The Quitter’s Diary: Day 2

Day 1 was a Sunday. When I woke up on Monday, the thought of going to work itself was eating me inside, the thought of not smoking the whole day, while at work was far worse and enough to trigger a craving that lasted for more than a minute.

When I reached work, I was absolutely irritated. I think the traffic, the noise and just the sight of so many people triggered that off. I plonked myself in to my chair and my friend, Jesubhai calls out to me asking me to accompany him for a chai and smoke. I tell him I quit (this was a better way of saying it, in retrospect, because earlier I would say “I’m trying” and nothing would come out of it). Quite funnily he asked whether I have quit smoking or quit having tea. I wanted to laugh but didn’t. I didn’t want to go with him because the thought of seeing him smoke might tempt me too. But nothing of that sort happened but by mid afternoon, my cravings were getting bad. Some of my twitter (follow me) posts are witness to that:

Tweet 3: A million ants are crawling in my veins. The voices in my head are urging, demanding for just one. One sane voice says NO! #quitsmoking


Tweet 2: Let's kill the bongs! Let's kill the bongs! Let's kill the bongs! Let's kill the bongs! Let's kill the bongs! Let's kill the bongs!

Tweet 1: 36 hours in to not smoking. Stay away! the voices in my head want to kill you!

The chant of let’s kill the bongs began when the two Bengali women around me began talking. Fuck I couldn’t stand them when I was smoking. Being patient with them at that particular moment I just wanted to kill them with a blunt object so that they hurt and I’m in bliss.

But as tweet 3 suggests, as the day went on, it was getting increasingly difficult. I started reading about people who have quit and how they went about doing so. Twitter had a search #quitsmoking that was helpful with links and testimonials. I never thought that the internet and social networking sites will help but anyway. The work day ended well. Craving were there, I was hyper, fidgety and couldn’t stop shaking my leg, just as EW does after a couple of drinks. But I was grateful that I did not kill, yell or torture anyone or in any order.

When I reached home, my mom commented on the amount I smoked because of the smell my body was emitting. I went like “WHHAAATTT!!!” I calmed myself to tell her that I had quit and it would be 48 hours at quarter to 12.

I had difficulty getting sleep. And I fell asleep at around 2 in the morning after retiring to bed around midnight. Will tomorrow be another day of struggle, I questioned myself.