Today is day 100 for me! I did not join a quit group but frequented this site and took enormous comfort in everyone's quit stories so thought I should share mine. Figured I would post here instead of HOF since I was not part of a quit group. Mods, please let me know if I should move it.
I dipped Kodiak for 30 years, a tin a day for probably the last 20. I "quit" many times, once for six months (although that was 15 years ago now), but always fell into the trap of thinking I could have just one. I can't. Evil nic bitch.
Took a long vacation with my family in the NC mountains and Disney World this summer and didn't bring any dip. I'd been a ninja dipper from my kids for the last five years or so and knew I would not be able to get away and sneak one. The funny thing was I did not miss dip at all for the almost three weeks we were gone. I guess we were having so much fun that I just didn't think about it. I also knew I had not "quit", I was just taking a break so my 10 year old son would not lecture me about how awful tobacco is. The second I got home though I knew where I had left a tin and packed a fattie. I continued dipping for a week and then came to the realization that I felt so much better when I wasn't dipping. On vacation I never had headaches, never felt my heart racing, never had that vaguely uneasy feeling I would sometimes get after a dip, had no fatigue, had no tingling in my arm. I guess I had been living like that for so long that it was just normal. I did not realize I felt like shit because I always felt like that, it was all I knew. I woke up on July 8th, had the last dip out of my tin and decided I was done. It was the first time I had ever quit for me. Before I had quit for my wife or for my kids but never for me. I think that fact made all the difference to my determination.
Quite honestly I have had no cravings. But the fog, oh the fog. I cannot put into words how bad I had the fog starting at day four. I don't know if it was because I whipsawed my brain by quitting for three weeks, dipping for one, and then quitting again but man I have never felt anything like that. I had it every day, most of the time all day. Sometimes so bad that I literally felt like I was going to fall over when I was standing. I have never had anxiety before but also had a tightness in my chest and a foreboding feeling that something bad was going to happen. The anxiety was not triggered by anything in particular, it was just always there, hovering in the background. Thank heavens for KTC because if I had not read other people's stories I would have spent thousands on trips to the ER. Another fact that helped me get through the fog was that I scheduled a physical with my doctor two weeks into my quit and got a clean bill of health. Because of this I knew I was not dying and it was just my brain re-wiring itself after 30 years of relying on nicotine to regulate so many functions.
I dealt with the fog by drinking incredible amounts of water and exercising. I'm probably one of the few people to ever lose weight when they quit tobacco. I started riding my bike the 28 miles round trip to work 2 or 3 days a week. The exercise somehow soothed my brain and on those days I was able to do some work through the static in my head. Days I drove I do not know how I got to work without wrecking or how I got anything done once I got there. I also began chewing on tea tree oil toothpick which helped with the anxiety.
The first day I awoke without the fog was day 40. I'll never forget it. It was a Friday. I thought, "Thank god I've made it to the other side." The fucking fog was right back on day 41. That was the low point of my quit and I almost threw the towel in. But I'd come so far and had that little taste of clarity that gave me hope my brain was not always going to be like this. I kept reading KTC stories and knew the fog liked to stick around but slowly lessen over time.
Sure enough, starting around day 65 the fog started to slack off. Instead of having it all day I would just have it in the morning or in the afternoon for a few hours. The tightness in my chest let up and the feelings of anxiety went away. There were still some days when I had the fog all day but it was gone more often that not. It came roaring back on the Monday and Tuesday of day 86 and 87 as bad as it had been the first 40 days but by that point I was smarter than it and thanks to KTC knew to expect this last onslaught of the nic bitch as she was in her death throes.
I have for the most part been completely fog free since day 88 and not felt better since I was a teenager. I feel like I can bike forever without getting tired. My body used to wake me up at 6 am like clockwork every morning for a nicotine fix. I now have to use an alarm clock for the first time in years to make sure I do not oversleep. I'm $500 richer. I could go on but this post has been long enough.
I know I'm not completely out of the woods but man do I feel better. I've read the fog can re-appear in the 120s or so and some people have to deal with it for even longer periods of time but I am ready and prepared if it comes back. I have crawled through the trenches. Thank you KTC for getting me through this. I could not have done it without the stories people have posted from their own quits.
