It is now 50 hours since I decided to quit smoking and it was something that had to be done coz I’ve gone out of my own control and hit the rock bottom in terms of my behavior, attitude and general being. None of them can be directly attributed to smoking, but I think it would be a decent first step to start changing the kind of person I was becoming.

As I watched what I intended to be the last of my cigarettes flush down the toilet, I was a bit frightened that I was giving up something that I haven’t stayed apart for the last 7-8 years of my life. As the blazing tip extinguished itself silently into the muddy water, the abiding thought was that I had committed a mistake. It was foolish to even think about quitting it, but somehow I weathered that storm and came back in, had a deep breath to process the decision and knew it was the correct one and had to be made. It was about bloody time.

The first day was remarkable for it made me feel that it was so easy to quit smoking. The day went past like a breeze and till the end of it, I wasn’t thinking about smoking at all. Maybe the one cigarette I had in the morning helped me get through it but all it gave me was a false sense of victory and an illusory hope of how easy it would be. It also helped that I spent the whole day at home, most of it asleep, but still I didn’t get the craving many said I would. It turned out that day one was always the easiest and it was the same for everyone.  

Today is Day 3 and I feel and look like shit. I haven’t felt this way ever before. I feel weak in my knees, legs, hands and every moving part is in some or other discomfort. I can literally feel my blood rushing through my veins like a distant observer. I can’t sit still or stay at a single place for a while. I constantly want to move somewhere, put the legs into motion and yet even that doesn’t help. I had 7 cups of coffee and I wonder if I’m buying one addiction to get rid of the other. Nothing helps. I’m restless, weak, vulnerable, irritable and just plain miserable since 6 AM this morning. I haven’t eaten anything in the last 16 hours and I don’t feel hungry at all. It’s as if every part of my body decided at once to stage a revolt against me. 

The worst thing is that this feeling occurs for about 20-25 minutes for every hour or so. I have no idea what to do and how to overcome it, so I end up reading about withdrawal symptoms and how to rectify them. I don’t want to use patches or gums and just want to depend on plain old grit, and it hasn’t been easy sailing so far. Probably the most difficult day in recent times and it has started again. It also made me realize how easy it was for me to succumb and consequently how difficult and demanding it would be to resist. I have never been a person of any sort of discipline whatsoever which is what makes this exercise even miserable. I want to scream my anguish out, tear my hair apart and I probably deserve a smoke, but I wouldn’t let myself think about it too much.

That’s why I write. I haven’t written anything in a while and I feel this is the time I put my mind somewhere else. I can’t control the shiver in my hands by sitting and doing nothing but feeling miserable all day long. This is just the third day and I have read online that days 3-5 are among the worst from the experiences I’ve read of the withdrawal symptoms. A Difficult week lies ahead and I’m too hungry without an appetite to look forward to it.

I would like to make this a journal to see how I’m dealing with the decision and I hope to make this a long one. Even though the writing may get tedious, I intend to visit this space as often as I can. It didn’t provide me any release per se, I’m still feeling all shitty and dirty, no headaches yet, and I’ve filled up a page.