“Yes, I finally achieved the impossible, from 40 a day to zero and smoke free for the last 15 weeks, and that's about £100 a week, do the math! I used to really enjoy smoking but hated smelling of smoke,I hated the way I had to stand in the rain outside the pub. I really wanted to stop but never thought I could do it. Until I met Snahal.

“I had several incentives to quit, all the normal ones, health, finances, smell, appearances but I had one extra. I am transgender and just before I was approved and prescribed for my hormone treatments,I found out that oestrogen can cause sever blood clots and risk of strokes to smokers. I had always wanted to transition more than anything in my life and if I had to quit smoking to do so, what better incentive than that?

“I came to learn through the process that I went through with Snahal, that anyone who has the incentive, who really wants to quit they can. Others will have different incentives in their lives but think what it will be to achieve something that big.

“So, at first, I called my GP who told me to ring ‘One You Surrey’. I was called back almost immediately by Snahal and she immediately struck me as a truly caring person. We talked at length about quitting how long it takes and how we go about it and then she asked me for a quit date. A quit date...? What...? Do I have to choose one now...? Yes. Well, how about next Monday? That was it! The first step. I smoked myself silly that week using up the last of my cigarettes and ceremoniously had my final fag at 9.30pm on the Sunday night!

“Snahal had sent me the first two weeks of nicotine patches and lozenges to get me through as well as some very good literature on the process I was embarking on. I had no idea you could get these on the NHS, if I had known that I would have quit years ago!

“I thought I was attempting the impossible,until you realise that so much of smoking is based around your routine. Get up put the kettle on. Have a fag. Make the tea.Have a fag. Go shower. Have a fag and so on. I never smoked in the house, but I spent a lot of time on the phone walking round the garden, with a fag. I used to joke that I had cut my fags down to one after every meal and that I had cut my meals down to 40 a day.

“I also realised that there is in society this sort of "blokey" thing where you think you are invincible. "My gran smoked 60 a day and lived to 101, I'll be OK!"But then you think about how great it would be not to cough all night long and swallow cough sweets all day. Also since quitting my blood pressure has back down so far that I have stopped taking one of my BP medications, my GP is thrilled.

“So Snahal phoned me every Monday at first and then every other Monday for 12 weeks to check on how I was. She was so kind and reassuring, it made a huge difference to me to have someone so encouraging and she sent me my patches after our chat which always arrived the next morning with a sweet note of support in the package.

“So, now I don't smoke. Thank you Snahal you have literally saved my life. Sending all my very best wishes to you and for your wedding day!”

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