Cigarettes and Porn

 

Not exactly the best lifestyle choice

My apologies if this is longer than you like to read. This may be more of a confession to online strangers than an article, but I have struggled with these two addictions since I was a kid. Right now, I am clean from both and I hope and pray daily to remain clean for the remainder of my life. If this life story is too long, go ahead and skip to the bottom to where it says "Points to take away". 

First contact with porn

When I was 10, I was growing up out in the country on a dairy farm. That summer, my brother and I decided to ride our bikes on this 6 mile loop and collect pop cans so we could turn them in at the local store and get the 5 cent deposit and buy candy. While we were stopping to collect these old muddy cans on the side of the road, I noticed a magazine. It had water damage, but we were curious and pried open the crusty pages. In the center were these pictures of naked women. Against our better judgement, we stashed that magazine in the bag we had and took it home. 

A few years later, I found a stash of magazines from my oldest brother who was in college. These were much more graphic than a Playboy and were much more interesting to me. I stole a few of them. In time, I developed a habit of looking at them and pleasuring myself. Looking at statistics, almost everyone can relate to this. 

First cigarettes 

Cigarettes started a little different. I was a sophomore in High School and there was this hot skanky girl that I was crushing on. One day for school lunch, a big group of us kids decide to drive out to the "gravel pile" which was this abandoned rock quarry close to town where kids would hang out with little concern of adults seeing what we were doing. While we were hanging out, shooting at old cans with a friend's .22 and my friend was doing cookies in the gravel with his mom's Buick. This skanky girl in question took out some cigarettes and lit one up. I ask her if I could try one, mostly so I could just hang out and talk with her. 

For the next couple years, smoking was just a social thing for me. It would just be a few here and there in social settings and parties. I wasn't addicted at that point and I enjoyed the tingling buzz and the social opportunities that smoking seemed to offer. It was a great way to just hang out and shoot the breeze with people.

However, when I turned 18, I was excited about my new prospects of "being an adult". I bought a big container of Drum "roll your own" tobacco to show off to my rougher friends. It was more harsh than the prepackaged ones I was used to, but I got a bigger buzz. In time, I started craving the cigarettes and chewing tobacco on my own and I waited for opportunities away from my parents so I could smoke or chew. 

Realizing I have a problem 

Up until this point, I dabbled in porn only occasionally, but as I grew older and moved away from my parents house into an apartment with one of my High School friends, there was nothing that was keeping me from abusing these things and I grew to be fully addicted.

By the time I was 20, I had a stash of magazines stuffed underneath my mattress that most 14 year old boys would be envious of, mostly snitched one by one from my oldest brother. I remember flipping the mattress up and looking at the pile and just feeling disgusted with myself. I picked up the magazines and walked them out to the trash. A few days later, my roommate says, "Dude, what did you do with your magazines?". "I threw them away". "Well, you could have given them to me!"

For the next several years, I didn't view pornography, although I still had issues with using my imagination and pleasuring myself that way. Every now and then, my friend and I would visit strip clubs but I don't think it was nearly the problem as a constant viewing of graphic material. 

Cigarettes were also a big problem. My friend also smoked, but when we were living in the apartment, we had a "no smoking indoors" rule that kept us from just totally behaving like chimneys. We later moved to Alaska with a third High School friend. 

First time quitting 

While in Alaska, I had an epiphany. I realized that if I kept doing what I was doing that I would become a loser. And if I ever got married, she would probably be a loser too, and then we would have little losers for children. That next day, I call up my mom and dad and tell them that I wanted to go to school. I go to the library and start researching colleges. This is the first time I really start developing a direction in life.

I decided I needed to go back to my parent's house and save up money. On the trip back from Alaska, I finish a pack of cigarettes and tell my friend that it was my last cigarette. I figured moving would be a great time to quit because it was big life change. I quit smoking (for awhile).

Quitting porn the first time wasn't too tough. This was in the days before the internet and I had no magazine subscriptions. If I wanted to get material like that, I would of had to go to one of those adult shops and pay the man some money. I wasn't about to do that, and my imagination would suffice, although my palms were getting rather hairy with my lackluster dating life at that time. Also, viewing pornography is not a social event like tobacco can be. 

Nicotine was tougher for me at this time though. I hung around a crowd where half of them smoked. Nearly every weekend some of my friends would drink and I would subject myself to temptation again and again. The first month of quitting tobacco is tough. I had lots of headaches and I was nervous and twitchy for that time. Most of the day while I was throwing lumber in the sawmill, I would be thinking of having a cigarette, but I had the reputation of a non-smoker there, so I used that to my advantage. 

When I drank with my old friends, it was a different story. Again and again, I would quit quitting, "just for this evening" and light up. It wouldn't be until a week or two later that I would smoke again at another social event. I thought I had it under control with my behavior at that time when I was living with my parents, saving money for college.

For some time after I moved back into my parent's house so I could save up money, working at a local sawmill and eventually go to a local college. While I was working, my friend that traveled with me to Alaska became involved with a woman and they moved in together. He stopped hanging out, so naturally I had to find other friends.

About this time, one of my old classmates introduced me to this guy named Joe. He was weird, but very likable. He lived on the road between the sawmill and my parents' house, so I stopped by nearly every evening because he usually had something going on. I would stop and hang out and some other locals would be hanging out. His mom and dad liked me a lot and thought I was a good influence on Joe so they would offer to feed me. This whole family smoked like chimneys though. From some parties, Joe knew I smoked on occasion and so he would always offer me cigarettes, then eventually his mom and dad would offer them too. In the process of time, I became addicted again. 

It was about this time in 1996 that the internet appeared. One of my other friend's dad had a computer I remember him showing me the internet for the first time. Then as a joke, he pulled up these nude pictures and printed off this picture of a woman's butt on one of those old dot-matrix printers. That was so cool at the time, but not really looking back on it. It wasn't a few months later that my sister bought a computer and hooked up the internet to it. She would spend hours on it in those chatrooms typing away. She didn't have it locked, so like an idiot, I would sneak on her computer when she was gone and view porn. That didn't last too long before I got caught. I was so embarrassed, but there they were, her computer memory was filled with photos that she did not download. She deleted them and installed a password on her computer.

It went on like this for a little while. I bought my own cigarettes and smoked daily. I viewed porn when I could, and actually was able to scrounge up some dirty magazines again. A year into this, I was attending college for civil engineering. At this time, I was taking a college level physics class and the Spirit of the Lord really started to work in me. I saw that there is no way that the universe could have just accidented itself into existence, nor would have life done that. There are so many physical laws and variables that if they didn't exist just so, the world would blow up and we wouldn't exist. 

Finding God

About this time, I was really starting to seek a good woman whom I could eventually marry. I looked around campus and sought after the cleanest women I could find. They all turned out to have a very strong faith in God which intrigued me with my new belief. Let me tell you, you have to swallow your pride to accept that your entire belief system is wrong and that you need to look at the world in a new way. For a year, I read the Bible on my own. I read the New Testament and the familiar books out of the Old Testament. In the winter of 97-98, I called up an old High School friend that I knew was devout in his religion (the same religion as those girls I dated) and I asked if I could go to church with him.

I knew his church didn't believe in smoking, drinking or extramarital sex (I wasn't getting anything anyway then). I prayed and asked the Lord to help me to give up those addictions that I had. When the missionaries committed me to being baptized, I decided that if I were to do this, I would go in 100% and give it all I had. Then, in a year's time I will reevaluate if it is right for me. I did just that. I quit all those addictions, I attended church and all the church activities. That was by far the easiest time I quit. I did still have the cravings and the distractions, but I also had the Lord strengthening me. There was a time or two that I had to stop by the Bishop's office and make a confession, but he was there to help me in a loving way.

For several years, I attended church went on a mission myself and remained clean from those addictions. I even got married in the meantime. With time, as I got settled into my married life and the stresses of life seemed to pile up, I somehow forgot where I was at in the gospel. Even though I was going to church regularly, I became complacent in my actions, like it was just a routine. I let my faith coast to nearly a halt and I found myself back to where I was. Only this time, I had a wife and three kids.

Forgetting God

This will be probably my hardest section to write in this. It is downright embarrassing to admit that you fail when you know the gospel and you know right from wrong. I suppose we are all weak and sinners, but it is no excuse.

At the time I got married, I was doing good. I been home from my 2 year mission for a year. I was a member of the church for about 5 years at that point and had been clean for that whole time.

It was about the time that my wife had our second baby that things started to fall apart. She was struggling with the post-partem blues and recovering from having the baby, which means a couple months of no sex while she heals. It is perfectly understandable and I held no animosity toward her for that, but it is stressful to come home from work to no affection and lots of complaints. I did my best to help out when I was home, but it did get to me. 

I can't remember why, but she took the kids and was gone for the day while I was at home. I was playing video games and surfing on the internet, and I looked up the news on Drudge Report. Soon, I found myself looking through a British tabloid site that showed topless women. From there, I let temptation get the better of me, and I just went ahead and typed in one of those website addresses that I knew from years ago. I felt guilt and ashamed that I would do this as a Christian man who is married to a loving wife and children. After I was done looking at the videos, I closed up and erased my history.

I continued to do this for a few months as opportunity presented itself. One day, I came home from work. I go up to my wife as she is cooking like usual to give her a hug. Instead of the typical warm embrace, I get a cold brush. I ask her if anything is wrong. She marches me over to the computer, opens up the browsing history and shows me a huge list of stuff that I looked at the day before. The day before, she drove up and walked in before I had a chance to clear the browsing history so I just closed it and figured I could clean it next chance I got.

She bursts into tears and asks me if I love her, if I find those women attractive, if there is anything else I have been doing behind her back. I know those cheating stories where they say, "They are not sorry for what they did, they are sorry that they got caught". But at that time, I saw how much I had hurt my wife and I really felt remorse for my actions. From that, we put a password on the computer that only she knew and would leave the computer locked whenever she was away. I confessed to my bishop about what went on. I was a BSA Scoutmaster at the time, and I was sure that they would remove me from that position, but they didn't. I successfully quit again (for a time).

Three or four years later, I was working for a man who was bipolar. Most of the time, the job was alright, but every now and then, he would go on these crazy tirades and cuss out me and the other three coworkers. It got to the point that I hated to go to work. I felt like Bob Cratchet from A Christmas Carol in my little cubicle. I finally had enough and decided to quit. This was in the winter of 2008 when the housing market collapsed and I knew that job prospects were dismal at best. I asked for a week's vacation and I spent that time on the road, handing out resumes to dozens of Surveying or Engineering firms. Again and again, I got rejected. Here I was, on the road all over Wyoming, Idaho, and the Dakotas (where the job prospects were the best), camping out of my pickup in the middle of winter. It was a stressful time, to say the least. 
I stop at a gas station somewhere in Wyoming and go in to pay for gas. I look and see some cigarettes there behind the counter. Again, I let temptation get the better of me and I buy a pack and a lighter. I figure I'll just have some while on the road to help ease my mind. By this time, it was at least 8 years since I last smoked. But, here I was, like an idiot, lighting up for some stupid justification I had in my head. 

I had never smoked while married, and I didn't know if my wife could smell it on me or not. I throw away my cigarettes at a rest stop about 100 miles before I arrive home. When I get home, she comes in for a hug, but I kind of turn away and say that I need to use the bathroom. I go in, brush my teeth and take a shower. When I am done, she is waiting in bed. I carry my clothes in to put them in the laundry. She must have noticed the smell on my clothes because she asks me why they smell like smoke. I lie to her and tell her that I had a bonfire the previous night in Wyoming. 

For the next few years, I would sneak a cigarette whenever I could. It was nearly always when I was involved with work, by myself. I eventually got a job working for the Forest Service inspecting road construction. This provided ample opportunity for me to smoke, as long as I had my last one before 3pm or so so the smell would dissipate before I arrived home. In time, I became addicted again.

I carried my smoking addiction with me into Utah. It was only 2-3 cigarettes per day and none on the weekends, but it was enough to create a system of lying and deceptive behavior. If my wife smelled it on me, I would tell her that I was hanging out with some coworkers and she bought it. I don't know how many times I told myself "this is my last cigarette ever".  During a particularly stressful time with a 60 hour work week job, I started viewing pornography again on occasion and she again caught me one morning.

My wife never found undeniable evidence that I smoked while we were married, and she is blissfully unaware to this day (I think). I really don't know the reason why, perhaps this current job didn't give me ample opportunity, but I quit smoking and viewing pornography. The last time I smoked or intentionally viewed pornography was about 2016, maybe 6 or 7 years ago. I remember being very irritable at that time. There have been times that I seen it by accident or by posted memes, but I really have not went on those certain websites to seek it out since. 

Perhaps my kids were growing up and the thought of disappointing them as a role model was too much. Maybe I just realized that I am not "getting away" with anything and I am only harming myself and my family. A lot of it has to do with the gospel and refocusing my life toward Jesus. I really don't know if I could have ever quit these addictions without my family to live for or the gospel in my life. Still, I pray every night for the Lord to give me the strength to stay clean. 

POINTS TO TAKE AWAY 

1) You are never rid of an addiction. Even years later, I still have a hankering for a smoke if I am in the wrong place. If I have a coworker light up, I still have this temptation in the back of my mind begging to indulge myself. Because of this, you need to consciously separate yourself from situations where you are weak. That may be certain friends or establishments. 

2) Seek help if needed. When I quit this last time, I told myself that if I ever indulged myself, I would tell my wife and bishop. Keeping things a secret makes quitting more difficult. When I first quit when I joined the church, I announced it to the world. I even won $50 from Joe by betting him that I could go longer without smoking tobacco than he could go without smoking weed. 

3) If you hang around friends that also engage in bad behavior, quitting will be much tougher, especially if they are not supportive. My friend Joe was not any help, and I eventually had to distance myself from him to overcome that habit. That wasn't the case with pornography as I never had a girlfriend with those problems, and if they are a guy.....well that is just gay. Another friend of smoking is alcohol. While I never had a drinking problem, those two go together like peas and carrots. 

4) If you are keeping it secret it does limit the amount that you can indulge. If you have to sneak around, you will not have the opportunity to indulge nearly as often or as much. When I lived at other houses and openly smoked, I could knock myself out and partake until I had issues with sinus infections. Great stuff, huh?

5) Don't start. These addictions were totally avoidable when I was a kid. They are extremely tough to get rid of and if they don't kill you physically, they will harm you spiritually. Your health will suffer, your relationships will suffer. When I quit smoking, there is a good month of headaches and nervousness. When I quit porn, I would go psycho-horny for weeks to the point that it would irritate my wife. 

6) Addictions are related. If you are the type to indulge in one addictive behavior, you are more likely to indulge in others. Even if you don't have a problem with alcohol, you would want to stay away from drinking if you are trying to quit smoking.

7) Be especially careful when you are under greater stress. When we are under stress or having a poor relationship with our friends and family, we are more susceptible to fall back into our old habits. If we feel the temptation coming on, it would probably be better to seek help before we fall. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.   

8) Your physical and spiritual health will improve if you quit. With smoking, I noticed that my cardiovascular health improved when I quit. If I was running on a treadmill, I could go harder and my heart rate would be lower as I exercised. With porn, I had a bump in libido and other testosterone related results after quitting.