Hello all,
A little about me, I'm 30 years old. I started smoking cigarettes socially at 16 years old and cranked into a full time habit in college since there was no adult supervision. I continued to smoke up until I got my first professional job at 24 years old. I had already discovered dipping a few years prior to quitting cigarettes and did both for a few years. After I quit smoking, I started dipping full time. Now at 30 years old, I've witnessed numerous family members die from various forms of cancer, many of them related to tobacco use. I have recently witnessed two family members die in their early 60's from two different types of cancer and neither of them ever abused drugs or alcohol and never touched tobacco. Doing a little internal reflection, I realized I've used a form of tobacco for almost half my life at this point and started having panic attacks and losing sleep thinking I was a dead ringer for developing cancer. I have regular dental checkups and decent oral hygiene, but I've noticed the staining and gum recession associated with tobacco use and I've gotten paranoid about tooth loss, losing all or part of my jaw, premature death, the c-word. Recently, I was about to worry myself to death. I was crying at night lying in bed thinking I've already sentenced myself to a premature, agonizing, death. I was putting myself through torture. That finally strengthened my resolve to just quit.
I finished my last can on 6/16/2017 after going all day the day before without a dip. It's been foggy, I haven't been irritable. The first day was absolute anguish. Day 2 was better because I kept occupied. Today is better, although, not by much. I've been trying to exercise and drink lots of water to fill the void in my routine. It's just terribly difficult because I am doing this completely on my own, no one other than my dentist knows I dip. My wife gave me an ultimatum years ago, it was either her or the tobacco. I couldn't quit it for her and I did't want to lose her so I just got really good at hiding it. To this day, she thinks I quit more than 5 years ago. Basically, I have no one to talk to. I'm trying to be proud of myself for finally quitting, but I've been so deceitful for so long, I guess it serves me right as I am now struggling emotionally and mentally to deal with quitting.
I know this quit is for real because I've stopped many times before and my resolve to quit has never been as strong as it is now. I am determined to do this cold turkey, no patches, no gum, no fake stuff. Although I can say the physical symptoms are almost unbearable. I haven't taken it out on anyone and my mood with others has been pretty even, I know this has been my fault and no one else's. The guilt of hiding it and the paranoia about what could possibly happen if I continued to dip finally hit a tipping point, so I'm done with tobacco. I know I'm done, I just wish the physical withdrawal symptoms would go away.
