Glad to be here

[Athan]

Experienced an incongruity of thought with the Mrs. while shopping. Decided to walk home lest I utter something worthy of sleeping on the couch for a week. Not a long trek as the crow flies as it’s through the woods and avoiding the roundabout path of the highway. A light drizzly rain adds to the poor choice yet serves only to augment my stubborn bent. I was a few miles into it when I encounter the railroad tracks. I’d forgotten I’d have to traverse the railroad tracks. The embankment is steep on either side stretching for miles north and south, I’m headed east. I attack it at an angle but to no avail. I soon find myself slipping head long down the incline and picking up speed. At the last moment I decide to jump, opting to land vertical instead of headfirst into the gravel and ties. I felt it immediately â€" the ruptured tendon in the right foot. You know that moment when you realize that the course that you’ve set upon has become untenable? I had one of those. I’m still a few miles from home and no longer ambulatory. The rain is picking up. I consider my options. Traversing up the opposite side and then miles through the forest is looking less and less likely as my foot begins to swell and throb. I decide to follow the railroad tracks into town where they cross the highway. I’m going to have to swallow my intractable pride; I’m going to have to call her, apologize for my intransigence and ask for help. Damn it all. I make my way painfully along, hobbling from tie to tie, a cacophony of frogs and crows mocking me as I slink along.

Fast forward 4 hours. I’m now home on the couch having been released from the ER and sitting with my foot elevated per doctors orders when my phone rings. It’s my daughter. All college students are required to be tested for CoVid prior to attending fall classes. She’s positive (no symptoms whatsoever). We are all now quarantined for two weeks.

If there were ever a ‘just one’ moment this is it, the quitionary says look right here when you look it up. There’s just no end to them. This wouldn’t have been a just one event; it would have been a balls out chew like there’s no tomorrow honey go by me a sleeve. So that’s why I posted my promise yesterday and why I’m posting it today and why I’ll post it tomorrow. Because ‘just one’ is out there, with my name on it, waiting for me.

[Athan]

@GS9502 breaks it down....

Quit, Quit Baby â€" Quitnilla Ice

All right stop, expectorate and listen
GS is down with the KTC mission;
Nicotine had a hold of me tightly,
Poisoning my body daily and nightly.
Did I wanna stop, yo I sure did,
For me, for my wife, and for my two great kids.
Stone cold turkey I threw that shit down,
Opened myself like a hospital gown;
Quit, felt my head start to boom,
Nic killin’ my brain, make me think that I was doomed,
Deadly, nic was slowly killin’ me,
Addicted to it like a bee to honey.
Lovin’ that I left it, every damn day
WUPP is word, the KTC way
And if I start cravin’, I call on my crew,
We quit that shit, we’re down and we’re through!

Quit, quit, baby Oh yeah, I’m
Quit, quit, baby No longer
spit, spit, baby Oh yeah, I’m
Quit, quit, baby!

[Athan]

Just booked a flight & car to see my brother Skolvikings. I'll arrive on my day 1000, stay the night, and wake up with my hands between two pillows on his day 1000.
The countdown begins!!
This much is certain - photos will absolutely not be permitted

I just got a new LED light for the Ole' hot tub, it changes colors.  I'm thinking Chateaubriand, Béarnaise Sauce, Goat Cheese Smoked Taters, Prosciutto Green Beans and a Key Lime Pie.  Can't wait to celebrate with you brother.  I'll make sure I wash the PILLOWS

Hey you, yeah you! If you're just starting out and reading this....this is how life is meant to be. Celebrated. Not enslaved and groveling for the next fix. It does get better. All you gotta do is make the choice. Freedom is just lying in wait and oh how sweet it is!

[Skolvikings]

Just booked a flight & car to see my brother Skolvikings. I'll arrive on my day 1000, stay the night, and wake up with my hands between two pillows on his day 1000.
The countdown begins!!
This much is certain - photos will absolutely not be permitted

I just got a new LED light for the Ole' hot tub, it changes colors.  I'm thinking Chateaubriand, Béarnaise Sauce, Goat Cheese Smoked Taters, Prosciutto Green Beans and a Key Lime Pie.  Can't wait to celebrate with you brother.  I'll make sure I wash the PILLOWS

[Athan]

Just booked a flight & car to see my brother Skolvikings. I'll arrive on my day 1000, stay the night, and wake up with my hands between two pillows on his day 1000.
The countdown begins!!
This much is certain - photos will absolutely not be permitted

[Athan]

from @Badmoona on 2 years (much respect Don Quitlioni):

badmoona - 2 years.  feels good.  Remember folks, I would have been at 8 years if i didn't cave back in 2014.  I left my group (October 2012 ironically) and caved months later.  I really don't plan on leaving ever. thanks everyone.

Ain't never cured boys. Like Exbearhag says, you read stuff like that and get a 'reset'. We're only as quit as yesterday. Quit on brotha's!

[Athan]

From my quit brother @stillbrewing , as BluManChew likes to say, a textual chocolate:

"Hello quitness my old friend
I've come to quit today again
Because addiction softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was dipping
And the vision of quit that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of quitness"

Adapted from Simon & Quitfunkle

[Athan]

Wife and girls gone for a whole week. This would have been balls out chew like there's no tomorrow time. Especially when the front yard developed a geyser. Powered through that with narry a crave although cognizant all the while that I was doing it without a lipper. Not now. Not today. Not for any reason.

Had the pleasure, nay honor and privilege of hosting a steak dinner for a young man joining the Marine Corps.  Every now and then you run into a young man who gives you hope for the future. I left him with these immutable truths: Jesus Christ is Lord, nicotine and alcohol are not your friend, that stripper doesn't love you, statistically three out of three people will die, contentment is the greatest wealth, and all real men wish they were United States Marines. Hooah.

I digress, the real reason I stopped by this morning is to capture this textual chocolate from BluManChew:
"Understanding the addiction and understanding that the reptilian desire and slobbering crave we have for nicotine is in direct conflict with what our higher sense of reason instructs us.  That's the mind fuckery."

[Athan]

Thanks boys. The sentiments are mutual I assure you. Crossed the nine hundy on the beach. Sure do appreciate all of the pickups. Even had a brother at his camp in Alaska pick me up from the beach in Florida. Woulda reached out all the way to India to QuitNWinay in Oct '18 if I'd had his number. Woulnd'tcha know it my brothers are all there packing lipper after lipper. I sat there as my younger brother packed a three finger wad in place, you know the one, stretches the lip out till it's smooth and shiny. There he was spitting in the sand at our feet. As disgusted as I was, way back in the recesses of my brain, way down in the hippopotamus, I felt an urge. I had a 'just one' moment. I imagined it there in my lip, all fat and juicy. I gave him a sideways glance and wondered if he knew what it's like to be free. I do. I ain't never going back there neither. A simple promise every day is such a small price to pay to keep slavery at bay.

[chris2alaska]

900

We can move mountains if we put our minds to it.

Damn proud to be one step behind you for eternity.

Much love brother - NAFAR

Waiting for the day when the three of us are at the same table together.

Until then, Proud as hell to quit with you.

[Skolvikings]

From Goody 5/20/18 on freedom:

We where booking in fisherman yesterday when I saw someone who has been fishing here for over 30 years. He had a mouth full of leaf in and saw I had a can of fake. He asked me if I quit and with shouldered back and head high I said your dam right I quit. He told me he could not quit the snuff but could quit the leaf when ever be wanted. I thought that used to be me. The words of an addict. He asked if it was hard to quit I said yes. But he new that. I told him of the KTC site. Didn't really want to hear it. I felt bad for him but God dam proud of myself. I will never be that person again. Just something interesting to pass on. It was nice to see the work was paying off in me brain to be around others chewing and it was OK. Now let's go fishing.

Dang I miss my friend Hank..... RIP Goody, I hope they are biting good on that glistening pond in the ultimate North.

[EXBEARHAG]

A month or so ago we had a nuclear bomb hit our family. Stole my breath, rocked me back on my heels, and ripped my heart out of my chest in one fell swoop. There are levels of anguish that cannot be explained. Things that cannot be undone. Life happened. I continued to get up every day and to breathe in and out. I pulled back like a turtle in a shell and focused only on our immediate household. I still posted in my home room every day but that was it. A thought hit me yesterday as I was working a pasture that a lipper would have been nice. Not a crave. Just a thought. It then occurred to me that had I used the trauma as an excuse to leave I would have popped 'just one' yesterday. Instead, I remained nicotine free another day. Life, good or bad, only happens one day at a time. Each day, good or bad, is a gift. We don't get to choose what befalls us; our choice is how to respond. Stay clean. Work the problem. Continue living. One Day At A Time.
for fathers of little girls

Preach it brother. Damn glad you're still here and still quit!

@Athan

You are a pillar here my friend.  Folks come to this site when they are at the lowest of lows...scared, vulnerable, fogged out, enraged, etc.  Most run into your posts without too much searching; a testament to your heroic involvement.  Speaking for myself, once I read one of your posts, I actively searched you out and read everything I could get my hands on.  You are a clear and concise writer and your posts are well thought out, often witty, and always on point with the best interest of the individual or group in mind.

Reading the post above put some things in perspective for me.  I've been fairly active on the site describing my struggles over the last 339 days...especially early on.  I could have written much more.  As recently as this morning, I awoke for work about an hour early, sweats and rapid heart rate.  Stressful tours = more craves and the unwavering thought in my brain that everything I do would be easier and more manageable with a wedge in my lip.  The depth of my dependance on nicotine continues to amaze me.

Yet I'm here at 339 days quit...a number I never came close to in the past.  Like you I believe that without this place and the connections I've made here, I would have caved by now in the same way you described above.  Posts like yours above "reset" me.  They ensure me that I am not alone...not unique.  They also prove that I've got a long road ahead...but so did you and you are still here and quit. 

I'm the father of a daughter also.  If you can make it through the last several weeks and remain unincarcerated, never mind free of nicotine, then I can make it another day.  Thank you for your involvement on this site and, on a personal level, thank you for sharing your story...I'm stronger in my quit than I was before reading it.  Hold the line my friend.

~HAG

[Skolvikings]

900

We can move mountains if we put our minds to it.

Damn proud to be one step behind you for eternity.

Much love brother - NAFAR

[69franx]

A month or so ago we had a nuclear bomb hit our family. Stole my breath, rocked me back on my heels, and ripped my heart out of my chest in one fell swoop. There are levels of anguish that cannot be explained. Things that cannot be undone. Life happened. I continued to get up every day and to breathe in and out. I pulled back like a turtle in a shell and focused only on our immediate household. I still posted in my home room every day but that was it. A thought hit me yesterday as I was working a pasture that a lipper would have been nice. Not a crave. Just a thought. It then occurred to me that had I used the trauma as an excuse to leave I would have popped 'just one' yesterday. Instead, I remained nicotine free another day. Life, good or bad, only happens one day at a time. Each day, good or bad, is a gift. We don't get to choose what befalls us; our choice is how to respond. Stay clean. Work the problem. Continue living. One Day At A Time.
for fathers of little girls

Preach it brother. Damn glad you're still here and still quit!

[Athan]

A month or so ago we had a nuclear bomb hit our family. Stole my breath, rocked me back on my heels, and ripped my heart out of my chest in one fell swoop. There are levels of anguish that cannot be explained. Things that cannot be undone. Life happened. I continued to get up every day and to breathe in and out. I pulled back like a turtle in a shell and focused only on our immediate household. I still posted in my home room every day but that was it. A thought hit me yesterday as I was working a pasture that a lipper would have been nice. Not a crave. Just a thought. It then occurred to me that had I used the trauma as an excuse to leave I would have popped 'just one' yesterday. Instead, I remained nicotine free another day. Life, good or bad, only happens one day at a time. Each day, good or bad, is a gift. We don't get to choose what befalls us; our choice is how to respond. Stay clean. Work the problem. Continue living. One Day At A Time.
for fathers of little girls