Charlie's Story
By Make Smoking History
Charlie has decided to quit for the sake of his kids. To give himself the best shot at it, he takes himself away from his housemates when they light up around him at home. He’s also asked them not to offer him smokes, even though they keep doing it! Charlie’s great advice is to know in advance when there’s going to be the temptation and have a plan in place to get out of it.
Explore our website for ways to quit, tips for keeping on track and the health benefits you can look forward to as soon as you quit.
Transcript of Charlie’s video:
I started smoking when I was, probably had my first cigarette when I was 14.
My folks used to ask me to run cigarettes from one side of the house to the other.
We had business running from home and I used to take puffs of them on the way because they used to be lit up and my dad caught me one day, sat me down and
made me smoke a whole cigar.
I didn’t touch cigarettes for another couple of years after that.
This is probably the only time that I’ve really tried quitting,
probably a year ago when I hit 40.
I tried to make a few lifestyle changes for my kids and stuff
I wasn’t getting any younger you know!
My mum’s died of a smoking-related disease which wasn’t pretty to watch her go through
and my health started deteriorating a little bit so it was just the right time to give up smoking.
I live in a share house with lots of other people smoking.
I have asked them to not offer them to me and they’ve turned around and said ‘yeah fine’...
Sort of lasts for a couple of weeks and then, you know, it’ll get forgotten about and they’ll turn around and ask me again.
So it is tough.
There has been times where I’ll just go chill out in my room and separate myself from them.
I’ve tried to keep myself busy, I’ve been studying a lot this year and stuff like that
keep myself away from it.
Definitely after food, I definitely want to have a smoke.
There’s been times where I’ve been stressed out in my life and I’ve smoked more
definitely when I used to see other people having smokes.
Even still now I still feel like having a smoke.
So it’s just those little triggers that, I mean, there’s like a thousand of them I guess,
little triggers that could make you want to have a smoke.
One of the hardest things to do, you know, go do a Sunday session somewhere
and you know, there’s people around you smoking.
I just bite the bullet and say no, I can’t do that, if I have one I’ll have another one.
Know your triggers and when you’re going to be in a situation where you’re
going to want to smoke and have a plan to get out of it.
The urge usually passes pretty quickly so just try and get over that urge
and you’ll be ‘right, you’ll get there.