Smoke Gets In Your Eyes

I started smoking when I was 14.  Since her parents were out of the country, a relative was staying with us for several weeks, waiting to start college.  I stole one of her cigarettes and smoked it behind the barn.  That was my first cigarette and by the time I was 16 I smoked daily.  My dad quit smoking when I was 5 and my mother never smoked.  They did not allow me to smoke so I hid my habit from them.  It was many years after I had left home before I would smoke in front of them.

In my high school, there was a "smoking area".  Students could smoke there if they were 18 or with parental permission if they were younger.  Since I turned 18 right before graduation, I smoked in the girl's bathroom.  When a teacher would walk into the bathroom, cigarettes went flying because unless they caught you with one in your hand, they could not prove it was yours.  We'd get stern looks as we shuffled out, until the next cat-and-mouse game.  I got caught once.  I was smoking alone between classes that day and my HomeEc teacher walked in.  Our eyes met and my heart sank.  If she turned me in and my parents were notified I'd be dead (well not literally dead, but I'd wish I was), but she didn't.  She told me to get to class and never spoke of it again.  I was thankful, but kept on smoking.

I was a heavy smoker; almost 3 packs a day.  It was the first thing I did when I woke up in the morning and the last thing I did before I laid my head down at night.  Bob smoked too, but not nearly as much; a pack a day perhaps.  I'd buy at least two cartons a week.  I remember when cigarettes were 50 cents a pack and I'd say when they got to be $1 a pack, I would quit.  Liar.

I smoked through all 3 of my pregnancies.  I am very ashamed of that and still feel guilty for having subjected my children to that.  Heather suffered the most since she was 13 when I quit; Bobby was 5.   When Bob was preparing to retire from the Navy, he suggested we quit smoking before he retired.  At the beginning of 1999 we made a pact and I promised him I would quit.  He left on a 6-month cruise and he would be separating from the Navy when he returned so I had 6 months.  I wasn’t sure I could do it.  I had tried in the past, but had never made it more than 3 days before I’d give in to the cravings.  I had made a promise and since I always kept my promises, I quit before he returned.  I am an all or nothing type of person so I knew I would not be successful tapering off, so I quit “cold turkey”, not one cigarette since June 1999.

It still amazes me that I was able to quit after smoking 28 years.  I’m thankful Bob made the suggestion.  I’m thankful my children have forgiven me choosing my selfish indulgence over their health.  I’m thankful it appears I quit before any lasting damage was done.  For several years after I quit, I would dream I was smoking and wake up terrified, it seemed so real and I never wanted to smoke again.