NtT - Day One

My first day of nicotine cessation did not start out at all the way I’d hoped it would. I signed off last night at around 10:30 p.m. and went to bed. Lettie, my four-year-old daughter (I will refer to her as Dolly most of the time as it’s the only thing I’ve called her for almost two years now) would not go to sleep. Apparently the nap she’d taken earlier in the day worked too well and she wasn’t tired. I was exhausted, though, and needed to get some rest. She finally fell asleep around midnight, and so did I. Then, a short while later I heard Zach, my six year old, in the bathroom getting sick. He only got sick the one time but, according to school rules, he can’t go to school until he’s illness free for 24 hours; so he’d be home with me all day today.

I finally got back to sleep somewhere around 2:30 a.m. and my alarm woke me at 6:15. Never one to linger in bed, I got up and began my morning wake-up ritual. I was tired, so tired. I wanted a cigarette to help me wake up. I don’t do coffee so my cigs are all I have; but I don’t even have them any more. No cigs, what to do? Okay, I did it last week, I can do it again. Tyler, my eight year old, was already downstairs when I got down here, followed by Dolly. Ty was already dressed for school and waiting for time to leave. I left Zach asleep in my room while Dolly and I took Ty to school at 7:10, a whopping five-minute drive, round trip. When we got back, I made her some chocolate milk and me some Carnation Instant Breakfast. I don’t usually eat breakfast or lunch so this helps me get the nutrition I need, plus it gets my metabolism going first thing and makes weight loss easier.

I finished what I was doing on the computer and went to the sofa to watch television with Dolly. She doesn’t get on her bus to pre-school until 11:40 so we had a few hours to kill. I figured it would be a great time for me to sneak in a nap. She and I lay down on the sofa to watch kids’ shows, and, before I knew it, she was asleep. Great, now I only needed to relax enough to sleep. Just as I began to doze, Zach came walking down the stairs. He grabbed a pillow and the remote, and lay down at the other end of the sofa, realizing that I wanted to sleep a little. However, as most young children do when their parents are trying to rest, he just kept talking. Shortly thereafter Dolly was awake again and they both wanted to eat. Needless to say, I didn’t get my nap; nor did I get to do much of anything else I needed to do today.

I wasn’t really having any nicotine cravings; and I was doing fine with my eating. I’d had the breakfast drink and, a while later, some sunflower seeds, the kind still in the shells. I like those best because they take longer to eat since I can only eat one at a time. My ashtray has now become my seed receptacle. After a while I give up on eating them simply because I can’t get anything done what with whole sunflower seed process: load one in mouth, crack shell, eat seed, remove shell, re-load mouth. It’s too much sometimes but I do get a small snack out of it. After I put Dolly on the bus I made myself a couple pieces of low-fat/low-salt lunch meat – ham and turkey – in a pita pocket. Filling enough especially with a big glass of water. Then I wanted to try to relax again. Zach wanted me to watch a movie with him so I did. I watched part of it and was just beginning to snooze when he said, “Mom, wake up and watch this, it’s almost over.” Again, so was my nap.

I didn’t get to do my yoga this morning, either. I usually do it after Dolly gets on the bus, but Zach was watching television in the living room; the only room with enough room for me to do yoga. So I skipped it for today. As the day went on I basically sat at the computer doing whatever I could with the constant Zach interruptions. He played a video game for a while, so I played on the computer. When Ty came home, he’d brought Zach’s work home too so they both had something to do for a while. Then the fighting between the boys started and my stress level started to climb. It was already slightly elevated because my schedule was changed by having Zach home but I’d handled it. Now it was climbing. Breathe in, breathe out…breathe in, breathe out…I wanted a cigarette at that point, but I didn’t have any!! I just put my head in my hands and breathed; and breathed; and breathed.

The day wore on, all three kids were home; dinner time came and went, bed time arrived and all Hell broke loose. Nobody wanted to come in from outside, nobody wanted to get ready for bed, Dolly wanted a snack, Zach wanted to sleep in my room, Ty wanted to control the boys’ T.V. set…on and on it went. I just needed a release. I finally got everyone calmed down enough to stay in bed and I pulled out my rebounder. I only did a half hour on it tonight because the more I jogged/bounced, the more tired I seemed to get. That happened last week when I initially quit smoking so I was okay with it. Tomorrow it won’t be so bad.

In any case, I made it through day one without a cigarette, but, I will admit, even though I started the day off eating right, I did overeat a bit today. It’s hard for me not to when one, or all, of my kids is around. Whenever they eat, they want me to eat with them, even though I tell them I don’t want to. So I did great through the pita, but went a bit downhill afterward; nothing drastic, just more than I wanted. I did get some exercise in this evening, though, as I’ve already noted.

Tomorrow, day two, will be better to some extent. All the kids will be in school and I’ll be able to resume my usual schedule of exercise and eating habits. However, my withdrawal symptoms will probably be a little worse than they were today. I’m wondering if I’ll get a full night’s sleep tonight, and if the physical symptoms I had last week will return this time. We’ll see. Until tomorrow…peace to all.