I think that gay men and lesbians are smoking less and less, just like the rest of society. But our group is still prone to the addiction more than others.

I was a pack-a-day smoker for 10 years, throughout my 20s. Despite common sense that cigarettes kill, I developed and held on to my love affair with them. I had always told myself that I'd quit by the time I turned 30.

I'm part of an in-between generation -- Generation X, to be precise. We were infused with all that anti-smoking messaging at early enough ages to make us painfully self-aware, even as we were seduced into smoking by mass media.

Society accommodated smokers with the "smoking section" in restaurants, on public transit and even at high schools. It's easy to forget that until recently, sexy smoking was everywhere in movies and on TV. I sat in the smoking section on a flight when I was 19 years old. By request. It was banned very shortly after that.

I am the outcome of that mixed messaging; I made love to my cigarettes, but I knew I had to quit them someday. Even though they had a smoking section at my favorite hangout, Hamburger Mary's, I would smoke outside on the patio where it was dark and the fresh air would minimize the smell on my clothes. My weakness would be less visible to others. A cocktail in one hand and a cigarette in the other didn't make me feel or look sexy; it only enabled me to retreat further into myself, creating a barrier between me and the crowd. It was a way to feel safer for a few minutes.

I knew the longer I waited to quit, the odds for success were lower. I was puffing on borrowed time. I had the will to stop, but the physical addiction was way more powerful than me wanting cleaner lungs, which is sad. That's what it's like being hooked on a physically addictive drug; you cannot call it quits without it making you climb the walls or yell at a cashier for giving you paper instead of plastic at Safeway. It was overwhelming.

Now it's been nearly a decade since I stopped. Hindsight being what it is, I credit two things for my final success; changing my mindset, and those little purple pills that I took short-term.

First, I had to start calling it what it was -- dysfunctional. I mean, I had come out of the closet to myself and to everyone at 21. But by hanging on to cigarettes, I was forcing myself into another one. I was among the tiny minority at work who would find places outside the office to smoke. Afterward, I would sneak to the bathroom and thoroughly wash my hands, so I could pass for someone who had more common sense.

And while the nicotine at one time had given me that special boost, by now, I was merely staving off discomfort by lighting up. My smoking was like being in a physically abusive affair; I was participating and loving it while I was in agony over it. It just had to stop.

Second, I took advantage of Zyban, also known as Welbutrin, which was being marketed at the time as a miracle cure for smoking. It worked wonders, and I believe I'd still be smoking had I not resolved to take the drug as part of my strategy to quit. It was as any memory of being hooked was washed away. The urges, the cravings, the discomfort -- they all stopped, and quickly. This drug, which I took for about a month or two, stopped the war against my will to stop and my body's painful withdrawal. It stopped my subconscious from tricking me into relapse. Eventually, I lost the taste for cigarettes altogether. It was as if I had never been a smoker.

And it remains so today, thank goodness.