I originally was wrote the bulk of this text as an email for Shelly but realized that everyone could benefit from the message. Yesterday was a special day
for many of our members. Since the vast majority of our members are off for less than a year and yesterday was a American holiday that has many established
traditions, yesterday was one of those days that you could predict an onslaught of smoking triggers. It may have been cleaning and preparing a lot of food
for a lot of company, or could have been driving to a specific place and following a route you have not driven since you quit smoking, and then getting
together with family or friends who only gather on such occasion, or maybe it was eating with only a few people and maybe even being alone and feeling bad
because so many others had big plans. Whatever the situation, the thoughts of smoking are likely to resurface from such time periods.
Not all days lend themselves to such predictability, but when they do occur it is best to be ready for them. By their expected nature they afford us the
opportunity to take a little extra precaution. If you initially made a list of why you wanted to quit, the day of such events is a good time to pull it out
and reread it. If you made posts the first few days here at Freedom, it would be a good time to review your early thoughts and the responses too. You will
quickly see how strong of a grip cigarettes had, the importance you put on getting off of cigarettes, and realize that even though the day had its bad
moments, in all likelihood it was easier than it was at the beginning and you never want to go through that state again.
I hope you all had a good day one way or another. But even if it was not a great get together, it was the first such occasion with out a cigarette. That made
it a banner day. As awkward as it may have been it has helped prepare you for future such occasions. As with any other day, if you wake up the next morning
still smoke free, the preceding day was a great day, at least in not smoking terms. Since not smoking is a gift you give to yourself to help sustain your
health and improve your life, whether it was hard or not now is not important. What is important is that it was possible to survive as an ex-smoker and have
now proved to yourself that your life has gone on. This is the mark of a great day.
When Christmas comes, prepare yourself again. Come and read all the same posts, I will have them up again. As long as your guard is up AND your resolve is
reinforced you will survive the first time triggers, but you really do need both safe guards in force. Some times are not as easy to predict, when triggers
will occur, but others are somewhat foreseeable. At least take extra precautions for those times. For the unexpected triggers, just keep saying to yourself
on a daily basis that you will not smoke today, spend a little time reminding yourself why you quit and why you don't want to go back, and always keep in
practice to never take another puff!
Joel
Joel

