Comments for Stronger Than This: A Journey Into Quitting Smoking

Comment on 30 Days of Not Smoking! A Great Milestone & Staying Strong by Paulete

Paulete — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 23:00:17 +0000

30 days of not smoking I havehad alot of struggles but its been worth it….I feel like a different person. I have had cravings and greived alot….

Comment on Day 6 No Smoking Video Post by Jason Heller

Jason Heller — Mon, 04 May 2009 17:19:55 +0000

Your spouse smoking is going to be problematic if it is near you. You need to discuss with him not to smoke near you, or quit together. Good to hear that you’ve been strong!

I quit and never looked back. It was the BEST decision I have ever made in my life. Find the will to do it. I have no urges and feel so much better.

Comment on Day 6 No Smoking Video Post by pah

pah — Mon, 04 May 2009 14:30:44 +0000

day six, all is well but nervous what will happen when i go camping with my honey next month. Because he smokes, and we smoke together when we are together…but maybe by then I’ll be stronger. Went to a bar on Friday, sooo tempted. But didn’t smoke.

Comment on Clean & Free! by Wendy

Wendy — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 20:25:17 +0000

Hiya Jason, I’m emailing you from Halifax, West Yorkshire in England here because I’ve just been going through my partner, Larry’s emails from last year as I need to close down the account. One of the emails I found in there was from me – I was sending him your clip from the BBC News website from 11th April 2008 where you announced the launch of your website about packing in smoking. It’s a very sad thing, Jason, since Larry died last year on Friday 29th August just a few months after I sent him your info. Larry was diagnosed with emphysema several years ago and since then I tried every way I could of getting him to pack in the smokes. He had around maybe a dozen goes at it but didn’t ever succeed in carrying it through. I’ve only just started to absorb the reality of losing him but one of the things I do realise is just how stressed and worried I was all the time because underneath I think I knew he was going into terminal illness. Neither of us realised how things would go last summer though. He had a slight chest infection and was coughing each night. In early August he asked me to call the doctor and was taken by ambulance and nebulised on the way to hospital. After a night in Accident & Emergency, they decided to admit him – everything seemed reasonable at that stage but they just wanted to get his blood oxygen levels stabilised. After a couple of days during which Larry was laughing and joking, they decided to admit him to the Respiratory Ward. A few days in, he developed “slight pneumonia” – we became concerned; they put him on intravenous antibiotics and thankfully, a few days later, he was said to be in recovery and his doctor anticipated him being released from hospital in time for the Bank Holiday weekend at the end of August. A day or so later, he’d dipped again and told me he had a collapsed lung. In the early hours of the following morning, they called me in to the hospital as he couldn’t breathe. They rushed him to the Intensive Care Unit where they sedated him and put him on a ventilator. Two days later, following a couple of investigations, they told me and his cousins that he had lung cancer; the prognosis wasn’t good as his right lung had collapsed and the left lung was full of emphysema. A week later, Larry was dead.

How many more people will go this way? I know that the tobacco companies are aggressively marketing their horrible products to children and young people in less developed countries. I believe Larry would not have had emphysema or lung cancer if he had not been a smoker. That means he would have been a pretty fit individual instead of the shadow that he had become. Here I am all alone and just turning over old emails from a year ago and remembering his presence and the things that were on our minds back then. He has gone and I have to get my head round that and move on. Jason, thanks for the inspiring thing you’ve done here. Hope you’re still off the fags. If for any reason you’re back on them, get off them soon, please. Regards and respect, Wendy Anderson

Comment on Clean & Free! by strongerthanthis

strongerthanthis — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 01:32:02 +0000

Yeah it’s amazing how it got to this point. Keep the faith. Know that it is possible to stay clean and free!

Comment on Clean & Free! by SJ

SJ — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 01:28:42 +0000

Congratulations!

Me? I did slip. Pressure in the office & I was off the wagon after 5 months. Now, my real job is to get back onto the right path, leaving this smokey silliness behind. Lord knows how rotten I feel physically, let alone how I’ve let myself down.

It’s a tough trip. Ciggy companies are criminal; they’re no better than dope pushers on the street.

Comment on Day 6 No Smoking Video Post by strongerthanthis

strongerthanthis — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 13:03:28 +0000

yup – been off those stinking things since Feb now. 99% no urges left! every once in a blue a little urge creeps in, but i can reassure you that 99% of the time, it’s not on my mind and i’m even repulsed by the smell most of the time.

good luck!

Comment on Day 6 No Smoking Video Post by emma

emma — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 12:32:47 +0000

did you keep it up? i am on day 6 today. it sucks. the sun is shining. it is a warm friday. and the balcony is calling. but i will resist

Comment on Day 21 – Stop Smoking It Will Kill You (And You Smell Like Crap!) by Stop Smoking

Stop Smoking — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 19:00:22 +0000

Broadcasting to the world is excellent leverage to keep yourself at it. Imagine being seen in the street with a cigarette in your mouth after posting on youtube. I hope strongerthanthis is enjoying the fresh air.

Comment on 30 Days of Not Smoking! A Great Milestone & Staying Strong by Stefan

Stefan — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 16:02:17 +0000

The first 30 days are the easiest. It’s the long-term cessation that proves difficult. What has happened since?