I agree, if he lies about smoking then god only knows what else he might be lying about. He might be sneaking more cake and ice cream than he should, secretly eating at mcdonald’s, or be stuffing fried twinkies in his face when no one is looking. If you can’t trust him to keep you posted about everything unhealthy he consumes, what can you trust him with?
thanks for your immensely helpful and mature responses.
*what’s funny about it, though? I have a sense of humor, but I just don’t see the humor in a husband who is struggling to quit a destructive habit as smoking and is lying to not have to deal with his wife’s opinions on it. Would we laugh if this was a porn addiction he was lying about? Drugs? Alcohol addiction? Would we liken an occasional glance at porn, to eating a twinkie? Why do we mitigate smoking? Not you, Nordar, just in general…people tend to view it as “less than” other addictions.*
Further evidence, for me, is that even if he doesn’t deny it, you characterize his failure to pro-actively confess each slip-up or lapse in tobacco use as a “lie of omission”. In short it seems like this guy can’t get a break.I can only speak from my personal experience with my dad. My dad was a religious man -both of my parents were very active & involved in their church. In addition to God, he loved my mom and our family very much. However, over the years he would try to quit smoking only to start up again usually behind my mother’s back. I remember times as a child, he would tell us not to tell mom he was smoking again. Is that lying, in my opinion I believe so. Do I condemn my dad for lying in this manner? No, as I realize smoking is an addiction which is very hard to break. He wasn’t lying with the intent to hurt my mother. He was lying because smoking was simply an addiction he couldn’t break at that time. So although, you want to separate the smoking from they lying, it may not be possible to do so.I guess I’m not getting anywhere on this thread because everyone is focusing on the smoking issue and that’s not my issue. I am having a hard time with the fact that I feel like I have lost my trust in him.
I’m sorry if my posts are not reflecting that.
wow.
i have no malicious intent.that is very insightful, thank you. i think someone else mentioned that it’s not HIM lying, it’s the addiction and i think there is some “truth” to that. (ha ha ha, pardon the pun!
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your whole post is excellent advice Rayne. and regarding the part in bold, we did have a talk last night and i did ask him what would be helpful, but he told me he honestly didn’t know. i think i will have him read your post and see if any of your advice sounds helpful to him.Well when he decided to quit I asked if he wanted to use any of the smoking cessation aids like patches, gum etc. He decided on patches so I bought them which he used briefly but then stopped because they broke him out in a rash. I didn’t say anything about him not using them. He decided to use sucking on hard candy as a replacement when he had the urge to smoke. In the beginning he was nearly always sucking on them -and I made sure he had a supply of Jolly Ranchers which was his favorite. We had small celebrations with each mile stone a week, a month, two months etc of being smoke free. At the one year mark my mom made his favorite dish that she makes especially for him in celebration. Other friends and family also congratulated him along the way. Also about half the amount of money that would have normally gone for cigarettes went to my hubby’s own private stash to buy what ever “toys” he wanted -although there were times I had borrow from his fund.
Now when my hubby decided to quit he decided several months in advance. He slowly cut down his smoking until he got down to the minimum he could smoke which was 5 a day, then he set a date New Years Eve which was still a few months away. So for about three months he only smoked 5 a day. Then on midnight on New Years Eve my daughter, who was 8 at the time I believe, did a happy dance on what was left of his last pack of cigarettes.
He also changed his routine – for example he stopped drinking coffee for quite a while because coffee went with cigarettes in his mind. My husband is also a recovered alcoholic, more than a decade now -so he used some of what he learned in AA an applied it to quitting smoking. Each morning he would say today I will not have a cigarette – the one day at a time thing. My husband says he still has the urge to smoke about a half a dozen times throughout the day even after all this time.
I think you should sit down with your hubby and ask him what is most helpful and what is not helpful. Ask him what would he like you to do if sense he may have slipped. They have free support groups for those in the process of quitting this may or may not be something he is interested in. Instead of guessing what kind of encouragement would be helpful why not just ask him?
Well if he doesn’t know what he wants you to do he may still know what he definitely doesn’t want you to do.your whole post is excellent advice Rayne. and regarding the part in bold, we did have a talk last night and i did ask him what would be helpful, but he told me he honestly didn’t know. i think i will have him read your post and see if any of your advice sounds helpful to him.
Many times my husband can’t tell what he wants but he can usually tell me what he doesn’t want…lol. Good luck to you both.Instead of asking him when you suspect him of starting up again why don’t you just state the obvious - “I see you’ve started again.” Don’t give him a chance to lie. Then ask if there’s anything you can do for him to help him. Questioning, even once a month or once a year, can seem like nagging to some men. Just let it go and pray for him and for you, especially your own frustration with the situation.