Quitting For Good (This Time)

I’m sure we’ve all decided we were going to quit dipping/chewing at some point or another before we actually did. I know for me, for about the last year, I’d get down to my last dip of the can and say to myself “that’s it Chad, you’re done with this shit…you’re not going to dip anymore”, then a couple hours later I’d be packing in another dip and feeling a little worse about myself each time. It was a vicious cycle and at the time seemed it may NEVER end. Then something happened to me…

A dear close friend of mine who had been sick with a very aggressive type of lung cancer for a couple of years (totally unrelated to tobacco in any way) got some bad news that there really wasn’t anything much left they could do for him and that their advise was to go home and rest. His name was Wayne, and he was the father of my wife’s stepmother (I know hard to follow huh), and probably the best example of what a man, father, husband, and person should be in my opinion.

I watched Wayne deteriorate over the next couple weeks and it broke my heart. I have never really shared with anyone the way I felt about Wayne or how much I really looked up to him. We didn’t have a very deep involved relationship with each other, I just saw him every couple of weeks and we would always talk about this and that and what he had been working on lately. See Wayne worked on “projects”, he was a welder/fabricator (something that always peaks my interest and something I’d always wanted to do) and the man could literally do anything. He would make things and fix things for people constantly using his assortment of AWESOME tools in his INCREDIBLE workshop and then still have time at the end of the day for his family and friends.

I say all of that to paint a picture for you of what a great guy this man was. He didnt’ smoke, didn’t dip, didn’t chew, didn’t drink, didn’t cuss and was an incredible Christian man who lived his life for his family and his God.

Watching Wayne die a little more each day over those couple of years as the family and friends stood by the doctors helplessly watching with a total sense of helplessness and hopelessnes and understanding that this man did NOTHING to make this cancer choose him as it’s next victim did something to me. It woke me up. It made me ashamed and embarassed to be a user of tobacco. I constantly felt guilty about using tobacco and the fact that the whole family knew about my addiction.

That was when I decided that I would once and for all quit using tobacco products and stop putting something in my body voluntarily that could make my life as well as all of my loved ones’ lives miserable.

Now, I tried to quit and was unsuccessful, and tried again and again and again. Then I found this site. This site is a thing of beauty, it’s really a hell of a thing. It’s irritating, these guys will piss you off, they will chew you out, they will hunt you down if you dont’ post roll, but most of all they will stand up with you EACH AND EVERY SINGLE DAY and be counted with you and say to the world “Today I will not dip!!!”.

This site works guys. Plain and simple…I’m nowhere near done with my addiction, but I have a hell of a lot better handle on it than I used to and for that I owe my gratitude to my friends on this site. I also want to say that I owe a HUGE HUGE HUGE thanks to my “brothers” from the May Quit Group 2010. Without all of you I could never had made it to 100 Days.

I’ve dealt with some serious shit lately in my home life. My wife has seizures and is diagnosed with epilepsy and has had a couple “episodes” lately and I can honestly say that due to the stress of some of the stuff we’ve been struggling through lately, were it not for this site, I would have caved once again.

If you’re wondering about this site, wondering about joining, wondering does it work, let me save you some trouble. JOIN, and do it today, quit and join a quit group and NEVER EVER look back. You can be where I am and where all of the other HOF-ers are right now, good luck, and if you need my support feel free to reach out to me…I’ll see you on the other side of your quit!

-Chad Wallington
5-27-2010

NOTE: This piece written by KillTheCan.org forum member CWall