Today is the big SuperBowl party. I’m very excited for the game, and though I’ll be cheering the Saints on, I really like both teams, and I think it’ll be a great game!

Since I have so many friends coming over, and an exciting game to watch, I’m hoping that today I’ll smoke even less than I have been. I’m still not going to push myself, but I do hope to have a little taste of what it’s like to be a non-smoker – and not have that craving for a cigarette interrupting good times with friends.

I haven’t told my kids yet that I’m quitting. I’m hoping that after I go a week or so without one, that I can tell them, and be confident that they won’t see a cigarette in my mouth again. They love to nag me about it, and I always feel guilty when they do. So, my rationale for waiting to tell them is that it will give me extra incentive to stay away from cigarettes once I’ve told them. If I tell them now, they’ll nag me about every single one, and it won’t have as much impact. I am definitely quitting for me, but knowing that it will be good for my children too is an extra boost.

The rate is very cheap – most of them average about $6 per hour, and that includes gas. When you make a reservation, it even tells you the maximum price you’ll pay. I needed a truck to move the rather large tv, so it showed me a price of $4.95, with a guesstimate of $9 or so as the price I’d pay, with about $12 as the maximum. I merrily clicked the reserve button, and headed up to the University of Utah Stadium to pick the truck up.

The truck has only about 600 miles on it, and still has a bit of that new car smell. It made me want a new Jeep. The process was easy. I waved my U Car Share card over the windshield and the truck unlocked. I opened the glove box, and the key was waiting for me.

I didn’t expect that it would take more than an hour, so that was how long I reserved the truck for. There was a truck closer to me, but it was reserved for about half an hour, and I wasn’t sure it would be back in time, so I chose the truck at the U instead.

I was very happy with the experience until I received a call about 5 minutes after my reservation was over informing me that because I went past my reservation time, I’d be charged an extra $25 on top of the hourly rate.

I knew I’d be charged the hourly rate, but that didn’t bother me. I assumed that if I reserved it for 2 hours, and only used it for one, I’d still be charged for 2, and since the only other truck reservation showing on their site for the entire day was half an hour at the one at the Trax station, I didn’t stress over it.

I’m sure it’s in the fine print somewhere, but I’m pretty pissed right now. When I reserved the truck, at about 2:15, there were no other reservations, and so I reserved it from 3 to 4 pm. I’m afraid I’ll get another call telling me there will be a 2nd $25 fee, because it will be past 5 when I return it now. I’m waiting on a friend to help me get the tv out of the truck, and he’s much later than I had expected.

I might consider using U Car Share again, but I will be very wary of it. It was unexpected that I’d be this late, and while I understand the fee, you’d think that there would be a guide somewhere that makes this plain. None of it is mentioned in their “How it works” section of the web site, which I did read this morning. If it had been, I would have been more aware, and probably taken extra precautionary steps, and made a longer reservation in the first place. So, I’m unhappy right now, and I won’t be as likely to use U Car Share in the future, but I’m not swearing it off quite yet.

Yes, another jammies photo, but it’s Saturday!

I had half a cigarette about 30 minutes after getting up, and then a couple of hours later I had the other half. Since then, I’ve been very tempted to go out and have another. I think it’s because I’m bored. I’d really like to have slept in later than I did, and so I’m tired and being lazy. The internet just isn’t interesting enough to keep my brain occupied, and so the habit is – if I’m bored, I smoke. Although I’ve said I’m not going to make an effort to cut back until this weekend is over, I am going to try to avoid smoking out of boredom. I think I’ll start with taking a shower, and then see if I have motivation for laundry. I may, or may not, post again later today – that probably depends on whether anything else changes.

Day 7 (Thursday) was an intense day at work, followed by intense cleaning at home, in preparation for Preston’s birthday party. I accidentally fell asleep earlier than intended – about 9:45, I think. I did wake for a phone call that I expected around 11, but then promptly fell back asleep. That was the only good night of sleep I’ve had in weeks, if not longer. Sleep has been an issue for me since December, and I was extremely grateful to have been able to get a good night, without waking to disturbing dreams, or just to being awake for no reason.

Day 8 (Today – Friday) was yet another intense (but good!) day at work. That ended at 3:30 with mad dashes to do things like pick up a birthday cake (can you believe I forgot to order a cake for my son’s birthday?!?) and get the kids and get back home, where a whole lot of people were waiting to surprise him. The surprise went well – he’s never had a surprise party, and was not expecting it at all. He thought his party was tomorrow. I had a lot of anxiety, but it all passed within about 10 minutes of getting home, so I was pretty thrilled. Eventually, the adults all left, and I found myself the only grown up with 8 kids at a birthday party. Somehow I came out of that with my sanity semi-intact, and I’m down to just 4 kids for the sleepover portion of the party. Today was the first day of 1 mg Chantix twice a day. Though, since I messed up earlier in the week, and traded a .5 mg for a 1 mg, my first pill today was just the .5 mg. I’m now back on track, however.

The birthday boy was definitely surprised, even though there was at least one dead giveaway as we arrived home.

So, you’re probably wondering how the (not) smoking is coming? Well, I’ve smoked less than half a pack each of these 3 days. Normally, having this many kids would make me retreat to my back porch for a cigarette every chance I get. I’ve only had a few this evening, and those were because my friend and neighbor came over a few times, and we smoked together. But, I put all of them out early because they just weren’t what I wanted.

I’m not pushing myself to not smoke, yet. I figure that I’m just now to the full dosing of Chantix, plus I had my son’s party tonight, and I’m hosting a SuperBowl party on Sunday. It would be silly to add anything to my stress levels when the Chantix is so obviously doing its thing, and getting me to smoke less.

I also noticed tonight that the last 2 – 3 cigarettes I had were just kind of icky. I normally feel that way the next day when I’ve smoked too much the night before, but I’m not anywhere near that point, so I think it’s the Chantix. Also, most of the cigarettes I have are just half. Even when I’m driving, which is a time I habitually always smoke, I don’t want more than half.

One other thing I have to wonder about – does Chantix make me drink less, too? Usually, when I’m stressed this much, and have this much noise and excitement in my house from the kids, I have to be careful not to drink too much. That hasn’t been a problem all week (even the night I had an anxiety attack), and I’m still on my 2nd (3.2/Utah) beer of this crazy evening.

It’s time to start finding the good things about not smoking, and making my lists.

This was a surprising move, because I expected that we would have a fighting chance (and possibly the LDS Church endorsement again) for LGBT Housing Protections, like we had in Salt Lake City. Of course, there were plenty of other bills that would be coming up, too. But, this was one that I really thought needed to happen this year – it’s the perfect time for it, and also the most likely.

I hadn’t seen this video when I was on the air earlier, but I wish that I had. Rep. Christine Johnson explains why the truce was called for this year, including backstory that we may have only guessed at without her telling us.

Now, what I argued on the air was that I thought that this would allow for both sides to work together and possibly come to a compromise, and hopefully that the Republicans might gain more understanding for LGBT issues. I said that I thought it was a good idea.

What I didn’t say was that I was really conflicted, too. I can see the other side – I can see people wondering why we didn’t go for the housing bill while we had the best chance, and thinking we’d given in to the other side.

I didn’t say that because, although I can understand it, my gut instinct says it was the right thing to do. And that was before watching Rep. Johnson’s explanation.

One more thing I want to add – more of our Senators and Representatives need to do this. Hearing directly from her on this issue really calmed any doubts that I had. So, thank you, Rep. Johnson. I hope others follow your lead.

(h/t to Eric at PrideInUtah for the video)

This was our view! How much better of a 10th birthday present could a kid ask for?

Anyway, so that was my excitement for the evening, and blogging was the last thing on my mind.

In all of my rush, I left my Chantix week 1 pack at work yesterday. Day 4 was supposed to be the first day of taking 2 pills – one in the morning, and the other in the evening. Among the many things I panicked about last night (anxiety had a huge hold on me) was what to do about the pill. I am not sure I could even get in the office, much less at 11 o’clock at night, nor did I feel like doing ANY extra driving. I had the brilliant idea of splitting a week 2 pill (they are 1 mg, and week 1 is all .5 mg) in half, and that dropped off of my anxiety radar. But, upon taking the pill out of its package, I discovered that they are not easily splittable. I’ve tried to split hard pills with a knife before, and they tend to turn into a mess. So, rather than let myself be more anxious, I just took a 1 mg pill. I will just swap it for the .5 mg pill on the first day of the 2nd week. I’m pretty sure that won’t actually do any harm.

Whew! I’m anxious all over again thinking about it!

Anyway, I didn’t end up counting my cigarettes today, but I did notice that I’m down to about half a pack. Some of those are ones that I smoke half of, and come back for the other half later, but most are ones I smoke half of and then just toss. So, I’m definitely down from 1+ packs before this all started.

Still no unusual mood changes. The anxiety is nothing new, and my Celexa generally handles that well – in fact, I think I might have forgotten to take the Celexa yesterday. Oops. So, I’m not counting that towards any Chantix side effects. And it will be resolved just as soon as I have both my bedroom and my kitchen in order at the same time (I can handle anything if the two are both organized). Guess I should go get my bedroom taken care of while the kitchen’s still looking good.

Yes, I’m in my jammies at 6:30. Don’t judge. I did leave the house today, so it’s not like I’ve been in them all day. I need to figure out something more interesting than just to put a photo of myself holding the package. That’s getting old, I think.

The only thing that I might be able to credit as a side effect is that I’m itchy everywhere today! It could be stress, but I generally get hives when I’m stressed, and there isn’t a hive to be seen anywhere. Epidermal conditions are one of the lowest reported side effects of Chantix, so I’m guessing it probably isn’t related. Mood wise, I’m just fine. I’m feeling pretty lazy today, mostly because I’m kind of recovering from a really fun party where I made the mistake of drinking red wine, which does bad things to me. But, I did manage to accomplish a few things today, and I’m not depressed in the least.

I hope I have time to keep blogging every day this week. It’s going to be a busy one, and I’m going to be stretched pretty thin. I’m not sure how many people are even interested in these blogs, but I’m mostly doing it so I have something to look back on, and keep track of myself.

This isn’t related, but I wanted to throw it in here anyway – on a whim, I tried on my skinny jeans today – and they fit! Ok, they weren’t my ultra skinny size 8 jeans that I’m not sure I even want to fit into again, but they are jeans that haven’t fit since last winter. They’re snug, but that’s ok. I had been thinking that I was eating less because of being sick, but I am starting to think that the Celexa I started on right before Christmas might be doing the trick. Whatever the cause – fitting into these jeans will be inspiration to continue eating healthy and eating smaller portions. Wooohoo!

Maybe by this time next month I’ll be a skinny non-smoker? That would rock!

The fancy pill dispenser didn’t work quite like I thought it did. It’s really kind of boring, but I guess they want people to feel special when they start taking the pills. That, and in case anyone forgets what the instructions are, it has everything neatly labeled.

Thanks to everyone who has commented – your support makes me feel good about this, and I’m sure that if I ever have a rough time staying quit, coming back and looking at what you have had to say will give me that extra boost I need!

I decided I’m going to start tomorrow morning. I figure that the first day isn’t very likely to affect my mood negatively, or make me ill. If that’s going to happen early on, I’m hoping for it to be over the weekend. Since the kids are with their dad this weekend, I don’t have to worry about how my moods will affect them. And this might just possibly have me not smoking by the SuperBowl party I’m hosting the following weekend. We’ll see.

The Chantix Month 1 Kit comes in a little rectangular box, with 4 cards in it. During the first week, I take 1 little white pill every morning for the first 3 days. Then, for the rest of the week, I take a pill twice a day. The remaining weeks look to be a stronger pill, which is blue, and taken twice daily.

The instructions for using the cards indicate that I should pull the purple slider and press and hold the green tab. This sounds complicated. I’ll be finding out tomorrow morning.

I’m a bit nervous. I’ve heard conflicting stories. Everyone I’ve talked to personally who has used Chantix tells me that it just blocks the receptors that give you a high from nicotine, and that after about the first week, you just have no desire to smoke. 3rd party accounts have told me that it makes you throw up if you smoke. I am hoping the 3rd party accounts are wrong.

Tonight I plan to call my closest friends and let them know. I’m very afraid of the worst of the side effects – suicidal thoughts. If I find myself there, I will immediately quit taking Chantix – it’s not worth the pain or the risk. But, I need the support of my friends to make sure that if I find myself there, I have people watching out for me.

I typically don’t get very down and personal on this blog, but I hope to blog daily, at least at first, with my experiences. I will write about my moods and any other side effects, because I think it’s important for people to know what to expect, and for me to keep track of it as I go along.

I hope that anyone who has used Chantix will comment as I go along, either to give support, or tell their experiences. If there’s anyone else out there actively using Chantix, I’d love to hear from you, as well.

My big hope for Chantix is that it will keep me not smoking for long enough that I don’t have a desire to go back. I have no doubts that it will work – or maybe I’m overly optimistic. But, I think it’ll get me to quit, and keep me quit for the 6 months I’m on it. But, what happens at 6 months and 1 day? Or 7 months? I really enjoy smoking, and I won’t lie about that. But, I plan to use the 6 months of freedom to find all the ways I enjoy being a non-smoker. The first thing I’m going to do is wear perfume, and use my lotions that make me smell good. And I hope to find lots and lots of other benefits, so that when temptation comes, I won’t want to give in.