Day 11: About Me

I can't believe I've made it so far! I see a lot of differences between the past few days and the first week not smoking. For the first few days my thoughts evolved around not smoking and not being able to smoke. Constantly. I don't know how many times each day I thought about it, it seems to have taken over my mind. That's not so true anymore. I think about it a couple times a day, but only in passing. My work day is flowing through without the smoke breaks. I've taken to walking around the 4th floor of the building instead of going outside. I'm just not thinking about it, and that's the big improvement at the moment.

I know the Chantix side effects are nothing compared to those of smoking. It's just that I'm not ready for a "benefit of not-smoking" frame of mind yet. I *know* the benefits of quitting, I *know* the harm it causes, but for the past 11 days I've been more focused on not being able to smoke, and overcoming each day as opposed to all the ways it will make my life better. My mind is starting to switch over, it just takes a little time ;-)

I realized that I have all these people reading my blog and cheering me on, but no one knows much about me, because all I've talked about is smoking and not smoking. So here goes:

I am 25 years old and live near St. Louis, MO. I work downtown (about 3 blocks from the arch) as an "Associate IT Analyst" -- which basically means I'm a computer programmer. I have 2 children, both girls, ages 7 and 4. I got married in July of 2007 to the father of the second child (we had the kid, lived together for over 5 years, just never sealed the deal till then). Although Alex is not technically the father of my oldest, you wouldn't be able to tell. The most major thing in my life at this moment is quitting smoking, but you already know that. Seeing as how I work full time and have two kids, free time isn't something I have much of. But when I do get an energizing moment, you'll probably find me playing the Sims 2 or DDR. You also might find me at the club, dancing my heart out (but I don't think I can handle the smokey clubs for a while yet).

So, that's me and my life in a nutshell.