The Weakness Of The Mind

I'm 34 years old. Grown up, got a decent job, house and car, but i do have a dirty little habit, and one that i'm ashamed of, and that is for the last 20 years i have been a smoker.

During the last 20 years i have made several attempts to give up. Some have lasted a couple of hours, some have gone on for a few weeks, but it would be wrong to say that some have been more succesful that others, and this is another case of one being unsuccessful, and i hate myself for it.

I got up yesterday, faithfully stuck my nicotine patch on, and felt a little bit of pride at breaking the 3 week barrier of not having a cigarette and beating the odd craving here and there. During the last 3 weeks i have felt a lot better, kept up with my running and progressing with that, by running further and not getting as out of breath, kept up with my healthy eating, and generally felt in better shape than i have done for years.

Yet, at work tonight, and it was a good night at work, relatively stress free, and pretty straightforward, i felt the urge for a cigarette and told myself that i can have some cigarettes and start again on Sunday, so i ended up going home from work in the car, and stopping off at a 24 hour garage, and buying 20 Marlboro Lights and smoking them until my heart was content on the drive home from work, and now i'm sat in the kitchen enjoying a well earned Jim Beam and Coke after work, writing this out, and got another fag on the go.

I feel stupid, i feel weak and i feel like i have let myself down, let others down who have had faith in me, and helped to encourage me in my attempt to kick the evil weed. By not having a cigarette for 3 weeks i'd felt good, i'd felt proud of what i had done, and now all that has gone to waste.

I'm going to go to bed in a minute and grab some sleep before getting back up at dinnertime, and then get out on the beer, watch Sheffield United and then have a good night up town, but today i' m going to smoke and i'm going to smoke as much as i want, but then when i wake up on Sunday morning, i'm going to lament the demise of Attempt Number 156 to give up smoking and get cracking on Attempt Number 157, and hopefully it will last for the rest of my life.