I’m 34 years old and I like to think I lead a pretty healthy lifestyle. I eat plenty of fruit and vegetables, watch my fat and carbohydrate intake and although I like a beer as much as the next man, I’m keen to promote moderation and restraint. I also love my exercise and in the last twenty years have played a bit of football and run four half marathons and seven 10K races. Not a bad CV, but I’m not happy. One thing has dogged me ever sinceI was thirteen years old and that is the knowledge that I am a smoker. Over twenty years of smoking has cost me thousands of dollars, given me a cronic morning cough and left me wondering what I might have achieved in the sporting arena had I not been compensating for my addiction. Perhaps worst of all, I am all to aware of the negative health aspects, with a mother that works as a specialist cancer nurse and having lost both grandfathers to smoking related ailments.

So, why do I smoke?     I have no idea

What do I need to do to quit?     I have no idea

Have I ever decided to stop trying to give it up?     Never, I have tried and failed hundreds of times, but I will never quit, quitting. It only takes one successful attempt and all of the unsuccessful tries are forgotten forever.

EAGLES is a smoking cessation study set up to try and help smokers find that one magical solution that works. It also aims to try and identify what makes us smoke and more importantly what keeps us smoking despite every logical part of our brains screaming it is maddness.

If you are serious about quitting and think that you can help the people at EAGLES to help countless millions of unhappy smokers; please, please contact them. This is a sickness and an addiction and only by helping each other can we ever hope to beat this and be free.