So, after 4 and a half years of smoking about a pack a day, I've finally gotten disgusted enough with myself to quit. I smoked my last cigarette about fifteen minutes ago.

So, for the smokers of OT.Com:

- When did you start smoking?
- Why did you start smoking?
- Do you still smoke? If so:
   - Have you tried quitting before? How many times?
   - What was the longest amount of time you went without smoking?
- If not:
   - When did you quit?
   - Why did you quit?
   - How do you deal with cravings?
   - Do you have any tips for quitting?

I'll go first:

Started smoking in the summer of 2006, in order to try to win back an ex-girlfriend I was in love with (she was my first love, so I would have done anything to try to win her back). She'd made an offhand comment about how she thought smoking was sexy, so I asked one of my of-age friends (I was 17 at the time) to buy me a pack. I started smoking, and she showed no more interest in me than she had before. Then I kept smoking to deal with her not wanting me anymore, then because I was addicted.

I've tried quitting several times - the longest I went without smoking was 3 months, I believe. I don't even remember how I started again, but it was probably while I was drunk.

Today, I sat around the apartment doing nothing but watching How I Met Your Mother and smoking cigarettes. I realized about an hour ago that I'd smoked two entire packs that had previously been unopened. I've never been a two-pack-a-day guy, and seeing myself do that just got to me in a way nothing else ever had. So I smoked my last one (after cradling it like a delicate flower for half an hour), threw away anything related to smoking (cigarettes) that I could find, and now here I am.

We'll see how this goes, but for now, I'm optimistic. At the very least, I'll be saving about $70 per week, which is great since I'm so very broke right now. So I'm going to try to focus on that to get me through the first couple weeks.