“If I carried on smoking I was killing myself, I know I was, I could feel it in my lungs. My daughter said to me, ‘Mummy, if you keep smoking you’re going to die, who’s going to look after me?’ And I was just like geez I’m not going to send that intergenerational trauma through my family because I didn’t have the courage or the will to stop smoking for my children, but for me too, first.

…There’s no more liberation than to know that you can conquer something. This has been the best thing that’s ever happened to me – oh – that I did for myself!”

Read the transcript:

I made a conscious choice to stop in May of this year. There’s some reasons around that as well my health was going downhill really fast. If I carried on smoking I was killing myself, I know I was, I could feel it in my lungs.

My daughter said to me, ‘Mummy, if you keep smoking you’re going to die, who’s going to look after me?’

And I was just like geez I’m not going to send that intergenerational trauma through my family because I didn’t have the courage or the will to stop smoking for my children but for me too, first.

So I did.

I freaked out I did it actually because I didn’t think I could. I literally in my head thought I couldn’t do it. It’s been a process, a transforming process.

My step-daughter said to me if you can do the first 3 days, you’ve got it. I did the first 3 days and I got to 11:30, midnight was the crossover to the 4th day, and I got to 11:30 and I was so stressed out and my poor hubby…I kind of bailed him up in the corner and was like ‘you’re going to give me a cigarette!’

He gave it to me and I actually had it in my hand and I went and sat outside in the same position. I put it to my lips, went to light it and then I put it down. And I sat there for like 10 minutes, then I was like ‘Oh! I’ve got to go and do the washing! I forgot about the washing!’ And I put it down and I never went back to it. I did go and apologise to my hubby though!

Create a safe space for yourself to be able to do it yeah and have whatever you need on hand to do it. Mine was coffee. And my psychological support, my external psychological support, my friends, my husband, I just got to look at my babies, my son and my daughter.

There’s no more liberation than to know that you can conquer something. This has been the best thing that’s ever happened to me - oh, that I did for myself!