Timeline: How I quit smoking

To start its easy but to quit it’s hard! Many people start with friends and smoke socially. But it becomes very late when you come to know that you are addicted.

I started smoking at the age of 18. I was aware of the danger related to smoking very well that my other friends who don’t. I knew that cigarettes have harmful chemicals that harm the body and become reason of death for millions people.

I smoked first time with my best friend. I never think that this first pack will change his life forever. I became addicted too nicotine soon. It started with a few cigarettes to a pack a day. Whenever I got the opportunity, I never missed the smoke. I soon realized that I was in bad habit.

My parents were also heavy smokers but both of them quit by the age of 55 and moved to cabin in the north to live healthy life. I was very inspired by the strong will power they used to quit. I decided a day and asked myself that I will never smoke again. It was very hard at the starting but the thing which made me strong was my self-conscious. I knew the fact that I was killing myself slowly with every cigarette I smoked. I bought the pack of nicotine patches and started using them. I was using cold turkey technique to quit. The first five days I didn’t smoke. I felt very energetic from inside. The pills to quit were not as effective as I think.

Except the gas problem, I was having no side effects. Smoking Withdrawal symptoms were also not as much as I studied. I was using simple quitting techniques. I drink lot of water. I was also using taste buds which can drive me away from cigarettes. I told myself that I was not leaving tea and coffee, it was only one bad habit that is smoking which I was quitting. The anxiety induced by cigarettes was gone. The life is now good.

If anyone wants to quit smoking, I would say do it. Your effort would worth a lot. Cessation is true gift which cannot be compared to any other you can give it to yourself.

How can friends help in quitting smoke?