Thank you for not smoking

New Year’s Day marked the one year anniversary of my giving up smoking. In the early days I didn’t think I’d make it this far – I’d smoked since I was a teenager, and I was good at it. I also enjoyed it – especially when the act was partnered with a few drinks. My aunt’s therapist recently told her that cigarettes and alcohol were essentially married – and in my experience the divorce has not been altogether amicable.

Of course the smoking ban has been a god-send when it comes to beating temptation – when the small minority of my friends who do still smoke pop out of the pub or bar for a sly cig, I don’t envy them the shivering or the social outcast status. But the summer proved to be tough – beer gardens, sun and smoking go together well. And house parties have nearly seen my downfall. Unfortunately for me, the group of friends who hold the most in-house gatherings are also the crowd in which a hefty number still puff away gleefully – whether they prefer to stay in so they can smoke freely, I don’t know, but I sure as hell have envied them those delicious alcohol-infused inhalations.

Annoyingly, the better half plays the mature ‘you’ll only disappoint yourself’ card. I’d much prefer it if he’d respond to my ‘would one really hurt’ drunken witterings by telling me that I simply am not allowed to smoke – that he forbids it. How well this direct form of control would go down in my drunken reality, I can only hazard a guess. But he’s right, of course. If I did allow myself ‘just one’, I’d only wake up the next morning feeling terribly let down – that all those months of abstaining had been for nothing. And once you pop that social-smoking cherry, it becomes instantly harder to resist the next temptation. There’s nothing worse than the person at the party or in the pub who ‘doesn’t smoke but would actually really enjoy one with this drink, even though they know it’s naughty’. In other words, they have given up buying their own fags, but would love to smoke yours.

But out of a drinking environment, I’m absolutely fine without the fags. Don’t miss them one bit. The first obvious benefits of stopping smoking were instantly rewarding – my fingernails grew rapidly, my hair and skin began to look brighter, and I no longer smelt. And the long-term benefits are just as sweet. Not only have I dramatically reduced my risk of heart and lung disease, I’ve also managed to save around £500 in the past year – money that would usually have been puffed away that is now going to help pay for my honeymoon. One of the main pieces of advice I’d offer to those trying to keep their new year’s resolution is to set up a standing order for the amount you’d usually spend on cigs in a month to go into a savings account, so you can actually see the worth of your continued determination.

Oh, and don’t fanny about with nicotine-replacement inhalers - they’ll just keep the stuff in your system for longer. In my past experience it was a steep slippery slope back to the real things. You might have had your fill of it over the last few weeks, but I found that cold turkey really was the best approach.

IMAGE by Flickr user psyberartist