I can truly say that quitting smoking was the best thing I've ever done for myself. That being said, I haven't really noticed a HUGE difference in the way I feel. I do know that I don't wake up coughing every morning. My clothes don't smell, and I've even started wearing perfume every day, just to remind myself of how good I smell without cigarettes! There have been a couple of times that I've caught a cold, and kept waiting for it to get worse, or to head down into my lungs and hang around for a few weeks making me hack. Surprisingly, that never happened! I had a cold a few weeks ago, that I was sure was about go into my chest and give me a nasty cough. Well, I got a sore throat, but that was it. No cough! I KNOW that if I was still smoking, that virus would've hung around making me cough for weeks. So really, it's the little things that reward me for my efforts.
I read this quote on one of the weekly quit smoking emails that I still receive (and still look forward to):
"I'd rather be a non-smoker who thinks about smoking once in awhile, than a smoker who constantly thinks about quitting"I could not agree more with this statement, and wish I had come up with it myself! It is so true. For years before I quit, I thought about quitting almost every single time I light a cigarette. It feels so good to not feel that guilt anymore. Sure, I still think about smoking, but it's only once in a while, not every day. Usually, I realize how much I don't want one, instead of wishing I could have one. This whole experience has been an amazing personal transformation that I was never really sure I could accomplish. Now that I have, I am so proud of myself for trying and for succeeding!
