Unfortunately it was me that relapsed recently. I am however back on track and smoke free. Back in grade school I had a teacher give us a assignment where we had to report about current events for homework. We had to do Who, What, Where, Why and How for the event we were reporting on. I think it would be beneficial for myself to do the same with my relapse so other people can understand what exactly transpired. So here I go:
Who: Ben AKA Tin Man
What: I relapsed into smoking after being smoke free for close to two and a half years.
How: I chose to smoke fifteen Black and Mild cigars over the course of several days. On the Friday of June twenty fourth NYS passed the SSM bill that legalized gay marriage. I wanted to celebrate so I bought a pack of five Black and Mild cigars. I think I smoked one or two that night. I finished smoking the pack of cigars that Saturday. I wasn't concerned since they were not cigarettes and I never really liked smoking cigars so I thought i was allot less likely to fully relapse into smoking again. Two or three days passed by and I decided to smoke another five cigars by buying another pack from the store. I bought another pack on Thursday June thirtieth. I smoked four on Thursday which left me with one left for Friday.
I woke on Friday July first and smoked half of the remaining cigar. I drove to work and couldn't find the half cigar that I brought with me to work. I spent four to five minutes searching my truck with no luck. All morning while I worked I was wondering where that cigar went to because I was going through withdrawals. At this point was when the light bulb went off in my head and I knew I had messed up. I had a decision to make which was keep on feeding the addiction by completely relapsing or go through withdrawal and salvage my quit. I found the cigar at lunch time and smoked the rest of it. I knew from experience from the last time I relapsed that it would be in my best interest to stop feeding the addiction right there so I decided not to buy any form of nicotine from the store.
I got home from work on Friday and out of desperation trying to get my next fix I smoked the remainder of the cigar butts that I had in my ashtray all the way down to the plastic mouth piece. As the night progressed I was reduced to scavenging the tobacco out of the mouth pieces and smoking the tobacco in a pipe that I had laying around. I felt like an heroin junkie trying to get my next fix. Early Saturday morning I wrote my first relapse blog on here as "Anonymous" and have been clean ever since.
Where: Most of the smoking happened at my house but did some at work as well.
Why: I left this one for last because this one I believe is the most important of all. I chose to relapse by making the decision to smoke. Im not very surprised I relapsed since I was toying with the idea of smoking in my head for a week or two before I smoked that first cigar. Why go back to smoking after two and a half years being smoke free? Reason number one is I got bored with my quit. All the hard work was behind me and I felt like I was punching air. When I was a smoker I smoked forty cigarettes day in and day out. By the time I decided I wanted to quit smoking I was so sick and bored with smoking at the time I wanted nothing to do with them anymore. Fast forward two and a half smoke free years later and smoking seem sorta interesting again since I hadn't done it in such a long time.
Reason number two is I live with untreated social anxiety. It's so bad that it controls every single facet of my life and every decision I make on a daily basis. It also affects my ability to talk in awkward situations because my voice box freezes solid so I cant talk even if I want to say something (Selective Mutism). Talking to people gives me panic attacks so I avoid socializing at all cost. The Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz would be a much more fitting avatar for me than the Tin Man. My lack of socializing leads to depression and me feeling invalidated since I am not receiving the validation I would be getting by talking to people. Without the validation from socializing with people I have to seek out validation from other sources. In the past I have sought out the validation I crave by eating, drinking, smoking, stealing and doing drugs to make myself feel better. When I made the choice to relapse by smoking those cigars I was seeking out validation through smoking.
This blog is long enough. Im going to publish it now. To be continued……..
