How My Wife and I Freed Ourselves from the Bondage of Nicotine

I "tried" to quit for many years; my wife did, too. We would decide to try and quit, but every time one of us would bum a cigarette from someone. Then the other would say, "Well, if he or she is not going to stay with it, then I won't either." I don't know how many times we did that over the years, but it was quite a few.

My wife was a stay at home mom and I had many jobs through the fifteen or so years we smoked together and we both smoked before we met. I was typical male I guess, back in those days when I was a teen it was kind of macho and if you drank then they went together.

We went on smoking more and more as time went on. The stress at work as shop forman in a Mercedes Benz dealership made it worse for me. I had a habit that every time the phone rang I would stand there and light a cigarette while I was trying to solve someone's problem on the phone.

I guess for my wife, being home with the kids- three young daughters, she was smoking 3 packs a day. One day I went home from work with an idea. We had recently bought a new pickup. I went home and told my wife "if we would quit smoking it would make the payment on that pickup". She was fed up with being a slave to tobacco and said "you're right" and threw the cigarettes away. She never smoked again!

Since she was almost always the first one to start sneaking a smoke or bumming a cigarette, I figured I would wait and see what she did. After about two weeks of watching her I could see she was serious about this so I did the same, cold turkey. It was not as hard as we make it out to be.

I have a theory about this 'trying to quit' thing that what we do when we try is that we stick our toe in the door, so to speak, so that the door won't shut all the way.

In other words we leave an escape route, but when you make a commitment and close the door behind you. You don't try, you just do it!

My wife and I did that 33 years ago and would not go back for anything. You can do it too, what is your life worth? Who has control of your life? If you don't then it is time to take it back.

I have a friend who at this very moment is trying to quit, remember what I said about trying! Every time he lets temptation get him it gets harder to overcome it. His wife quit about two weeks ago and has done real good. She told me today that she "just quit".

Good luck and enjoy your smoke free life that is ahead for you.