Start your quit on a day you wake up and feel like you can go without them.

    Monday Nov. 5, 2018, I woke up at 11:30 am. I stared at the random assortment (and abundance) of crap on my nightstand. Normally, the only thought in my head is"Dammit, I have to get ready for work." That day, that was only the first thought I had. The second was "Hmm... I feel like I can go without cigs today. Let's see how long I can go without one." Then I realized I didn't smell too happy. My third thought? You guessed it. Time for my stank ass to get in the shower then to put a patch on.

    An hour later my wife comes home from work with cartons of smokes for her and I. I told her :that I was going to try to quit today. She became cross with me because I hadn't told her before she bought them. To be totally honest I'm glad she did in case I failed. Also that little situation stressed me out which is a
big trigger for me to smoke. I could have argued back and all but I hate arguing, she was right in her frustration with me, and I didn't want to go into work angry so I stayed silent until we moved on to a different topic(which didn't take long to happen).

    2:20 pm came so I felt my pockets for my car keys, the patch that I haven't put on yet, my work keys and badge. I hugged and kissed the Mrs. Goodbye, and drove to work. When I got to work, I bummed a smoke from a coworker. When I finished, I marked the time (3:05 pm) so I could put it in a quit smoking app to keep track of how long I've gone without a smoke. It wasn't a bad day at work for the most part. In fact, the first week wasn't bad without cigs. It was a pretty easy week. Little did I know, the real battle was about to begin.

    Now, some folks prefer to set a day to quit like my Mom did. Some just randomly decide one day they are done like one of my close friends had done. They're several ways to begin to quit smoking. What worked for me, and could work for you, is to start your quit on a day you wake up and feel like you can go without them.