Finding My Why

Hi Reader,

This is the account of my quit journey on KTC:

One night, mid-August 2021, I was up at 1:15AM with a cat turd of Grizzly Wintergreen in my lip and I snapped – in a good way. I didn’t know why, didn’t really know how, but all of the sudden I decided that I’d had enough of dipping and started vigorously searching the internet about side effects of quitting cold turkey to prep myself for the upcoming days. Like a lot of us dippers, I had tried several methods to quit: weaning myself slowly over 12 weeks, Chantix, using a combination of fake dip and real dip and tapering back the quantity of real dip until there wasn’t any real dip left – you get the point.  But after a solid 17 years and several stoppages along the way, I decided that enough was enough.  Somewhere in all of that, I had found KTC. I had been on the site before, several years earlier, but I stumbled around the site for long enough that night to sign up, write an intro and post a Day 1 in the November 2021 quit group.

Fast forward about 42 days and I had caved. I wanted to dip and I dipped. I tried to ghost my way out of existence on the site. I hoped people would just forget. They didn’t. That isn’t what this place is about. I was called out immediately for not posting and I was convinced to “re-up”.  @grizzlyquittergreen , you told me something to the effect of “I’ve been where you are, and it took me 7 years to get back on the wagon.”  I didn’t want to be the former you, so I re-posted a new Day 1 in the January 2022 quit group.  At this point, I didn’t have a tangible reason for quitting and there was something in the back of my mind telling me “Yeah, but if it gets really bad, then you’ll have a good enough reason to dip…”  LIES.

I started anew with January ’22, almost proud of myself that I had stuck with it. It’s laughable because about 20 days later I had caved back to the poison again. And this time I almost did slip through the cracks and into oblivion. I had stopped posting for about three days before I got a text from @grizzlyquittergreen wondering where I was. Then from @EdT3329. Then a “what the eff” voicemail from @peloncito and then some words from @BrianBrianBrian .

Both of the failures and the resulting accountability really pushed me to actually examine why I was doing any of this. Essentially, I had stopped dipping twice in a 60-ish day stretch and then waddled back to the the can both times – and for what?  Obviously, I still wanted to dip, so why am I still here?

At some point after the second cave my wife looked at me and said “Do you want to dip or do you not want to dip?”  We’ve been married about 5 years and while she wasn’t “supportive” of me dipping, she never really nagged me either. So this was a bit out of character for her to call me out.  Typically, she was cool with whatever I wanted, but my wishy-washy stopping had finally pushed her to the edge too. I think the resulting conversation that we had finally helped me to realize why I am quit.

This story will hopefully help illustrate: The one thing, really the only thing that she’s ever asked of me related to dipping was that I not do it at night in our bed. She wanted that space to be for us and our marriage. So, the first time she brought it up, two years into our marriage, I said “Of course, I won’t dip in here.”  Unfortunately, that wasn’t a commitment that I kept.  And. so for years, I blatantly disrespected her request and dipped anyways in our bed at night. I didn’t just disrespect her request, I disrespected her. I chose the can over my wife.

Don’t misunderstand me: I’m not quit because of my wife. But what this story illustrates is a long history of me choosing dip over everything else. I’m sure it’s familiar for a lot of quitters.  What I realize, now, is that what finally broke in my mind at 1:15AM that night in August 2021, was that I was sick and tired of being a liar and a fake.  I was tired of the type of person that I had become – the type of guy who said aloud that faith, family, and friendship were the most important things to me, yet who had established a repeated pattern of dropping any of those three if I was running low on dip.  In August, I had my moment where “I had had enough”, but I couldn’t see that or describe it or understand/internalize it until much later.

WHY AM I QUIT?  I am quit because I am desperate to actually be the person/dad/husband/friend/coworker/son/brother that I envision being every day, and I allowed dip to ruin that for 17 years – NO MORE. I am quit because I refuse to be a slave any longer.  I am quit because I refuse to let a dead plant dictate the type of person that I am toward those that I love.  I am quit because I choose QUIT every day – it is my choice.

Ultimately, I am quit because I decided that is what I want and I keep making that decision daily; however, I’d be remiss to not mention a few key supporters that have embodied Accountability + Brotherhood:

Thanks @peloncito for being a friend and for continually pushing me to understand my “why”.

Thanks @grizzlyquittergreen for refusing to let me quit quitting and for not putting up with my lame ass addict-speak.

Thanks @EdT3329 for timely advice, for kicking me in the sack when I need, and for ongoing support and friendship.

Thanks @BrianBrianBrian for your humor, consistent support of my quit, and the reminders that my kids are also beneficiaries or a more authentic daddy as a result of my quit.

Finally, thank you to the January 2022 Jackhammers and Noisy November 2021:  This collection of people has put up with a lot of my crap for the last 170ish days and I am appreciative for you all holding me accountable to myself and for continued support and brotherhood.

Sincerely,

Justin – CharliBluff1032 – January 2022 Jackhammers

NOTE: This piece written by KillTheCan community member CharliBluff1032