My Journey - A Confession
Hello guys, today I'm sharing something I've kept to myself all this time and the start of my love for houseplants in general,might be lengthy, sorry; I started smoking about 10 years ago when I was about 11 years ago, I'm 21 now.I started when my elder cousin sister introduced me to it, she's about 6 years older than me. What started as a naive way to fit in with people around you suddenly became a habit, for my high school and higher secondary I stayed away from home with my grandparents, that's when this secret habit started to take shape into a routine, I used to smoke atleast 1 cigarette a day(half and half) in secrecy from 7th to 10th standard, I was pretty good in academics and very cautious so maybe that's why the suspicion phase never started for my parents, then came higher secondary school for which I started living with a friend and started smoking 3-4 cigarettes a day on average, it literally integrated into my habit and I couldn't live without them; finishing that I started college and started living alone, I started smoking more than I could keep track of, the regret/frustration of taking physics as my majors subject added to the habit; Immediately after completing 3 years of college,I went away from home state on my own for the first time, to teach at a school; Being a reputed school and strict rules in the school compound I started smoking 3-4 cigarattes a day again, 7 months in and not being able to adjust to the food change/weather I returned home on December of 2024, back at home I had to be very cautious of my parents not knowing of my smoking habit, couldn't always get enough reason to go somewhere far for a smoke break, and that too 3-4 times a day, not being able to smoke would make me physically exhausted, mood swings and headaches; That's when an idea struck me while watching those chinese succulent videos on facebook, 'I'm gonna start gardening', we had an unused cymbidium shadehouse on our rooftop, a few ignored jade plants and thus began my journey, started immediately the next day, gathered some plastic glasses, pots lying around and started taking leaf cuttings and organising my garden that would mask all my future smoking endeavours; I had no interest in houseplants at all, it was just my excuse to get time and space for my secret smoke break, when jade started looking too dull to believe added some snake plants, a rubberplant,spider plants and a few common haworthias, before I could fully realise if I was actually enjoying caring for plants or not, my plants went from a few here and there to almost overcrowding the polyhouse, I had actually started to enjoy growing these succulents, cactus, aroids and some natural orchids; fast forward to exactly 7 months ago, I made a big decision, to quit my 10 year old addiction, for the first time in my life, the first few days were unbearable, I experienced all sort of physical withdrawal symptoms, nausea, headache, fever, head itches and what not!! I probably wouldn't be able to carry on with my weak-ass willpower, but I had another addiction now, a healthy addiction, an addiction for plants, I beared through the first few weeks and eventually got rid of the cravings and withdrawal symptoms, for the first time in my life I felt free, and the cost? I was now nicotine free with garden full of all sorts of plants that I cannot live without anymore!! So this was my journey from an addiction to cigarettes that led to an addiction of plants and I'm loving every bit of it. Also nobody in my family knows I've smoked all these years, relatives, neighbour, nobody else!! Also above are the photos of my beautiful plants, I've also added some pictures of when I started gardening🙌🏻, thanks for reading , it's something that I'm sharing to anyone for the first time, ever!!