone to go to sleep in the evening, and I could go outside whenever I wanted.
I continued to feel that it was important for me to hide this from Jen. I told myself that I wasn't really lying, I was keeping something from her that she hated.
I knew, inside, that I was really trying to be the perfect person that I knew I wanted to be for her. I also knew, by this time, that I was actually addicted to smoking and that I wasn't going to be quitting of my own volition.
Then, one evening, Jen came over to the apartment. For some reason, I had to run out to my car. When I came back in I heard a door close (the closet, I thought) but when I opened the door Jen was sitting on the couch, and she said that she needed to go. It was late, so I didn't think anything of it.
About 10 minutes after she left, I went to my closet to get a cigarette out of my coat. Inside the pocket, with the cigarettes and the lighter, was a piece of paper. I had no idea what this could be. I pulled it out, hoping that I had left some money or something in my pocket, to find two words written on the paper. "I Know"... in Jen's writing...
Caught in a lie. To be continued.
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