andsoitgoestoo

Welp sitting here still thinking I would be so much happier and motivated if I could just smoke. It couldn't be that I am still sore, thinking my bladder sling surgery got fucked up, that my parents are still in crisis mode, that I haven't worked at somethign that makes me feel good about myself in years, that I am fat and ugly and useless and ... all that reality would just go away with one puff.

You know it just fucking might.

Yesterday Mariananna and I were talking and she was very enthused that I still haven't smoked. I STILL haven't been out the fucking house what with this heat wave. She wanted to know what I was going to use to help me keep not smoking. Hah. You think I am that organized about this? I just thought being on meds and being housebound might be a good time to, ahem, quit.

But actually what I am using are these pictures in my head, like signs. I believe in signs. I believe the universe talks to me. Yes, that's right. Just me.

I have been dicking around with this for so long I really was getting sick of myself. I'd go a day. Then give up. I would ration them, putting 8 in a bad for day one, then 7, etc. Then I would just steal from Michael. Sometimes I would spend the day in bed to get through it.

And then I would get up in the morning to run down to the Farm Store to get my stash. That is always a stressful experience for me because unlike any other area of my life, I try to be in the closet about smoking. I would quickly scan all the cars on the parking lot to make sure no one I knew was there. And if they were I would check out the fat content in potato vs. tortilla chip until they were gone. I mean I talking about Eli's soccer coach from 5 years ago!

I am also tired of being always furtive while driving in my neighborhood so no parents I know would see me. Like this fault would be the one that would make a parent not let their kid play with mine. I am really glad I got the magnetic signs off my car for the decorating but now I just have this ugly car with magnet crap on it. I am now just any ol loser in a beat up car smoking her brains out.

And, I am tired of the kids giving me shit. I know they mean well but when I would get one moment of solitude on the back porch they would inevitablly have to ask me something and then make a bunch of noise about the smell or even something less annoying like me dying.

I am tired of say going on a field trip with school and by the time we got home I was such a raving bitch for not smoking all day. That I really hate.

I am tired of being in complete and total denial about what a stupid thing it is.

Okay and like I said I believe in signs.

My first recent one was when my mother was at Stella Maris. I took her in the wheelchair out on the grounds and we sat there. There was patient, a man in probably his late 50's who seemed paralyzed from the neck down. His wife/SO and he sat there smoking the whole time. She would put the cigarette up to his mouth and he would take a puff. It seemed like that was probably his only enjoyment and it was something he couldn't even do himself anymore. Now he may have been in a car accident but more likely it was a stroke or heart attack. Well, you know what. I would probably smoke too at that point.

My next sign was when I was in my stealth mode at the Farm Store. A guy was in line with had a trach tube. One of those where you can put your finger over the tube and talk because he did ask some woman about the icecream she was buying.

I thought to myself, I bet he is going to buy cigarettes and damned if he didn't. I did too but I oh so very ashamed of myself.

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. I can't get these pics out of my head but I think that is good.

I need more visual cues though so I just went and looked at some oral cancer photos. Here is the URL if you are as sick as me. http://www.entusa.com/oral_photos.htm

I just wish I had never started. I remember the day. I was 24 and helping run a new wave disco night at a local club. I had a band that I had worked with doing publicity for them and I was nervous as hell and I just asked someone to give me one. And the rest was history. I was a late bloomer when it came to smoking but it stuck.

I did stop when I was pregnant both times. I know it can be done for the greater good of someone else. I guess I haven't have never felt that I could possibly be the greater good.

Could it be at 46 I am finally seeing that if I come last whether it is exercise, having fun, down time, etc. that there isn't as good stuff left for the kids and my parents and my dear, dear friends? Oh this sounds like a 5 minute story on the Today Show. Middle aged woman gets cancer, gets cured. Life changes dramatically. blah. blah.

I do so hope this time it is going to work. I don't feel like it is that dramatic since I have been fucking around with this dx for two months now. I have been chest xrayed and cat scanned and scraped and proded so much that I feel like my health is pretty good right now. I mean they didn't seem to be able to find anything else. Does this mean I should just carry on ... hey smoking ain't gonna hurt me now or should I try and make some changes? You know how you hear these stories of get their lives together and then boom, dead from a heart attack. That surely would be my luck if my luck lately is any indication.

I am awful with team support, support groups, people offering to help me. I don't want to hear ...keep up the good work. I just want this to be a year from now and I am through the worst of it.

I know I need to do this on my own, for myself.

First step will be liking myself enough to think I doing this is, like the Loreal chick, because I am worth it.

And so it goes.