On my 18th birthday I started to smoke in front of my parents but I smoked already since some months without them knowing it.
I am a person “all or nothing” y from the time I started smoking, I smoked 30 to 40 cigarettes daily.
So I continued amassing nicotine in my lungs. At 25 years I fell in love with a Spanish boy and I left my country, my work, a good salary and my car… all for love.
My fiancé had to move to Las Palmas of Gran Canary Island and I accompanied him. As a military man he had to work there andI found a job in the Services branch or better said: the job found me. First of all I worked in the office of a travel agency and was in charge of the international correspondence. Very soon other companies were interested to hire me to do excursions. During some time I didn’t want to because, in reality I am a shy and reserved person. I didn’t picture myself entertaining a bus full of tourists. Anyway they insisted and on the other hand my husband tried to convince me as well and then I agreed.
I never regretted that because in this work I learned how to provide wellness to others and I got to know myself better. By that time it still was permitted in busses. Besides that the tobacco was incredibly cheap in the Canaries and, knowing my character, I got even to the point of smoking 3 packages daily.
After that we got married and had 2 children: first a boy and then a girl. We found that good enough to have 2 descendants.
I even smoked during both pregnancies. Thinking it over, I feel ashamed and I probably didn’t deserve to have 2 healthy babies.
Anyway, the tobacco didn’t give me health problems (yet) y my lung capacity was big. I was have been in my forties when I started to feel uncomfortable at home: everything was smelling badly!
When having my days off I cleaned the house thoroughly and washed all the wood with water and soap. I washed all the curtains, all the book covers… Tired but satisfied to have again a clean house I sat down and rewarded myself smoking a cigarette…. one of the 50 daily. The result didn’t have me waiting. Some days later the house smelled again badly. I though about buying everything new: furniture, curtains…. everything. Then I suddenly saw the light: No Margo, the change shouldn’t come from outside; it should come from inside yourself!
Then I decided to stop smoking. That was easily said but My God! That was very difficult! In an outburst I threw the 3 packages of cigarettes I had in my bag out of my car’s window on the road to work. From home to work it was 45 minutes or according to my measures: 4 cigarettes.
The first 3 weeks were the worst and after that the yearning for smoking got less and less. My colleagues, the bus drivers, didn’t believe their eyes: “Woman, this is incredible! Nobody will believe this!” One of them said: “Now that you’ve mastered that, you could only smoke a cigarette after your meals” and he offered me one of his’. And this always will happen… somebody will offer you a cigarette and I accepted. After work, on my way home I bought 3 whole cartons of cigarettes and I started smoking with more anxiety than before.
¡¡¡GGGRRRRR!!!
After smoking some months in an uncontrolled way I started feeling again bad with myself and the bad smell in the house. Now this time I would prepare it better….
My car was old and I bought a new one deciding that not a single cigarette could be smoked in the new car. That was difficult because, as I said before: from home to work I smoked already 4 pieces. But, little by little I started being mentally prepared. At a certain point my body and mind didn’t remember the cigarette while driving. After a few months I would extend the smokeless area.
Luckily we have a big house and I chose a room that wasn’t in use. I emptied and cleaned it and I moved all my stuff of entertainment to that room. I would do my reading, writing, playing organ in there. I forbid my husband to come in there smoking because this would be my smokeless corner. Understand me: in the beginning I was only in there for some minutes and then went outside to smoke but I got accustomed to being in there each time a bit longer.
Now you might think that I already smoked less but that wasn’t true by any means. At the end of the day I had smoked the same amount of cigarettes as before. In our bedroom we never smoked.
I was very decided to restrict the smoking areas at home but it was difficult because my husband didn’t want to collaborate: “You can do what want but don’t include me in your wild, silly plans. Besides that, one has to die of something!” What a negative thought! I was alone in this task!
The next goal would be not to smoke in the living room and the kitchen and, if I wanted to smoke, I just had to go to the garden or the courtyard. But then suddenly, I don’t know how but something snapped inside of me. It could be that my mind had contacted a superior will (my own Will after all). It was on a Saturday in April 1986.
I woke up and it was if though I heard a voice inside my head saying: “you don’t need to smoke anymore”. I got goosebumps at that moment because I know this was serious. I got up and went to the kitchen to prepare myself my morning coffee. “No” (the voice inside my head had other plans) “better prepare tea” and again my arms got completely the shivers with goosebumps.
All of a sudden I was guided in everything I did. I prepared the meal for my family but for myself I prepared vegetarian food. I didn’t drink alcoholic drinks anymore and all of because that voice in my head that repeated “Drink water”.
Then I used to drink 3 or 4 litres of water and that helped me to detoxify of the excesses of half of my existence. There were large spots and skin rash showing on my arms, my stomach and torso. When I approached my hand to the spots, I felt how they irradiated heat.
Of course there were moments when I felt a tremendous necessity to smoke. In that case I got into my car and started driving around until the longing was gone or I went to my smokefree room where my mind knew I couldn’t smoke. And I continued this until I got used to my new style of life.
By that time the voice in my head, my own willcraft had such a big influence in my life that it even showed up in my dreams guiding my reactions.
Short dreams: I was walking and met a colleague inviting me to have a coffee. “No… I prefer tea” – Have a cigarette – “No thanks, I don’t smoke!”
Another dream: I was sitting on a flat roof with fabulous sights when I suddenly found myself going down a staircase into darkness. I had a burning cigarette between my fingers. Quickly I threw it away and went running upstairs to the place with the beautiful views.
The symbolic meaning of those dreams draws very much the attention. Dreams like that, I had by the dozen during that episode of my life.
It must have been already one year that I stopped smoking when I met an acquaintance while walking in the street. She offered me a box of Dunhill (the brand I used to smoke). Of course, I refused but then that person told me she was trying to stop smoking and didn’t want to have the temptation of cigarettes so near. Just to help her I accepted the pack of cigarettes. Once at home I took place on my favourite spot on the rooftop. I opened the package of Dunhill and took a cigarette out. I lit it and while inhaling I felt the smoke entering in my lungs. I thought “I don’t like it anymore” but I continued smoking it in spite of that. When I finished it, I picked another one and again and again. I started feeling bad with myself. I tried to get over that feeling and thought: Well, if I could stop it before, I can do it now again. I will finish this package and stop again. Let’s see how many cigarettes are left. I opened the package and I was astonished because it was completely full.
I started to cry and cry. Between tears and cries I sobbed “now I’ll have to start all over again!” I was disconsolate and almost drowned in my own tears.
“Margo…, darling… what happens? Wake up please.” My husband held me in his arms trying to consulate me and I said that I had to start again from zero. Not even at that moment I was aware it had been a dream. Was it a dream? No, a nightmare!
This happened in over 35 years ago. I have lit a couple of cigarettes, not to smoke them but to give to my mother who was dying of lung cancer. She wanted to smoke so badly but she didn’t have the capacity anymore to light a cigarette. She was already in hospital. There was nothing we could do anymore.
My husband stopped smoking about 15 years ago. My children have smoked during a short time, only a couple of years but now are whole family is smokeless.
I’m neither a vegetarian nor a teetotaler anymore but I have been busy during a whole year to stop smoking.
I’m not one of those ex-smokers being difficult when a smoker is around. Not even a bit! It doesn’t bother me. The only thing that I still despise is the smell of dead tobacco, I mean the smell of smoke in clothes or hair but the smoke of fresh tobacco doesn’t bother me at all.
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From Sims to Real Life 