Winners never quit, quitters never win

Like most good Americans, I take several drugs, prescribed or recommended by my doctor. Prescribed are: two beta-blockers, a statin, a cholesterol absorption blocker, two anti-depressants, and a smoking cessation drug, Chantix. While each of these drugs has its idiosyncrasies, the best of these is Chantix.

I've been taking Chantix for almost 8 months now. From Pfizer, the miracle workers who brought us Viagra, Chantix is packaged in two different cardboard folders: the "starter pack" that has a 7-day blister pack of increasing dosages for the first week, and three 7-day blister packs of full-strength, and "continuation packs," which contains four 7-day blister packs of the full-strength product. Notice how cleverly they have circumvented my prescription plan's one-month-supply prices. Out of any 48 consecutive months, only 3 of them have only 28 days. But I'm not writing this to quibble about the rip-off.

About a week after beginning my Chantix regimen, I discovered that I cared less and less about smoking. It no longer particularly bothered me if I went several hours without a cigarette. At work, even under stress, if I thought "now is a great time to run out for a smoke!" and didn't actually get up and do it right then, an hour or two might pass before the idea would occur to me again. Down to about half a pack a day from two-and-a-half packs a day.

Also, about a week after beginning my Chantix regimen, I discovered that I could fly. It was in a dream, of course, but it was exceedingly vivid - lavishly colored, intricately detailed, beautifully choreographed. My exhilaration was gradually replaced by dismay, as I awoke to dreary reality. For the next several months, my dreams were impossibly lovely. Even a few nightmares were made bearable by their sheer beauty. Not all of the dreams were flying dreams, although many were; there were the usual money/sex/wish-fulfillments, too, but all made gloriously intense. I napped a lot in those days, and woke remembering all of the wonderments. If this had gone on much longer, I would have done my best to turn into a fairy-tale princess and slept my life away.

Finally, though, these dreams became less frequent and substantial. Reality began re-asserting itself, proving to be better than dreams on a few occasions. But still, every once in a while, I get a real humdinger of a dream - a technicolor extravaganza of epic proportions, leaving my waking self actually jealous of my sleeping self.

Chantix's brochures list "sleep problems (trouble sleeping, or vivid, unusual, or strange dreams)" among possible side effects. I certainly don't consider what has happened to me to be a problem. Instead, it is the reason that I'm still taking Chantix, and still smoking about half a pack a day. Gotta keep on dreamin'!