I can see clearly now...

I am very happy there are support websites like this one! Having this opportunity to write and share with others my trials and tribulations with cigarettes is a great motivator.

I started smoking at the age of 13 with a friend of mine. I'll never forget trying to act like I knew what I was doing. And of course, I had to show my older sister that I smoked. She noted that I did not inhale, so of course, I had to inhale, and started choking and coughing. Imagine that!

At that time, the Surgeon General had not posted his findings about cigarettes, and the warnings were not on the packages. They cost about .25 a pack.

We had recently moved, and I so desperately wanted to fit in with the kids in the neighborhood, and be cool, and have 'adult' knowledge, which included cigarettes, that I would have tried almost anything. I also remember 'trying' to quit as a teenager, and finding it difficult, not realizing the hold they already had on me. Slowly they attached themselves to every aspect of my life - I let them in. I let them become the first thing I did in the morning, and the last thing I did at night.

I am happy that now, after all this time, I am breaking that binding.