I’ve been trying to quit smoking for years now. I started 7 years ago when I was 19 years old. It started as something to do when I was drinking at parties at my old university that I never graduated from. Eventually, the cigarettes became a way to cope with anxiety. Makes no sense. I’m feeling anxious, so I light up a stimulant that raises the heart rate and causes shortness of breath. After using the cigarettes as a coping mechanism for some time, I became addicted. It wasn’t long before my body felt like it needed the nicotine. I tried quitting with multiple methods on multiple occasions. A few methods worked for a while. The patch did alright. I tried anti-depressants, Chantix (the medication from hell for people prone to depression), e-cigs, and even cold turkey a few times. Some of them worked better than others. This time is different though.
I’ve decided to combine my two most effective methods to help me quit. I’ve been on Welbutrin for a couple of months now and I’ve noticed a severe decrease in cravings. Just last Sunday, I only smoked about 5 cigarettes with very few bad cravings in between. I even went nearly six and a half waking hours without one. So on Monday, I decided to take the next step in my process: the patch. I stuck the patch to my right upper arm after my morning coffee and smoke. I went through my whole work day only feeling the need for a few. The one’s I did smoke - maybe three - were so awful, I almost couldn’t finish them. I don’t believe I’ve had one since Friday evening, and it’s Sunday at 11:00 in the morning as I’m writing this. All this seems like it’s relatively unrelated to my dreams, I’m sure. These are real-life experiences I’ve had over the course of the last week and it seems to be having a positive impact on my life. Of course plenty of people who have tried to quit smoking know the side effects all too well. I’ve been sleeping with my patches on - which isn’t inherently dangerous - to avoid having morning cravings before I put on the new patch. Sleeping with the patch on, really messes up your dreams.
Dreams with a nicotine patch on your skin become very vivid. You’re able to remember them better. You dream just a little bit more actively. It feels like you have a little more control over what goes on in the sleep dimension inside your brain. Even if you wake up multiple times throughout the night, you can continue dreaming as if you hadn’t awoken at all.
Sorry, side-note: I shouldn’t be using the term “you” when describing this as this is my experience and I can’t necessarily speak for others. I’ve only hear a few anecdotal stories from others who have quit smoking in similar ways.
Point is, I can remember my dreams better and I think it’s at least worth looking into them while I have this opportunity. Because whether I succeed or fail at quitting smoking, I won’t be wearing these patches forever so I should take a good look at this part of my mind while I can.
Anyway, onto last night. I got ready for bed a lot later than usual because me and the girlfriend were up late playing board games. Once we had played plenty of rounds, we each brushed our teeth got into our sleepwear and proceeded to play on our phones for absolutely too long before trying to sleep. I spent my time on my phone listening to relaxing ambient sounds and reading an e-book that I had purchased a couple nights ago. Once I was good and tired, I put on my sleep mask with little bluetooth headphones in the sides, turned on a familiar fiction story, and drifted off to sleep almost instantly.
I remember the dream beginning with me popping a new video game in to start playing. I’ve been looking forward to playing the Final Fantasy VII remake on PS4. However, my perspective in this dream was never on me at all. It’s as if my view was only of what would have been on the TV screen had I been playing the game. I’m relatively familiar with the game, as it is a remake and I’ve played the original. The game began just as I had seen in all the trailers that I had watched leading up to the game’s release (and all the game-play footage I had watched after). However, shortly after the title had popped up on the screen, a battle began, with the ending boss. Even in the dream this didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, but I carried on as if nothing was wrong. It was then that I noticed that I wasn’t playing as the main character of the game, but a character from a different game entirely. Much weaker and, without trying to sound too ridiculously nerdy here, was honestly no match for the final boss of this game. I decided to play and give it my best shot anyway. And I really did give it my best. This game was stressing me out even in my dreams. I kept having to pause and evaluate the situation of the game, I threw precious healing items in a seemingly feeble attempt to survive the fight just a little bit longer. It seemed like I was even making some sort of progress. The fact of the matter was that I knew that it was extremely unlikely for this to work at all and that I was just going to have to do something else with my free time. Even so, relentlessly I went at this using everything possible at my disposal. The most flawed part of this was that I eventually started to think that it was absolutely possible for me to win and carry on with the game. I don’t have a good time frame for how long I stayed in this state of mind that I might be able to win, but I woke up before the battle even came close to a close.
It was a very strange dream and it definitely makes me sound WAY nerdier than I am. I don’t even play video games all that much. I like them, sure, but it never seems like I have time to sink into them. I know plenty of people my age in similar situations make the time play for hours and hours, but it’s just not as important to me. I figure it’s best not to over analyze this one for the time being. Maybe I’ll go through and write out a few before I start diving deep into analysis. For now, I’ll just leave it at this.
Loading comments...