Addiction and Schizophrenia by Jonathan Harnisch

My name is Jonathan, and I am a tobacco addict. Life goes on without smoking, but for now I fight for life. I don't write off a thing. It feels like hell, but I know it is peace—and strength. Overall, the symptoms are temporary, so far. I am nowhere near the end of the addiction, but I am on my way. 

I think: Help! I am kicking the habit. They are not going away, these withdrawals. The nicotine and the smoke itself. The real hardcore heavy chain smoker and tobacco fiend. A friend of the enemy. I befriend my fear. My fear of not knocking this off my bucket list before the bucket has its first and perhaps last heart attack. Cancer, COPD, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

The severity of depression. Jumbled thoughts. Life goes on. I need this. I need my life. I crave life. No false hopes. The real deal. Quit. Win. Stay in the now. Stay alive. 

Mental illness aside, physical disabilities too, my body. I forgot about my body. For decades. It finally hit me. Something more profound than life itself. No assumptions. No projections. I am still figuring it out. Some are the smoke. The habit. The destructive behavior and serious issues of smoke. It might now take away my other issues. Just no more puffs. Slow and long steps to this slow and legal suicide. I am stronger than my mind. I can deal with life. I just need to preserve it as lovingly as I can. If I had resolved this earlier, sure, different story. I didn't, but I am now. 

I have been offline and on my way, in combat with my mind, my schizophrenia, but now also with my body, sensations, my second nature, smoke. Heavy smoke. Smoking is easy. Death is inevitable. But smoke. It is all I have needed to feel its effects. 100 clouds of smoke and puffs per day. 100 cigarettes. 

I can deal with schizophrenia and with mental illness. I am ready to quit the smoke soon and to live with life. Life is hard enough. I had an epiphany. I couldn't even walk 100 steps to smoke without being out of breath. For 10 minutes. Years of lies I told myself. It was my second nature. I needed to smoke and d¬¬rink caffeine. Smoking, quitting smoking, rather—this is a battlefield I must fight peacefully. I am a warrior. A survivor. A realist. I am still wrapped up in the ringer, but I am doing it, I am quitting. I have been quitting. 

I have been offline and in detox. A slow detox mixed with the detox of yesterday's psychotic episode from schizophrenia and the crazy mess I left behind yesterday. That was a symptom of life. I let it go. Just quit. Just do it. Commit to something not by doing but by not doing. These heavyweight headaches, all of it. And I haven't even kicked the habit 100%. Not yet. 

I am, however, on my way. Well on my way. Five packs of the six per day. I tossed them. I gave them to my medical team to dispense for me, one a day, and with a plan. I have quit, of course, 30 times, honestly quit. But I never had a plan. I never outline. I just do what I do, and I still smoke. 80 cigarettes less now. 20 to go—day by day. I am stronger than my mind. I am stronger than my depression, my anger, my withdrawal symptoms due to letting go of four-fifths of my everyday life. Of my addiction to death by smoke. 

How do I sound? Raspy. How does this writing therapy session help? Who cares? It helps, that is all, it helps. I have help from others, and I use electronic cigarettes and lozenges. Thoughts bombard my head, my psyche, my mind. They erase and delete. They change. They return. They are just there. Time to live life is available. It's been waiting for me. Time hones in, creeping closer to death. I knock out another puff. Lord help me. I can almost hear Him saying. I have been here all this time. I was waiting for you. Flight of ideas, racing thoughts, then they slow down. But they won't stop. There is no easy way for anything, anything worthwhile maybe. 

It sounds easy to quit. Just don't do anything. Smoke? Then don't smoke. Sounds good. Easier said than done. I would light a cigarette now because I wouldn't care. So I choose to take a breath, not to take away ten breaths—because I care. Nicotine replacement. Every ache and pain that exists. I fight a private war. A common war. It doesn't feel common. It is worse than kicking crack cocaine. A war of fear. The thing I fear will soon vanish because I now know that I am stronger than my mind. I can and I will defeat this. You are stronger than you think, and the strongest people are not those who show strength in front of the world but those who battle and win the battles that others do not know anything about. Maybe they do. Maybe they don't. 

I rid my body of fear, of addiction, of hatred, because that hatred is fear. I battle fear. I recently wrote about how the world suffers greatly because of the silence of good people. I have been silent because I fight a private war, a war of fear, of addiction, and of life. This thing I fear will soon leave because I now know that I am stronger than my mind. I can and I will defeat this. As the fear lifts, a freedom I never knew will mesmerize me. I can see it now; I can see it already. I am ready. I am ready now. 

Can you see my face, with my eyes that speak, that drip tears and sweat, draining out the chaos of phlegm, of disgust, screaming with pure energy? They circle around. They see, sort of, dyslexic, legally blind, bestselling author bull. No. I can't either. Cancer eats at me. I take the Dallas Buyer's Club route. I take in and absorb my religion, my creed. Readjusting to a new and improved lifestyle that will benefit me medically and emotionally. Have I quit the smoking habit? No. I have not. On Thursday, no. Tuesday, no, I can't remember. Blame schizophrenia, blame confusion, blame nothing, and not myself. Creativity keeps me alive. Music, too. I kicked the crack cocaine, PCP, and hard liquor kick a dozen years ago. That is mine. It's easy. I am aware of how it will be. 

I used to be a non-smoker, a person who didn't reap his body, and the people around him, nor his health, I mean, his life. 25 years ago? I couldn't fathom the thought of smoke. Schizophrenia and smoke, comfortable with schizophrenia and cigarettes—they often go hand in hand. I used that excuse. I heard quitting tobacco can be harder than kicking heroin, I was on everything, and I would eat drugs out of the toilet. That was how stinging and demanding that fear embraced me. It overcame me; rather, I let it. Five packs per day, five tins of smokeless tobacco. Something like that. I'd just use and abuse, abuse myself, my mind, my body, my spirit, my world, myself, my self-esteem. My pride. I didn't know. I carried a case of bottled water, cases of caffeine, to my office just to get through 6:00 in the morning. "I'm an artist, a bohemian, I am allowed to smoke.” Old Hollywood is now long gone when smoking was glamorous. It was cool, to me. 

Now, looking back? Guess what. And it’s astounding now. Excuses. One case of bottled water, walking with it for 20 yards, on the flat flagstone. 5 minutes pass. The phone rang. It was important. I.D. theft or something. Stupid stuff. I was out of breath. The case of water, and the 20 years, not on my mind. "Hi, I just came back from a rigorous run, you know, a quickie 5-mile jog…." Former New England Champion, 1993. Semi-Pro in ’94. Graduation day. High school. I am cool. I lit my first, just celebrating with the others. I just graduated from the best school in the country. Easy. One hour later, one pack, addictive personality. I was an adult. An adult! Big time baby! Smacked with suicide, a failure, hospitalized, music saved me. I called 911. That was mental illness, depression, that was 1995. That was LSD. The next day ecstasy, PCP, junk, booze, malt liquor, fake I.D. Liar, liar, a friend of mine, where has he gone? I loved me. 

Next up at bat. Hospital. "You have schizophrenia. Here is your script.” The head doc meant my script for medication, not life. I was set. I was rich. I paid for friends. I paid for everything with Ben Franklins to spare. $25,000 per day, nothing illegal, no criminal record, no STDs, just some guys' stuff, some promiscuity, some garbage. Some things burying in me, my body bearing the burden. Smoke. Caffeine, too, and smokeless tobacco, dip. I knew how to pack that. To be cool. I didn't say it, I just rolled with it. I knew cancer, death—all that comes later. I remain in the moment. I was sick. Bottomed out. Quit everything. Square one. Just cigarettes. Let me stay sober for a year and then I'll just knock out the smoke. Dip? My teeth are fine, for now, I am a good kisser. The best. Big, sweet, sick, pure ego. No. I mean fear. 

Literary word jumble. To cope. On Day 3 or 4. Something like that. No, I didn't quit. Here it comes. I am doing it right. Right now. Getting help. More help. As much as I can get. I want to live and not die. Much less to die a painful death. Leaving others behind. Not many but maybe many more than I think. I have a plan. Have I a plan? Is this a joke? Tapering off. Starting with knocking out 5 of the 6 packs instantly. Is it hard? I'll write 1,000 pages next time to explain how hard. One pack left. Caffeine? My last two vices? That's all. Wait is that all? Yes. And I am already on my way. It is either swiping the smoke or letting my life go. Choice point. Keep going. 

I am stronger than my mind. To be continued through Christmas at least, maybe not on paper but for the documentary I have been making to capture these times of change. It's nothing. Something just hit me. Maybe it was—what's it called? God? I can work with that. Stay in the now, just for today, stay in the now. Let this sink in. Stay aware. Scan the body, in the name of God, and for the life of me, the life that awaits, the freedom, for crying out loud, my body wailing just relax. Just relax. Just relax. What lies ahead—it is miraculous. Freedom. I can choose. I can. I can. I can. I am still on board. Turbulence expected. I'll get there. I turn 40 soon. I need this. I have this. Just for today. Just for right this bloody second. I march on. Always, continuing to surprise myself every day. I am my hero sometimes. Often. Quitting smoke is my war, my body, my mind, my fear, my fuel, my life, and ultimately my death. But I am still around. Being silent doesn't necessarily mean being forgotten. Thank you for your support—Jonathan Harnisch.