Quitting smoking

I quit drinking coffee every morning at the same time as I stopped smoking, but I caved on that one the other day. I had two cups yesterday and was crazed all day and didn't know it. So today, no coffee.

And yeah, I stopped smoking indoors a long time ago and I just got a new car, and I don't smoke in it at all.

I guess the most positive thing I can say is, it wasn't as hard as I thought, in that after the first week the time does just seem to go by. Of course there's always the danger of going back but I figure just take things on a day to day basis and you'll be fine.

Running definitely helps and also acts as sort of further motivation, the idea that you can actually be physically fit and a non smoker is an attractive one, I found, anyway.

You'll feel alot better, and I found I slept alot better too, just go for it. In the first 3 weeks I smoked one or two on my birthday, and one or two some other night, I didn't buy a pack though, which I think is key. So don't buy a packet.

I'm not sure about others but I really did find the first week or two hell, but after that it got alot easier.

My usual smoking crowd is this one girl who just sits at home and watches war movies on DVD and this other hermit who just sits around with his dog smoking his hookah.

i gave in eventually, and had one cigarette. it has to be my last one. i am worried about my health

Huh?

Anyways, good luck, Gear. I quit last December, and it was hard as shit. Now, though, it's no big deal. You really do feel better. Hang in there.

Now I feel pretty confident. I would suggest quitting cold-turkey. I am sure there are pros and cons to any method, but cold-turkey has an absoluteness to it. "I did not smoke any today" is far more motivational than "I only had two today."

Also, after a while you start not to like the things. I started actually smelling cigarettes and not liking the smell. I also became much more aware of the smoke. Go into a restaurant and look at the smoking section and the non-smoking section. The non-smoking section is so much nicer.

found that by running more and taking Vitamin B6, I was able to pretty easily stop my cravings.

Wow, does this actually work? Even if it's just a placebo, why not, I'll go take some-a those supplements I got months ago & haven't touched.

I can't run right now because I am sore from the other night when I had to run 4 miles total to the store & back to get my dog some syrup of ipecac after he ate roach traps. (excuses) And I don't want to take up a new hobby because I always get frustrated at learning curves. I was good at smoking right from the start. *bittersweet laugh/cry* Maybe I'll just start making art regularly again and maybe meditating more (aka zoning out to drone in semi-dissociative state and eventually taking a nap).

So the ONtario government will send you a five week supply of nicotine inhalers for free if you agree to participate in their "study" which consists of three no doubt long and irritating phone calls over the course of the next year.. http://stopstudy.ca I foolishly started smoking again in June after 6-8 months without, and I've tried to quit a few times since and it's been a lot harder. I suspect it'll get easier soon as I can only smoke outside and it's starting to get very cold and terrible outside, but I just tried my nicotine inhaler's first puff and it's an incredible replication of smoking without the smell, smoke or being outside in the cold. Apparently it doesn't contain the many other toxins that you would find in a cigarette, only the nicotine. Anyone else ever use one to quit?

I believe I would just get addicted to those.

it depends on how much you believe your addiction is due to chemical dependence and how much you believe your addiction is due to habit. in my case it was mostly the latter.

former for the first three days, latter for the next 8 months

...then i started again, of course

meditating more (aka zoning out to drone in semi-dissociative state and eventually taking a nap).

― Abbott, Sunday, July 8, 2007 8:10 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

hey, been about two months!

Haven't smoked since August of 2007 but I swear to God, I just started craving one.

don't!

Well, I'm not gonna.

hey, been about two months!

― donna rouge, Tuesday, October 21, 2008 11:02 PM (1 month ago) Bookmark

i "broke edge" when i was in georgia two weeks ago (for some reason i can't resist when it's legal to smoke in a bar) but that's been it since quitting in august

This morning an insurance agent asked me if I smoked, and I said "no," and realized I've been off them for a year and a half. This is pretty much a miracle for me. I loved smoking and did it for twenty-plus years. I have been through some REALLY AWFUL PERSONAL LIFE SHIT since I quit and it hasn't even been a problem, and have gotten drunk innumerable times without goin' "fuck it, I'm drunk, I gotta smoke!"

I just wanted to testify because it felt really great to actually feel, in response to the question "do you smoke?": "of course not"

High fives, duder! High fucking fives. I haven't smoked since February and this breathing thing is a thing I can totally dig.

Abbott let me just tell you that this time next year you are gonna 1) barely remember that you used to smoke and 2) have one of these "fuck yeah, this is way better!" moments when you do remember

High fucking fives!

i wonder if the next questions of the insurance man was: have you smoked in the past..

Haven't had a cigarette since 2008 (or more accurately the wee hours of 2009), but it was the kind of thing I usually only did on weekends, as a "treat," and now I find myself using weed in the same way. Used to be I would smoke weed every couple weeks or so and it didn't really matter if I did or I didn't, but lately I've kind of gotten into a routine where pretty much every weekend, I'll get stoned at home one night and watch The Office and 30 Rock, and it's totally something I look forward to during the week like I looked forward to cigarettes. It's not preventing me from living the rest of my life or anything -- if I have Saturday night plans, I just do it whenever I get home, after my girlfriend falls asleep -- but it still sorta feels like I'm just replacing one vice with another.

Technically I quit last Sunday - I had a cognac cigar at the renaissance festival. On Mother's day I told my mom I was going to quit and diet since she had been on my case about eating unhealthy. So far I am doing just fine without cigarettes. I think a lot of it has to do with having two goals I'm working on at once. Also I had definitely cut down on smoking to the point where I was only smoking one pack or less a week.

i quit more than a year ago. and the cravings haven't vanished. i didn't realise how strong my addiction to nicotine was, i thought i could stop any day with a bit of discipline. what i realised in the meatime is that stopping smoking is a lifetime project. it's not like i don't smoke for a year and then i can have one. it's definite. the first bloody cigarette is the nail in my coffin. why the fuck is this drug so fucking strong. i still can't believe it. btw like john i have smoked for 20 years. but i have started only with 23 or something. it was a very conscious decision to start. and i smoked roll-ups. i only smoked ready-made cigarettes when there was nothing else. they taste like shit but roll-ups are really tasty.

The trick for me is not to really quit. then again I was never a really big smoker (for a long period). I think I smoked about half a pack for roughly ten months. My dad refuses to consider me a smoker (slip: I typed joker first). so anyway yeah I smoke zero to five per day. Usually it's about four. I know that's still smoking (to non-smokers) but I rather enjoy the odd cigarette than quitting altogether (esp with a husband who smokes).

Alex, my dad quit about 15 years ago and still has cravings. He was a MAJOR smoker, as was my mum. She'd get up and have a smoke in the middle of the night. Now she's a fullfledged anti-smoker. (TBH I have yet to smoke in front of'em. Tonight I was outside. she probably noticed but pretended not to see me smoking.)

I just realized that I've made it 5 years last month! It seems insane that it's that far behind me considering how attached to smoking I was during the 10+ years I smoked.

I don't have cravings anymore, but it definitely took more than a year. And not long ago I saw a whole cigarette that had obviously fallen out of someone's pack just sitting there on the curb. It scared me that I had to think twice about it.

My dad quit for a couple of years, I think, and his brother (probably maliciously) left a pack. he was smoking again in no time.

I just realized that I've made it 5 years last month! It seems insane that it's that far behind me considering how attached to smoking I was during the 10+ years I smoked.

― kingkongvsgodzilla,

Me too! Five years ago when we bought this house my wife and said, "Enough is enough." Having someone else going through it made it easier (I had tried to quit a few years earlier but she hadn't - I lasted about two months).

Now if I can drop the thirty-odd pounds I've put on since I quit...

wife and I

hey alex you kick ass for having not smoked for so long! and isn't it nice to have ILX to vent to? (It helps me when I'm cranky baout shit like that.)

absolutely. i love this place. posting away and getting answers by people from all over. one of the coolest things on this planet.

I have backslid a few times in ~2 months, but I'm really lucky that I don't get cravings the next day.

I only made it part of the way through the Easyway to Quit Smoking (Carr) mentioned above, but the line that stood out to me is that having a cigarette isn't really relaxing or enjoyable, it's just putting off withdrawal.

Nath, I'm totally in your camp. I'm a zero - three a day smoker, and I feel like that's not too bad for me. I've never been a heavy smoker, and I certainly feel less crappola when I'm not smoking too much.

For those who cannot control it, though - I feel for you. Its got to be really tough.

i went from 15-20 cigs p/day to 1-3 p/day over a year ago, and have maintained that level since. my husband thought that cutting down so drastically during such a huge life change would be a bad idea, but it was actually the best - whole new environment, whole new set of habits and new routine. made it waaaaaaay easier than trying to quit while living in the same house where i could always smoke inside, and going to the same job where i would smoke before, during and after work. and several times - while on vacation - i've gone for as long as 6 days without even thinking about smoking.

next time we move i might try to stop altogether.

Gum didn't work for me (my jaw got sore) and the patch didn't work for me (I need to adjusting my self-medication to the situation).

But I encountered Swedish portion snus from a peer on another forum, and that's worked for the past 8 months. Snus is steam cured mini teabags of oral tobacco left under the front lip with essentially no carcinogens, they're discreet and don't require spitting. Once I got the nicotine dosage under control I slowly, over a month, lost the habit of needing a cigarette between my fingers. Over the next few months I stretched individual portions out to 2+ hours, till I was down to 4-5 a day. I'm presently down to 1 portion a day (and not every day), but plan on keeping tins around for anxiety emergencies, as its far more benign than cigarrettes.

In the US, Camel is marketting a rather foul saccharine (and low-dose) version. Don't judge snus on the Camel product - if your intrigued either as a cessation aid or for harm reduction, get a sampler from northerner.com or swedish-snus.com before you write it off.

wah

this would be a little easier if i didn't need a giant excuse to get out of the office right now

I wonder if taking up knitting will help distract me from my smoking :/

YES it WILL if you are of a singular and obsessive mind like I am.

It worked REALLY WELL for me.

Hahah I was actually remembering you Abb! And then I remembered how you said you couldnt interwebs when you got onto the knitting and I was all "nooooooooooooo"

it appears i am already replacing fags with more caffeine

this will not end well

Hmmm yeah you can't really type & knit @ the same time but if you just want to read intenets then you can hit the page down button right? No biggie!

esoj you could knit too! But it's not nec. You're already not a smoker, right? ESOJ, non-smoker! And vent away if you are pissed the fuck off in a nic fit bcz let me tell you what, those people on the hotlines are some smug, punchable Pollyannas.

I strarted smoking at about 13 or 14 yrs old and smoked until I was 31 or 32, 4 yrs later never smoked anything again. I was a pack a day smoker, if I went out drinking 2 or 3 packs a day :). I quit with the patch and a lot of gum. I still chew a lot of gum, but I never smoked again.

it's not so much that i need something to occupy my hands with, more that i need to replace it with something that i can't combine with smoking. last time i was off em for more than a year, which was helped by cycling (since i can't maintain a sufficient level of fitness for biking while being a smoker) but then i got sick, stopped riding, and got back on the darts.. gah

c'mon dawg u need to clean the bike up and come riding w/ me on sundee

Ya I have the smoke/alcohol diad that's killin me because one wont work without the other so I just end up having both, way too freakin often.

If you quit smoking you can drink a lot & wake up feeling pretty normal & not at all like a barbecue grill that hasn't been cleaned in 2.5 years.

this sundee riding idea is intriguing tho i need to find my helmet

also i currently have the fitness of a 90 year old

wake up feeling pretty normal & not at all like a barbecue grill that hasn't been cleaned in 2.5 years.

Hahahha ohhhh so true :(

I started smoking again after quitting for 7 years. I was in a what-is-the-point-of-everything mood while visiting my 92 year-old father (who still smokes!), bummed one of his cigarettes, and was hooked again. I only smoke at night after dinner because it calms me down after the incredible tension I experience from work. Because of that it's been hard to find something to replace it with. I know that changing my environment worked the last time, but don't have any trips planned for the near future. I think I have to build up my level of disgut with it so I have the motivation. Nicotine is a powerfully addicting drug, but the ritual of smoking itself is just as hard to give up...

i would say a cigarette after dinner is a man's right to choose, but that's just me.

Yah I only smoke in the evenings after work too. Smoke and a wine and simpsons. Which too often turns into a few more, heh heh.

yes that's the problem. I can't seem to make it even one night without smoking. Last time that happened was two weeks ago when I was visiting my one year old god daughter overnight in Napa

the ritual of smoking itself is just as hard to give up...

this is very OTM... I don't particularly like the buzz of nicotine but having an excuse to go outside or smoking after a big dinner or something is very nice

after 7 years? i know i will be hooked again if i smoke another fag. actually i am hooked right now as i crave a cigarette like crazy. one year without nicotine. today was hard as i did some exercise in the early morning, outside it was very sunny and i worked from 7 to half 7. we have deadlines and stuff. has anyone else smoked roll-ups and has got the impression that they seem more addictive than normal cigarettes? i have had a sore throat for over a year now. will it ever become normal again?

I just recalled a good solution - become violently ill and bedridden for more than one day. This happened to me about twelve years ago and I ended up not smoking for two whole years. It happened again and I have had only two cigarettes all day.

Hey so I haven't smoked since Sunday because flu and I haven't not smoked this long since I started like seven years ago.

I'm pretty much completely well now, but I have an intermittent productive cough and I'm wondering if this is a quitting thing or a flu thing.

(PS got some snus around cuz I've got a friend who's a total snus stan so I'm not really doing much withdrawal at the moment)

wow has it only been six weeks

feels like months

^should point out that i have had 2 cigs in this time, and tbh i don't know why i had either..

i have had 15 months without a fag now. and i am still struggling. my throat burns. the only thing that keeps me from not starting again is all the effort i have put in quitting. while smoking i did not realise how strong my addiction was. now i do.

My heavy-smoker ex just had his tonsils out and hasnt smoked for 2 weeks as a result... be interesting to see if that sticks.

been on the patch for a week. boredom is the enemy of quitting. been sitting here all morning wishing i could smoke.

found a pack of chesterfields just in time for new years. dusted them off and haven't wanted one since.

been sitting here all morning wishing i could smoke.
thta's what i have been doing for the last 17 1/2 months. kind of. but it's too late to restart now. after all the effort i put in not smoking. i have to admit that there are long periods without thinking about fags at all. quitting is possible but beware. the relapse is always around the corner.

Day 9

I'm going to get that laser "acupuncture" therapy one day this week, which worked really well for my aunt who smoked as much as I currently do for 30 years. I'm sure half the "cure" is mental, but the patch and gum have NOT worked for me.

I will murder people!!!

don't do it

i mean murder people, quitting is ok. may i offer u a stick of my trident "layers" ?

How long did you smoke? My father says it's irrelevant, but I do feel it plays a role. And how long have you been off it? What are you using?

I've been off it for about a month now. It's going well. But then I was never a proper smoker (in my mind).

Ech, probably since about 19, so ten years. I've tried giving up a few times, with not a smashing success. I smoked so much on Saturday night that my lungs just felt wrong the next day, and sort of still do even today. Since Saturday I've had one cig and a few puffs on a low-tobacco spl1ff. I find that it's not just the frustration and the fidgetiness that gets me, but bouts of depression and anxiety too (which are kind of worse).

I'm trying to cut down with the aim of quitting before Christmas. NiQuitin mints are the most disgusting thing I've ever tried. What is it about nicotine gum that makes me hiccup?

smoked for 20 years, quit January 4th using the patch. have cheated twice since then. feeling great, not missing it (except every once in a while when I drink).

i have had my second anniversary on the saint james's way - where i stopped - and these days it is getting better but this summer i was suffering a lot. i still fell the nicotine and/or the tar in my throat. the throat burns occasionally. i have the impression the tar is mounting up from the lungs. whatever, to stop smoking is possible and definitely worth it.

i've been tapering down over the last year or so.. from a packet a day (i have no idea how i kept that up) down to 3-4 daily average. i can see myself completely without at some point in the future but i'm not quite there yet

3-4 cigs not packs

I had one yeaterday. I couldn't cope - I was getting frustrated at work and bickering with my girl. This is the main problem, although I don't know if I believe in patches and gum is absolutely disgusting!

Why not just cut down? Whatever works for you to lessen the amount of smoking, right?

Yesterday I craved a smoke SO FUCKING BADLY. It was really overwhelming. But I just don't go to buy a pack and it goes away. I don't have the anger, so only I am suffering. lol

6 years this summer! Considering how heavy of a smoker I was, it's really weird how fast I'm creeping up on being a nonsmoker for longer than I was a smoker. 2015, here I come.

quitting for the second time in a year ):

actually yesterday i was really stressed out and i was like MAN I AM NIC FITTING LIKE A MOTHERFUCK I NEED A CIGARETTE NOW so i bummed a fag off a coworker and realised it did not help at all and was like OKAY I GUESS I WASN'T NIC FITTING I AM ACTUALLY JUST REALLY STRESSED OUT ABOUT STUFF

I was gonna quit but then I discovered rolling tobacco. :>

I read some article years ago about how nic withdrawal feels like stress (duh), so that's always going to be a trigger, but you just have to realize it's bullshit and get past it. There are other ways to get rid of that feeling: step outside (where smokers don't congregate) and take some deep breathes and ground yourself. or do a few push-ups.

Haven't smoked a single one in five and a half days now. Was on 20+ a day. NiQuitin mints really work. And I've only had about two a day of those because they have, err, a really strong laxative effect, to say the least. Don't think I'd have done it cold turkey.

Good job, quitters! It is not easy but it is so so so so worth it, so hang in there.

If the two year old that was up to 40 cigarettes a day can quit, so can you!

I was talking to someone who quit (with meds). When I told her I quit without help, she replied "but you didn't smoke much and not for long." About seven years and half a pack to a pack per day? I guess not. lol

i've been kind of lame about quitting. I've tried to cut down or not at all, but it's so easy to slip back into it. I knwo someone who used one of those inhaler things to quit which is a bit o_O

I am craving a smoke rrrreally badly :-(

fight it nat!

^^

Just noticed that the sale price on a pack of Marlboro's an my local convenience store was $5.75.

At a pack a day, $5.75 for a month = $172.50. For a year it's over $2,000!

Oh the golden years when smokes were $1.30. Always said, if they ever go over two bucks, I'm quitting!

I remember seeing a cigarette machine at First Avenue with packs for $3.00 and thinking what a rip-off.

The problem is that I don't really consider a smoker: I never smoked THAT much (she says, lol, knowing that's rub) and not for that long (hah, seven years). But I think I'll stick to not smoking. I hope.

Smoking makes a person feel like dried-up shit, don't do it, nath!

Grr...haven't had a cigarette since Friday night, & right now the universe is REALLY testing me, 'cause it's my lunch hour, and it's raining outside; and I luuuv to smoke in the rain! And it rained yesterday too, and when was the last time we had two consecutive days of rain around here? Stupid elements...Grr...

Bottom line: Lousy time to quit; but GREAT time for a thread revival, thanks!

When Halloween comes around, are you tempted to sit around and eat a pillowcase full of candy?

That comes out meaner than I intend it to be, but all these little situations that tempt you to smoke aren't permanent. I can remember smoking in Denny's, smoking on road trips and even smoking in my apartment. Now, I can't even imagine doing any of those things.

You're always going to have those moments. I felt my serious nicotine pangs in a long time on Saturday while watching a close football game. But just like the game, it passes. You ride it out and once you're not nicking out so hard, you can say Okay. Rode that wave and I'm still clean.

All this much easier said than done, I am more than aware.

x-p
cravings will always come back for a long time, nath. but they will go away as well. i haven't smoked (almost wrote stopped!) for more than two years (after 20 years of about 20 grams tobacco, ie 20-25 fags, per day, i smoked roll-ups) and i have entered another period where i crave cigarettes on a daily base, usually after meals and when drinking alcohol. not sure if it is ever going to stop, my throat is still sore, but maybe it is better this way as it reminds me of what kind of a motherfucker nicotine is. and the most dangerous thing about it is, that you smoke because you think you are not hooked. that is an illusion, my dear.

Giving up right now. Second quit in 12 months. In the easy bit, first couple of days when I feel in a permamuddle. Sort of fun if I'm not in company, and in this early bit I know what I'm fighting. It'll be dangerous in a month - that's when I think I can have just one. NO.

last cig was friday am. the longest i've gone since i started. feeling pretty good so far! had the most amazing run ever this morning. still get testy / annoyed and it's still hard even though it's easier now. i have some gum just in case. my partner smokes but it hasn't made it harder, mainly because i decided not to let it!

really helps that i want to take my runs to another level and today it happened :)

Yeah, like some days I'll pass some wretched old hag standing under an awning smoking a cigarette and I'll be like "damn, that smells good!" but most days it makes me nauseous and irritated.

Day two of quitting again.

Hardest part for me is always the communal aspect - going out to smoke with friends or on class breaks, not chain smoking while drinking.

Eventually all those things start to feel normal, or not 'a thing,' like Pleasant Plains noted. You have to believe!

This thread revive has inspired me.

It's crazy to me to think that I am only about three months away from a full year of not smoking. I never thought I would ever be some kind of smoking cessation success story.

The hardest times for me are the ones like last Friday night: I had a great day, the weather was beautiful, I had just done some intense exercise (yay endorphins), and then my partner and I went to a new restaurant in the neighborhood and had some tasty food and a glass of refreshing wine. And, right after we finished and went outside and were greeted by, like, a 70 degree night (a rarity here), I wanted a smoke so bad I may have blown up a school bus for one.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3536/3864760873_c07a6d6d60_b_d.jpg

today. i quit in december but stupidly started again a couple of months ago "to cope" with the stress of finishing my thesis. terrible decision and i can seriously feel the negative effects it's had on my health. time to quit again....

Smoking makes a person feel like dried-up shit, don't do it, nath!

srsly

paralysis?

ugh this shit gotta stop

if i could keep it just to the 1 cigarette i actually enjoy every day or two that would be fine, but..

yeah, exactly. started like that again (after i hadn't smoked for about a year, during pregnancy and bf-ing) but after couple of weeks i was smoking half a pack again. urgh i crave it soooo badly. i stupidly think it'll help with the diet. lol

2days in! FUCK

starting smoking

!

started again recently :|

if i could keep it just to the 1 cigarette i actually enjoy every day or two that would be fine, but..

― pies madness (electricsound), Tuesday, 5 October 2010 22:23 (Yesterday) Bookmark

yep.

at the moment i'm on this horrid rising-panic-must-smoke thing, and then when i smoke the panic flows out and is replaced by miserable. suckssssss

my gf can buy a pack and have it last her for a over a month easily. she'll go a week without smoking at all. hate her for that tbh

2days in! FUCK

me too! going ok. quite pissed off at the world. stay strong!

Five weeks, one day and 19 hours since my last.

I will murder people!!!

― village idiot (dog latin), Wednesday, September 1, 2010 11:11 AM (1 month ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is difficult

I quit on either January 7 or 8 of this year. For the first month I had to constantly remind myself that I was either a pack a day smoker (which I hated myself for being) or I was going to have to quit completely. I do not have the ability to only smoke a couple cigarettes a day or whatever so i would only be throwing away all the progress I made if I reward myself with an occasional cigarette. They are not to be messed with. At least not for me.

The pangs subsided after a while though I still get the occasional desire it's easy to squelch it. One thing I underestimated is how you have to reorient your entire identity into being that of a non-smoker. For so much of my life, I was a smoker that was part of who I was, and now I wasn't. And it's strangely disorienting at first.

As far as the social isolation goes, I learned to just go outside and hang with the smokers, even though I wasn't smoking myself. If I know I'm not going to smoke, then I know I'm resolute enough to not smoke just because I'm around people who are smoking and the fact that I might have a pang of a craving isn't enough to override the social need I still feel to go outside and hang out with the smokers.

Really, we can go on and on about how hard it is, but it's really just getting over the initial hump of withdrawal. Go 3 days without any nicotine and it only gets easier and easier. Before you do it, it seems really hard, but looking back, it wasn't really that hard at all.

Today was my 5th day and I had a really intense craving. I was at work, left my office and went on a hunt for a cigarette. Luckily I didn't see anyone smoking for a while and when I finally did I managed to dissuade myself from bumming a smoke. I feel like for me the hardest part is reminding myself I'm doing this for myself and not anybody else.

yes! my husband just inhales really deeply. this reminds him how much better it is not to smoke. his lungs are finally getting some oxygen. for me that's not really something i can do, i didn't smoke long enough to feel that disadvantage. but otoh having clients who stink of smoke come in your shop is an eye opener. before i didn't notice.i wonder if i smelled that badly too. don't think so, cause we never smoked inside the house.

if you make a list of the pros and cons, there's not that many advantages to smoking, really. and boy does it save money. i am pretty sure we save about 150 to 180 euro per month on cigs. yikes.

I really have not had much of a problem at home the last few evening, even drank some beers and hung outside for a bit. It’s this damn workplace that kills me. i've been here 15 minutes and i'm already freakin out.

Day 6. Quitting with a friend, we usually end the night chain smoking on her porch and talking. It's helping a lot to reinforce each other, since if I cave she's going to and probably vice versa. We're staying strong for the team.

Am currently applying the full arsenal of anti-smoking products because nothing has worked! I went to Target and grabbed the gum, the lozenges AND the patches, plus lots of sugarless chewing gum. Now that is helping! Don't forget to drink your juice - if your body feels healthier, it is more reluctant to accept pollutants.

u s steel did you try the allan carr book

I smoked for twenty plus years and that thing straight cured me, it's been almost three years now.

Drinking lots of water helped me a lot.

If this guy can control himself, so can you.

http://i38.tinypic.com/2djvrsp.gif

When you get a craving, that's all it is. You don't physically need a cigarette any more than Celine Dion songs actually make you nauseous. Just ride the snake, learn to love those tense moments. Because they pass. And when they do, you can say "hey, I didn't smoke just then."

Thanks to my massive consumption of anti-smoking products, I own about ten of those new age subliminal CDs. I am skeptical, however.

Also they say just talking about your efforts helps. I am chomping on the gum as I read this.

gonna ask you again if you tried allen carr which will rid you of your ideas about how addictive nicotine is

I think I did but will check it out again, thanks!

no sweat. my testimony: I didn't just "smoke for twenty years" - I smoked one to two packs of Winston red packs a day from 1983-2007. then a friend told me she had read allen carr and was thankful to feel confident she'd never smoke again. a while later I ordered the book; that was three years ago; I don't have any desire to smoke now. not when drinking, not when stressed. the desire to have a cigarette is just gone. it fucking rules.

has he done a book about biscuits?

if allen carr tries to stand between me & the bakery I will run him down

dont dent your fender on his coffin

but, uh, i appreciate the sentiment

Yeah, aerosmith my dad used to be a notorious chain-smoker, you could smell him coming from 3 towns away - 2-3 packs a day since the fifties and for a year and a half he has been totally SMOKE FREE! It can be done! He looks great now, had to have heart surgery after quitting tho so let that be a warning to you.

If I could control my dreams I'd smoke my way through them every night. Almost six years on and I still miss smoking at least once a day.

I still have the dreams where I've somehow stuck twenty cigarettes to each other end-to-end (centipede style) and I stretch my arm out to light the last one.

I probably have a hidden desire to light fire to my penis, but they're still pretty good dreams.

Alan Carr book seconded, it is pretty amazing at shooting down any reason why you think you might want to keep smoking.

The Nintendo DS game based on his book is NOT recommended, however, save yourself the $$$.

One thing that also helped me was living next door to the world's biggest fuckhead, a 75-year-old asshole who bragged that he'd slept with his wife and daughter at the same time. o_O He had emphysema and was hooked up to an oxygen tank, but he'd still lift the tubes out of his nose every 15 minutes to smoke a cigarette. He was usually naked, with just a sheet covering his junk (sometimes this fell off though, argh) and accidentally ashing all over his disgusting white chest hair and third nipple. And then hacking and coughing and struggling with his oxygen. I told myself, I do not want to end up like this guy. So thinking about him helps me if I ever get nostalgic about smoking.

o.m.g.

i'm not sure i want to keep breathing after hearing that, let alone smoking.

it's both a good thing and a bad thing that i feel so much better so quickly after stopping. a good thing in that it seems like i'm not too far gone to "recover" completely. a bad thing in that it makes it seem like smoking is no thing so it doesn't matter if i do or not. but i don't want to push it to the point where it doesn't seem like no thing.

i'm never sad to have my singing voice back. this alone makes me feel baffled that i ever get back on the cigs.

the allen carr book is total rubbish. i read it a couple of years ago when everyone read it and allen carr got a millionaire or something by writing that pile of shit. he is so wrong, stopping smoking is not easy at ll, stopping smoking is bloody difficult. i had my last cig more than two years ago and i still have cravings. and my throat has been burning for all the time untill today. and the only reason why i haven't relapsed is that i don't want to go through the hell of stopping smoking again.

you keep mentioning that your throat is still burning. you may want to go get that checked out if you haven't already - that shit isn't normal. I smoked for about 20 years and quit 9 months ago and I haven't had any kind of sore throats or congestion at all.

I have, um, kind of started smoking lately. At age 39.
I'm not proud of this fact.
But right now, I only smoke one or two cigarettes a week.

Can I keep this up? Or am I on the edge of the abyss here?

I have heard of people who can be casual and occasional in this way and never get really sucked in, but it seems like a really slippery slope, and I've watched people close to me struggle for years to quit. I won't go into the whys of how I started up but I see that this is self-destructive and a bad idea. Talk to me smokers and ex-smokers.

x-post (there are many people who succeed in smoking occasionally)
did you smoke roll-ups? bison, samson, van nelle tobacco? a packet (40-50 grams) every two days? plus the occasional joint which i inhaled like crazy? i think my lung is pretty huge, i have been running marathons before i started smoking 22 years ago. there is still lots of tar in my lungs, i am sure. isn't there this rule of thumb that if you have smoked heavily for x years, you need x years to tidy up your lung?

lungs not lung

nope didn't smoke roll-ups. I guess it makes sense that they would be worse. did your throat hurt while you were a smoker?

xps i smoked about a pack a day or 1.5 days for around 12 years, and then cut right down to 2 a day in july 2008 - still at 2 a day. occasionally 3. if we're away from home i can go at least 6 days without evening thinking about it.

the problem with this method and with the allen carr method is that neither of them are gonna suit everyone. for me, giving up smoking was about the routine of it: i crave a cig when i get home from work, bc that's when i always have one, but i never think about having one now at any other time (except still when i'm drinking - that's the hardest - which is probably why i rarely drink these days). everyone said that quitting or cutting down when i moved countries would be the worst time, and i guess it probably was in some ways, but it was also the best bc i had an entirely new routine which was untainted by a smoking habit. i got to basically start over.

haha should have doublechecked before i posted - i basically already posted the exact same thing already! except we did move and i didn't completely quit bc goddamnit i enjoy a cig when i get home from work, esp now we have a pretty backyard i can sit in while i do it.

QUIT SMOKING!!!!!!!!!!!!111!!1!

did your throat hurt while you were a smoker?
when i smoked too many cigarettes, let' say 40 a day or so it did. i also often had the smokers cough (Raucherhusten), ie when you don't smoke for a while, eg in a cinema, you start coughing as your throat is sore or scratchy.

dr3w u r on the edge of the abyss, for real

Made it through my first friday night without smoking. Ran 5 miles this morning and just trying to make it past this weekend

got shitfaced and only puffed on two fags, going pretty well imo

Day 7 of not smoking, including three nights when beers were had.

This competitive thing with my friend (I won't crack until she does) is really working for both of us - but I have a feeling she's on the verge (her live-in bf is still smoking), I have to be able to stay the course after she does.

2 WEEKS YO

5.5 years... i'm still plannign on writing my book about quitting!

quitting s1ocking

48 days, four hours and 55 minutes. Still not lapsed, unexpectedly.

im going to try AGAIN, this sunday. I bought one of those electric cigs.

slocki when you write you book, you should not come up with or use a bunch of different synonyms for cigarettes. I mean, you can if you want, but it gets kind of maddening to read a book where they have some cutesy new name for the things every paragraph.

"backer-wackers"
"mouth buddies"
"lung-treats"
"inhaler wailers"

mouth buddies makes me think of

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OqhPZgP-VR4/TFi-DakX3hI/AAAAAAAAJrA/y-JSNDqAZvQ/s640/AIR+BUDDIES+2006+DVD.jpg

they fucking TALK

Good literature featuring quitting as a central theme:

The narrator / protagonist of Italo Svevo's Zeno's Conscience quits frequently.

X20: A Novel of Not Smoking by Richard Beard. Again, about quitting, but on the Oulipo tip, with numerous writing constraints based on the number 20.

my husband started smoking again. must resist temptation to have one myself. ARGH

mouth buddies makes me think of

gis'd what "mouth buddies" makes me think of but will not post results

there just comes this time in the evening when i want to head outside and lean against a wall and stare up at the sky and smoke a cigarette.

I lasted 3 whole days before I caved lol :( But, I'm getting better at going 24-36 hours without smokes, so I'll just try and get more disciplined. I have ZERO willpower bcz basically I dont GAF.

Just the phrase "mouth buddies" makes me glad I'm not a smoker. It makes me glad I'm not a lot of things.

im going to try AGAIN, this sunday. I bought one of those electric cigs.

― thebingo2010 (chrisv2010), Tuesday, October 19, 2010 7:56 PM (Yesterday)

huge pro tip here - the first 1-3 days you will be convinced that the thing isnt going to work out and that it isnt giving you enough nicotine and whatever, but stay the course, from what i can tell thats just withdrawal from all the pointless bullshit in cigarettes, once you get past that the e cigarette is the shit.

(note: if u smoke camels that is the worst for this effect.)

also load up on cartridges, its way too easy to run out and then go "oh hey ill just buy a pack while im waiting for the shipment to arrive"

plus dropping $100 on a shit ton of cartridges worked my "must use everything i buy as much as possible" weird old miser nerve really well

ecigs did nothign for me, like smoking vapes, I hated em.

Also, any money savings from ecigs is theoretical at best. You'll end up spending way more till you find a PV and liquid you're happy with.

First try a disposable Q-ecigarette for $10 to see if vaping is remotely plausible. Then I recommend the Joye eGo (650 mAh batteries mean you're not constantly swapping batteries). E-liquids are a usually a mix of propelene glycol (PG, not antifreeze, for throat hit), vegetable glycerin (VG, for visible vapor), flavorings and nicotene. My experience is that nearly any amount of PG gives the smoke a saccharine sweetness I hate. I liked the VG only liquids in mild flavors. A retailer I liked was www.cignot.com.

In the end, I discovered after a couple months that I really had a better (and far cheaper) experience importing snus. I gave all the e-cig kit I'd accumulated to a nephew who has used them for a couple years.

that sounds way more complicated than quitting

The 2 ppl I know who invested in ecigs smoked them for a week or 2 then went back to smokes. They *are*handy for smoking in non-smoking venues, mind you (if the venue'll allow that).

one week today. from about 15 a day. still kinda want to just murder everything, but it is getting a bit better, i think. pretty confident i'm gonna make it, at least.

How do you get past the whole not even WANTING to quit thing? Thats basically where I am. I only even tried last week because I am sick of being a compulsive smoker and it putting off potential dates (as well as aging my skin/being stinky). But beyond that I genuinely dont *care* about giving up. Not in the least.

(Sorry JD - you were so supportive of my declaration on FB, I feel bad now!)

for me it just happens once a year or so, usually after being sick with something and remembering how much i really would hate being unhealthy for an extended period. while i always kind of know i should quit, sometimes emotionally things just seem to align, and i always wait for that before even trying. that's where i'm at now, and obviously it makes it soooo much easier. while i want to smoke, the desire not to be a smoker is much stronger right now. hoping the feeling lasts.

So I've been leaving my cigs at home when I go to work in an attempt to cut down and finally quit. Seems I can go the day without em, but yesterday I ended up getting OTT stressed out, nearly shouted at my own boss and went to have a cry in the toilet. My emotions were utterly out of wack for the rest of the evening.

How do you get past the whole not even WANTING to quit thing?

I have this problem. Like, I know I should quit for health reasons. I think the problem with me is that I don't smoke very much so I don't really notice any adverse effects like a smoker's cough or running out of breath, or spending loads of money, so I don't have much in the way of motivating factors. I end up thinking, well I only smoke when I'm out drinking, is it really doing me that much harm that's it worth going through cravings every time I go for a pint? Which unfortunately is what happens, I've given up for months before and it doesn't seem to go away.

three-and-a-half weeks. over the bit where I want them a lot (in fact I dislike the idea of them now), but rage & impatience running high. My casual conversation is full of swearing, & I feel ready to kill/excoriate people standing too close to me, brushing against me, walking too slowly, speaking near me, misoccupying bus seats etc etc etc, (just a cranked-up version of usual London rage, obvs). it's sort of fun, rage is fun.

can completely see that motivation problem - if I wasn't so gung-ho about it & could just smoke while drinking with friends, then I'd be far less driven to stop. But if I start, it fills my idle hours, and the mountain of reasons to quit - health, hygiene, money, ethics (bad companies!), shabbiness of dependency – falls on me.

Kind of a fundamental rehab/quitting thing that you're not going to unless you're ready, right? If you know that you should, but still have no desire to quit, maybe it's not the time to try - you're just going to make yourself extra miserable and fail.

I was in the "I don't want to quit" camp until I developed a bit of a smoker cough, which was why I ended up quitting. Smokers ask me how I quit and I just tell them I finally really wanted to. One thing that worked for me is was that I sort of let myself fail once. I quit with the patch for two weeks and one Friday night I just indulged myself. Ripped off the patch and bought a pack (and a bottle) and went to town. I felt so shitty, smelly, and guilty afterward, I think it really helped me avoid temptation when I quit again a few weeks later.

P.S. I don't really understand people who get all aggro when they quit, especially weeks after the nicotine is out of their system, but I guess "it's sort of fun, rage is fun" kind of explains it. It's not the nic withdrawal; it's you.

u still have to live with u

god, i need to stop. i really need to stop.

my mouth hurts.

yeah i have the vapopro joy e 110, thing is a beast. Plus refillable cartridges.

P.S. I don't really understand people who get all aggro when they quit, especially weeks after the nicotine is out of their system, but I guess "it's sort of fun, rage is fun" kind of explains it. It's not the nic withdrawal; it's you.

OH YEAH? MAYBE IT'S YOU. BRING IT. JUST BRING IT. IT IS ON.

(but srsly, this is prob right - it feels like smoke-routines, even putting chemicals aside, structure or modulate anxiety and rage - always an action to take, always something to reach for, always a back-of-the-mind plan about the next one. Without them, it all gets a bit more unpredictable.)

I hear you on that. Maybe for me the equivalent was just missing the smoke pit at work. Getting stressed about something and immediately wanting to "take a break", and not really having anywhere to go

I have forever been all about not wanting to quit and I just really like smoking. It came to a head a few weeks ago when I just had no money and wouldn’t have any money for a least a week. These fucking things go for more then $9 a pack around here. I smoked about a pack a day it’s just ridiculous having to account for that in my budget every month.

does girlfriend steal smokes?

lol
I’d have to hip her to some fancy designer ones or somethin

i do miss the feeling like when things are fucked up and you're down or stressed. you could sit back and have a smoke while thinking "at least i have this here cig"

yeah when I feel uber lonely I likentonhave a smoke and listen to safman indie tunes

likentonhave safman?

Anybody else get upper back pain after a day or two of withdrawal? It's centered on my spine, just below my shoulder blades.

is it definitely your back and not your lungs?

Yeah, it's muscle pain. It dissipates for a bit if I do a bit of serious stretching.

huh. i've had odd achey spots in the back that someone said was probably my lungs, but it wasn't recognisably muscle pain.

I smoked for 7 years, quit 3 years ago, but then socially smoked pretty hardcore for 2 - I found I wanted to go out and drink solely so I could smoke. A year ago I had some weird chest pain and quit cold turkey and I haven't had one since. I don't even want one when I am drinking now. It's pretty rad! I can safely say that I'll never smoke again.

Also feels like when I was 22 EVERYONE smoked, then everyone quit for a long time, and now it feels like more and more people I know are taking it up again which is kind of weird

I can safely say that I'll never smoke again.
after two years and three months i am not there yet and i am happy about it. because i know what will happen when i realize that i don't miss them anymore. i will have one immediately. the one thing i have learnt about quitting smoking is that i should never be too self-confident. as that is the most dangerous state for a quitter.

made it through a full blown party without smoking at all! it was difficult but i was able to get away for a few minutes at a time to regroup and then go back to hangin out. it will be one month tomorrow.

congrats dude! #stickwithit

http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/regulation/2010-11-10-tobacco-labels_N.htm

US cigarette packs may soon get the warning labels w/ imagery that is used in other countries.

I quit earlier this year, but then started again after about a month. Hoping I can knock it off for good before I have to start looking at cancerous lung photos on my pack.

like violence in film, you get desensitised very fast.

It is your archetypical crisp, clear autumn day here in the nation's capital and the cigarettes that people are smoking smell just perfect.

it's like that here in san francisco, too. i walked by like four groups of smokers on the way to pick up lunch and the smell was divine.

here in berlin it's getting cold now and i pity the people smoking in the streets a little bit. it's so obvious that they are unhappy, that they are only outside because of their addiction. maybe i am over-interpreting. but i know that nice smell too. and i smell it more these days than when i used to smoke 20 roll-ups per day.

over-interpreting. sometimes the cold is a bother but i always loved being outside in the crisp, cold air having a cigarette.

i'm guessing. i always liked it, anyway.

I had about ten hours without a cigarette. I started at 8 PM and made it clear to six thirty without one. Thanks to my relapse I have a massive stash of gum. I just shoved lots of gum in my mouth until it was time for bed. It worked however I had a minor relapse this morning. But this is progress, the gum is working!! I hope the two packs I bought this morning are the last!!

I still have my last pack from 2007. For me, "stopping" smoking was easier than "quitting" smoking.

Whenever I get an urge, I just tell myself, "Oh, I'm just not going to smoke right now."

exactly, that's how it works for me too. i tell myself that one day i will smoke again, but not today. my love story with the fags isn'tb finished, it is just postponed...

for me, 'stopping' smoking resulted in my starting again, after finding an old backup pack and thinking 'fuck it, i'm stressed'. and then a few months before i could stop again. Still, a couple of weeks back I went out on the red wine with a friend who I always end up smoking with, and we both managed to avoid buying a pack, so... maybe this time i'll be stopped for a while.

is it weird that i don't remember when it was i stopped (the most recent time)?

gah giving this another try then. day 3 kill me

me too tpp, only second day. all the best.

not had one since nye

still going, feeling ok on it. Had drunken nights, & still resisted. Want one now and then, but just tell myself that that craving will pass. It always does.

Disgusted when walking behind smokers now.

2 months now. not a drag

never quitting

how many packs a day are u

I really need to quit. I was doing so well but then I got stressed and was more than happy to use that as an excuse to slip up. Bah.

of course im on the patch, chewing the gum and using an electronic cig. Charlie Nicotine

Sweet jesus! Are you allowed to use the patch and gum at the same time? I didn't think you were for some reason. For me the nicotine isn't even so much of an issue. I swear at least 1/2 the cigarettes I smoke are done out of either nervousness or boredom.

yes, i asked my doctor if it was ok to use both. He said its fine, but if your heart starts feeling like its going to explode or you feel like your going to throw up, get rid of one.

I associated my smoking with video games, drinking and boredom. I also decided to quit once my son picked up a crayon and put it in his mouth and said "like daddy". I was done the next day.

I know a woman that quit 12 years ago using the gum, she's been using the gum for 12 years...addicted to that now.

the only way

http://www.moxxienetwork.com/Portals/0/turkey.jpg

valentine's day resolution = quit smoking, as a show of love towards my body

I have been smoking a lot less lately (spending time around grandparents will do that, heh), and noticed today that my singing voice is stronger already, which makes me feel like I've made the right call. we'll see how I feel after I actually go a couple of days without a cig, though.

the most stupid thing for me is that last time i quit (last december, for about 6 months) i told everyone at work and they were so happy for me and continue to congratulate me to this day (they are all super healthy non drinking non smoking lovely-if-boring ppl). then i started again and didn't have the heart to tell them i was a dirty smoker again so i've just been putting myself through cycles of smoking furiously when i'm at home and then nothing at work. kind of exhausting....

*last-last december

4 months for me
cold turkey, haven’t had one puff since
today has been a depressing, stressful mess and i almost bummed one :/

congrats Aerosol!

thanks bro!

we all know it's so difficult but it's been worth it for me.

still love cigs though and always will i think

i have a problem to believe people who say it has been easy to quit. the whole allen carr school in fact. there is a colleague who has quit maybe 4 weeks ago. and she says it was piss-easy. i bet she will smoke again in one year's time. because if it is simple to stop it is even simpler to start again.

otm
just thinking about how hard it was for me plays a big part in discouraging me to start up again.

day 4. went to the pub with a 'trigger' friend. he went out to smoke and i stayed firmly inside. feel drunk but proud :D

day 5 even!!!

:D

I still think s1ocki should write a book about this!

WAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHH

Went on weekend vacation with new ladyperson, don't smoke around her generally, noticed I hadn't had one in a day and a half, decided to ride it, now on day 3, have I mentioned

WAAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHHH

Doin' it though.

good luck!

I am out of cigs and almost-out of chewing gum (which I have attempted to substitute in order to placate oral fixation) and trying to decide what I should buy when I step out to the store later today (probably end up with both though, who'm I kidding)

3 months now.

CHRIS! GOOD JOB

its actually easier when you put your mind to it.

Keep it up!

When I smoked I had anxiety when I couldn't smoke for a while (visiting family, air travel, severe illness, etc.) and when I knew I wanted to quit I had massive anxiety about that as well.

I found the anxiety over quitting was worse than the actual physical withdrawal from nicotine and the habits associated with smoking.

For months prior to stopping, I deliberately interrupted certain routines developed over years and years, things like smoking while driving, smoking after a big meal, etc. so that later on it wasn't so sad.

Day 6. Been doing something that really helps, I find: I actually carry a pack around, and when a craving is really bad, I get it out, look at it, and tell myself "I can totally smoke one if I want to. Nothing bad will happen. I'm just not going to, because I'd rather quit smoking." or something to that effect. Removes the anxiety I associate with even the shortest periods of not smoking.

Also I've made $3 from people wanting to buy one from me.

I still have my last pack of cigarettes in my desk from three years ago. If I ever want one, there they are.

Right. This time I'm going to make this public so I have more at stake. I'm having another crack at quitting. I have a cheer squad behind me threatening to kick my ass, this time.

And a likely new bf who is a non smoker, so I have a very good motivation :D

I really hope I can do this, I'm so sick of being tired and smelly and broke.

new love interest definitely helps. seratonin runnin' etc

Didn't think of that angle, good point!

Reading this thread reminds me of my nursing assistant class: Nine people and the instructor, all of whom smoked except for me and one woman who was pregnant. We all hung out together outside in the smoking area, of course.

I didn't originally quit just because of the price of cigs, but that really helped keep me from cheating.

Yeah I'm suprised it isnt just the cost that stopped me before now. As I've prob mentioned on other threads, cigarettes are CRIPPLINGLY taxed here (and banned everywhere these days too ugh). Now they average $18 a pack and when you're spending that daily, you really go broke fast.

$18 dollars a pack! Holy fuck.

I don't even think of having a cig anymore. Addiction completely gone. For now. lol

I am at the point where staring at the massed ranks of them in tobacconists brings me joy in relief - feeling that I don't have deal with that any more, don't have to give up a stupid amount of money to get them, don't have to plan excursions or structure my day to have them .

I'm curious about ex-smokers who take up social smoking when they go out. I'm going out tonight for the first time in a while and it might be a tad tempting to have one after a stiff drink or two. I feel like I can get away with doing this since I don't go out very much, but I have a friend who quit around the same time as I did and he has been "social"-smoking more and more lately. I even saw him out in the smoke pit behind the building last week. I can't even imagine the circumstances that would convince me to go back out to that depressing are of coughing addicts now, but maybe he couldn't either the first time he decided to dabble in it again.

i'm pretty sure i couldn't do that.

it might last like one day and i'll be out buying a pack the next

I think it would take a lot for me to make the leap from one cig to buying packs, but it's been about 14 months since I quit and I've only had 2 in that time. All that said, I really doubt I'll have a problem tonight. It's not even my old smoking crew I'd be tempted to smoke with, but the people who -only- smoke while drinks are being had.

like, the smokers just seem like a miserable group of people to me now. coughing and stinking (sorry to any readers who haven't quit yet, but it's true!) They might actually be the biggest motivation not to go out there.

You can still smoke inside some bars and restaurants here. A few weeks ago, I went to a late-night send-off party for a guy heading to Iraq. I hadn't gone out to one of these places in forever, and it was just a complete shock to me. The place smelled like shit. As soon as one smoker would put out his cigarette, another would light a fresh one. There were ashtrays smoldering where someone had put out a butt on a filter. And the next morning, my clothes smelled bad and my throat and nose hurt.

The shocking thing was that this bar, these smokes were how I spent most of 1995-2005. Did I really used to smoke inside my apartment? Did I really think I was fooling anybody when I wore that jacket to work or family gatherings? I haven't smoked in three years, and there was a small part of me that thought I'd be tempted once I returned to my old haunt. Turns out, it was the complete opposite.

The key to being tempted or not is to ask yourself, Do you still want to smoke? If you do, you may want to rethink quitting. Anything besides that question -Do you want to smoke? - is going to be an artificial barrier that will come down again at some point.

coming up on 4 months. i've had one cigarette and it made me throw up in my mouth.

a week today. my impression so far is that it's very much like breaking up with someone you love very much. i just have to keep in mind that it doesn't love me back. in fact, it's been trying to kill me ever since i met it.

(but that knowledge still doesn't fill the hole)

It's okay, thanks for asking. I just walked into a door knob and it blackened my lung.

You're right, PP. Tonight I'll re-ask that question, and I know what the answer will be. I doubt I'll succumb to any temptation. Last time I went to a big shindig with these people was last July and I did have a cig, and it make me feel sick as hell. The first drag was undeniably great, but I tossed it out about 3/4 of the way through. It also helps that I would be highly ashamed to be seen smoking in front of certain people that will be there.

i tell you what though, if i didn't have my e-cig i'd be smoking again. At least now, im off the patch, gum...etc.

e-cig, huh.

tracer, they are a godsend.

joye 510

so far my craving manifests itself as kind of pulsing energy surge, like my insides are electrified. i know a smoke would sate it, but if i change my mentality a tiny bit it's almost like being high or something.

i honestly can't even conceive of what an e-cig is supposed to even be. i'm intrigued, though

http://www.thevaporpro.com/joye-510.html

best investment i made in a long time....plus you can get nice tobacco flavored smoke juice. but not from there, his juice sucks.

it heats up vegtable based liquid into a vapor (it has nicotine) but nothing else. You get a throat hit and actual smoke (water vapor).

i just watched a youtube review of the 510 and that is honestly some amazing Fifth Element type ish

ive also saved an assload of money too.

Vaporizers were being used for marijuana use long, long before they were used for tobacco. (I'm assuming that there's no way to adapt e-cigs for use with pot?)

(...and pot smells much, much better than tobacco, anyway.)

so far my craving manifests itself as kind of pulsing energy surge, like my insides are electrified. i know a smoke would sate it, but if i change my mentality a tiny bit it's almost like being high or something.

Holy shit this is so spot on.

I'll be blunt - I dont want to quit. I'm doing this cos I'm sick of being tired, and cos its kind to my nonsmoker dates/friends.... but I suspect when I'm at home alone just me and N (who also smokes) I'll cave. I'm just useless when it comes to self discipline.

That said the main things I really dont like are the stinging eyes and the smell. If I could somehow get rid of that, I'd not bother quitting at all.

(ecigs yeah but they just dont feel the same somehow)

would've thought the main thing was the illness and the dying, but ymmv

the smell has never worried me, even long before i became a smoker (i was a late starter). feel like it is overstated, but mmv i guess

i'm not breathing well lately and it has been affecting my sleep for months now, even when i'm smoking only a couple cigs a day..

I quit when a friend of mine died of lung cancer aged 42. We all have to die, but lung cancer is a nasty, nasty way to do it as I saw first hand.

so far my craving manifests itself as kind of pulsing energy surge, like my insides are electrified. i know a smoke would sate it, but if i change my mentality a tiny bit it's almost like being high or something.

Yes, otm – the first few days after quitting are a trip, confused & charged up. Treated it like a high last time - it's when you rebalance and it gets boring and itchy (the 10000th time you think 'what should I do now, well my hand wants a cigaaa - wait no I've given up') that the temptation comes.

gonna say it again: Allen Carr's Easy Way. I smoked from 1981-2007 and nothing worked to get me off and keep me off and then I read Allen Carr's book. Now it's 2011. Three years and counting, zero desire/urge/cravings: not when drunk, not when on the phone, it's really like if there's a food you lost the taste for - you know you could eat it but why would you since it doesn't appeal.

Just realized yesterday that Jelly Beans sorta taste like Lysol, in similar news.

lol out here we roll with the Jelly Belly 3-lb. bag

Christine there is no smell with the e-cig. Well maybe a slight one almost vanilla-ish

5 days

A month an a half now! I get random cravings every once in a great while, but that's pretty much it. Definitely in the "I don't smoke" mindset now, which is really awesome. Ran around with our dog today for hours, no huffing and puffing or anything.

what tracer says about an electrified surge of craving is amazingly apt. i was off for 6 weeks, back on for two, got v sick last week which, i'm pretty sure, was because of the fags but i'm off for good now. definitely.

my relapse after a six week break produced around 5 seconds of pleasure - the first five seconds of the first cig following the break - after those five seconds of pleasure it was pure joyless addiction. it's not really worth it, is it? really there's not much to be said for smoking!

I haven't quit, but I cut back from smoking up to a pack a day, in my apartment, to smoking maybe 1-3 cigarettes a day, NOT in my apartment. Actually it wasn't even hard. Shows how much of my smoking before wasn't even fun or necessary or anything.

Still have the physical habit, watching movies without anything in my hands is kind of torturous. But it's not the chemical addiction part at all.

Having something in your hands while watching the movies – that is what knitting is for.

lol I've said before that I might FINALLY have to take up knitting if I ever srsly quit smoking.

Yeah I havent fully quit eiter, but I am finding I'm more irritated by it, and its always been easy for me to go 48 hour at a stretch without, and now when I cave its only to have a few in the evening and not half a pack. Sunday nite was an exception and boy did I feel it on monday ugh ow.

xp - lol, if i ever start posting about taking up embroidery it's because i've finally decided to quit smoking

With u on the movie/TV watching thing Laurel, thats one of mine - wine and a cig with the DVD. And, out socially, I find socialising VERY hard if I dont have my drinksmoke to hide behind.

Well let's not be ridiculous, I haven't quit drinking.

Haha :D Yeah ditto - having a non-smoking/drinking new bf is making me cut RIGHT back tho, and thats a good thing (he's not imploring me to, but when I'm drinking and he isnt I'm like... this is a bit pointless).

my ex-bf was a non-drinker, and i never felt drinking was pointless.

I mean when it's just the 2 of us, it's diff when there's others about I suppose.

oh, i can see that. meanwhile -- i've just "celebrated" 20 years as a smoker.

i am developing a great dislike of drinking when my gf isn't. which is good for a number of reasons

srsly, i don't think i could have a non drinking bf.

Mines not a non drinker, but he doesnt seem to overindulge like nearly everyone else i know does heh.

ah that's different ;)

the thing that sucked was that he was also a non-driver.

Some people just don't know how to make themselves useful.

that was my bff's opinion of him as well! She actually said to him one night when we were at a bar, "so you don't drink, and you don't drive, what the fuck good are you?"

I feel a lot better, dudes. A LOT better than I used to. I'm not sleepy by 7pm, I can stay up and stay out, I want to do projects at night, I can dance for AGES, and when I do, I can finally get that feeling where it's my muscle fatigue stopping me instead of my cardiovascular capacity/thinking I might throw up.

It took a while for the shit to work its way out of my system, it didn't turn around right away, but I feel great, and I haven't even QUIT anything completely.

I'm sorry, I shouldn't be on your thread for actually quitting. I just turned some kind of corner in the last week or at least noticed it, and wanted to celebrate it for a sec.

Dude pack a day --> 3 a day is huge!

Thanks, Abs! It doesn't even feel huge, I just stopped drugging myself with smokes and booze, which I was doing so I didn't feel things or want things, and turned my life back into DOING the things I want and planning how to do MORE things I want. The health benefits are pretty much just part of the overall lyfe benefits and I'm so thankful.

...and not all nondrinkers stay that way. I am a major example. :-)

good job laurel, im still going without for almost 5 months now. this is the longest i've gone in years. im still swearing by my e-cig.

e-cig is cheating

I stopped smoking once and for all by deciding I wasn't allowed to smoke

e-cig may be cheating but it works.

you're still on nic, though. eventually won't you want to go off the e-cig? then you get nic cravings and the temptation to smoke comes back.

i don't think the temptation to smoke will ever go away if you have smoked regularly for a longer time period. i stopped july 2008. cravings come and go, my burning throat does not seem to go. sorry to have written the same post for almost three years now.

im on the smallest dose of nicotine per cart for the e-cigs, i've gone from 36mg to 2mg. Next step is 0mg. so i haven't been suffering...but what the hell i'll take the nicotine in a e-cig than all the other shit in a real cig.

alex in mainhattan yes - I have come to terms with the fact that I will always to some degree want to smoke and the only way to keep off is I'm just not allowed to

welp.

Doing this as of this morning and I'm scared.

good luck e!

reposting my testimony for you E!!

no sweat. my testimony: I didn't just "smoke for twenty years" - I smoked one to two packs of Winston red packs a day from 1983-2007. then a friend told me she had read allen carr and was thankful to feel confident she'd never smoke again. a while later I ordered the book; that was three years ago; I don't have any desire to smoke now. not when drinking, not when stressed. the desire to have a cigarette is just gone. it fucking rules.

it rules so fuckin hard to be free of smokes. honest to God it is awesome.

Thanks. I want to quit and know I have to at this point but I identify as a smoker and sort of love doing so. For me that's the toughest part. I really can't imagine not being a smoker. That probably doesn't make much sense but I've smoked since I was 17 and it's very much a part of who I am. Right now aside from all the health stuff I'm trying to focus on other positives like all the awesome summer clothes I'm going to buy with the money I'm not spending on cigarettes and while I've managed to have pretty good skin for a smoker up to this point I don't want to start looking old and wrinkly before I have to so this should help that. Oh and not being tired all the time would be nice too. So, we'll see how it goes. I hope I can do this. The longest I've ever quit before is like 3 months.

it rules so fuckin hard to be free of smokes. honest to God it is awesome.

But I like smoking!!!

Oh and I have the Carr book sitting on the coffee table. I'm gonna read it tonight even though I've already quit and he says you should quit after reading it. It should still work, right?

for the love of God get the Allen Carr book because a lot of what you're saying is stuff he will completely relieve you of.

I "loved smoking" too - until a clear argument was made to me: "no you don't - that's what you tell yourself for a variety of reasons"

Oh and I have the Carr book sitting on the coffee table. I'm gonna read it tonight even though I've already quit and he says you should quit after reading it. It should still work, right?

― ENBB, Tuesday, April 19, 2011 9:52 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

smokers tend to invest a lot of energy into persuading themselves that they're really into this activity, they have compelling reasons to do so but get a clear view of it & voila, the enjoyment is actually a combination of conditioned responses & rationalizations

xp yeah just read it!

that book works so well. i quit smoking (also 1-2 packs a day) without even meaning to because my flatmate left it lying around and i read it. i go on and on about it to smokers who want to stop and some listen and read it and stop, but many are sceptical that a book could work, but it does, it does, it does.

ok, ok, ok I'll start it tonight!!!

That probably doesn't make much sense but I've smoked since I was 17 and it's very much a part of who I am.

like here is part of the deal:

1) zero people, including yourself, will ever think "ENBB is different now that she doesn't smoke" - "it's part of who I am" is one of the things you tell yourself to maintain this actually quite mild addiction
2) it's not really part of who you are it's just a thing you do about twenty times a day. or 30, w/e. we build up this titanic rationalization about our character being "a smoker" etc when there's really no such thing, it's just a behavior & a mild addiction, once it's understood in that light stopping is about as hard as giving up pixie stix after you've realized "I kinda don't dig pixie stix any more"

two weeks from now you are gonna be like "holy fuck I am so stoked now" and that feeling will persist actually forever

scout's honor E!!

but i kinda like going outside the pub and hanging with other cool and attractive smokers.

only smoke when i'm drinking now.

I had a pocket version of the book that a read through a couple years ago so I'm sort of familiar with his theory (also read the book about flying he wrote) and it does make total sense. I just wasn't committed at the time and I think the full book version will be better anyway.

Thanks JD :)

okay a book about not freaking the fuck out when yr flying i could use

oh his flying book plus a prescription for Ativan helped me loads and loads. I still don't love it but the very thought of getting on a plane is no longer enough to make me have a panic attack.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Easyway-Enjoy-Flying-Allen-Carrs/dp/0140278370

My only issue with Allen Carr is that there was a book called The Alienist by Caleb Carr some years ago, and I keep reading "Allen" as "Alien" whenever it's next to "Carr." Inconvenient.

awes

good luck e

good luck e!

what is nice about stopping smoking is that very soon there will be a day when you wake up and your mouth doesn't taste kind of ashy and sour.

what helps is when you realize just how noxious and processed and awful cigarette smoke smells. (hand-rolled cigarettes w/ good tobacco, now that's another story.)

well I was smoking american spirits which I think smell a little less awful than others but I do remember the last time I quit (although hope this one is for good) when a couple weeks afterwards a co-worker came to my desk and the smell was so so bad I was horrified to think that's what I'd smelled like.

hah I don't know what american spirits smell like. most people here smoke menthols and the smoke smells awfuuuuul

Even while I was a smoker, American Spirits smelled particularly awful.

currently trying to quit; wrote this bit of doggerel the other day as a way to resist cravings:

Cigarettes I Have Known:
Marlboro Reds glow in my mind
like flaming rum-soaked raisins;

Bali Shag is heavy, spiced,
mysterious and Asian;

the Camel is a desert smoke,
as crisp and dry as parchment scrolls;

and Pall Malls taste like sandpaper,
abrasive to the heart and soul.

Drum is musty, mulchy, earthen,
a fungus sprouting in the mouth;

Spirits have a caramel sweetness
I thought I could not live without;

Newports greenly colden, shooting
crystals through the stiff’ning veins;

Parliaments have little dips
some people use to snort cocaine;

a Crush was given to me once
by a slender pretty girl—

I gladly sat beside her while
the smoke, and her long legs, unfurled.

Lucky Strikes are what, I’m told,
our boys in Vietnam preferred

(although, in my experience,
they mostly taste like dirt);

Nat Shermans, elegant and brown,
taste less smooth than they appear;

but when I searched for Chesterfields,
I could not find them anywhere.

re: American Spirit smell — take w/ a grain of salt but my ex- used to tell me the only reason she put up with my smoking was that they smelled better than any other cigarettes. told her I used to smoke Reds before that, and her response was "I wish you still did cuz then I'd make you quit in a heartbeat!"

Lucky Strikes remind me of my friends out on the West Coast.

Camel Lights remind me of my ex-girlfriend at christmastime

Oh I smoked camel lights for years before switching to AS in an attempt to convince myself they were healthier. lol.

yay good luck Erica!!!

I think my problem is that I'm convinced I would fail at quitting, so I don't even try.

that's the propaganda sarahel! it is like nowhere near as hard as plenty of other stuff you've probably already done

I honestly don't believe there is anyone who can't quit smoking once they're able to understand that it really is the case that it's not all that hard. couple days of a weird headspace & recalibrating habits. once your understanding of the habit is "a behavior I decided to cultivate," not "a thing that now has THIS DEATHGRIP ON ME," it's like this huge revelation

Bernard Snowy, I think you've convinced me to pick up the habit again with that poem. Also, I didn't know that about Parliaments, but it explains a lot!

j/k re: relapsing of course. I am just going to do what I see as my duty and remind all of you who are trying to quit to stay super-hydrated. Go down to the grocery store and buy a pallet of bottled water or whatever. It'll help.

lot easier if you can go boozeless for a week or two, too

I know I know but priorities, you'll be able to afford way better booze once you get free

in the end, i did quit right around the time i turned thirty and never really looked back. i didn't find it to be particularly difficult for some reason, maybe because i kinda realized that i didn't want to see myself as a smoker anymore. when you're in the middle of a long run as a smoker, you probably recognize the long-term effects on your health but don't really realize how nasty it is on a day-to-day basis until you've been off it for awhile and your system starts to clear up. it's not just in the lungs, it's everything. and as far as it being a part of image, i certainly notice when people who didn't smoke (or i didn't know were smokers) light up a cigarette, but when people who are smokers totally quit, it's really not noticeable and doesn't alter their identity for me because smoking isn't a defining characteristic for someone unless they're a cartoon camel.

i've quit drinking before, when I felt I was drinking to excess, and that was fine. And now I'm at a point where I can drink in moderation and be okay. But I'm unsure whether I can do that with smoking.

i think a lot of it is more psychologically habitual than physically. the whole process of movement and ritual involved w/smoking is itself addictive. and i also think that people who say smoking chills them out might in fact just be chilling out because they're standing around inhaling and exhaling deeply, they might actually chill out rather well w/o a smoke doing just that.

definitely! Or because they tell themselves, "I am taking these 5 minutes to chill out."

how nasty it is on a day-to-day basis until you've been off it for awhile and your system starts to clear up. it's not just in the lungs, it's everything

OK so tell me some of these other things. What specifically is going to be awesome assuming I stick with it, of course.

kinda hard to pin it down but you're not going to feel as winded from physical activity, your skin might be even *better*, cleaner teeth, you will actually taste food better ime because your taste buds will clear up (or open up, idk), your car, clothes, house/apt will smell better (because even if you only smoke outside it's gonna come along with you wherever you go), and i tend to think that w/o smoking as an expected crutch or the ritual you'll go to at the end of every day, you'll have a bit more zest and ambition for future endeavors. that sounds stupid, maybe, but i think it's true. i don't think it's really hard to cast aside once you decide that you are not a smoker but rather you are a person with this smoking thing that you do sometimes. there is a difference.

It is so nice to sit here and not worry about when and where my next cigarette will come.

When I go to the doctor because I don't feel good, he doesn't tell me to stop smoking. Not sure if that was ever the problem in the first place, but now, at least he has to dig a little deeper.

No, I don't have a light. Guess I can keep walking.

I once swore I'd never pay more than $2 a pack. I quit when they were $3.50. I don't know how all you moneybags are still keeping up with this today.

$3.50?! My god. I've been making a list all day of the cute things I'm gonna buy with all this money I'm gonna save. Pretty excited about that part tbh.

Good luck to you.

That would be the most exciting part for me, I think, the previously wasted dollars adding up.

Seriously. Every time I've had a craving today (which has be surprisingly infrequent) I've bookmarked something I'm gonna get instead of smokes.

best of luck e

Thanks guys the support is nice and now I'll feel like a real ass if I don't stick with it so this is good!!

i have high expectations for next time we hang out :)

If it goes anything like it did for me you'll eat some hummus or a satsuma or something else really plain in about three weeks' time and it'll taste like nothing else on earth ever did.

lol if you start back again u gettin sb'd

lol

xxp - speaking of which, I'm gonna msg you on fb now about that

It is so nice to sit here and not worry about when and where my next cigarette will come.

this was a big one for me. no longer being a slave to the smoke break was worth no longer being able to take one (in the very few situations where I actually enjoyed interrupting what I was doing to go outside and have one). I also got sick to death of always planning my cigarettes. I never liked buying them in bulk, so I would constantly be counting them to make sure I didn't run out after a certain time and have to leave the house to get a new pack. Then I'd worry when a friend had to bum one ("omg am I going to have to run to the store later? should I just go now and get it over with?"). That constant low-level stress adds to the pile, and it's so nice for it to be gone.

other benefits of quitting:

- no longer giving my money to Big Tobacco (how could I bitch about evil corporations when I was funneling my hard-earned cash to the evilest of them all?)
- no longer dreading long car/plane trips
- no longer dealing with mooches on the street
- being able to smell and taste things better (this actually helped me lose weight after quitting because I realized that vegetables tasted so fucking great)

I thought the hardest thing about quitting would be missing the culture of smokers. The smoke pit at work, the self-identification. I won't front: One of the biggest reasons I started smoking to further differentiate myself from the popular or "good" kids (and later on adults). Since I quit, I look at smokers as self-destructive fiends; pathetically sucking on their cigarettes just to maintain a normal feeling. I don't miss the social aspect of it at all - and haven't since about two weeks after I quit.

thread revive yesterday gave me the wherewithal to turn four hours without a cigarette into 24. feeling really good right now. i've been meaning/"trying" to quit for a year. the past few months my half-hearted attempts have been jettisoned by cigs being this "fun"/"escape" part of my life and schedule. aerosmith's posts above made me realize that, of course, this is total bullshit! feel like i've had to peel back all of the ingrained rationalizations for smoking i've built up over time, and letting go of this one might be just enough to quit for good.

Gotta do this soon. I'm too old for this shit.

OK so still going.

Btw you know what's a great deterrent? Reading stories online about ppl not all that much older than you that died of lung cancer. Basically scaring the shit out of myself. It seems to be helping tho.

every time i go without cigs for awhile and my sense of smell clears up, it feels like all these neural pathways that haven't been lit since i started smoking go off and i'm like "OMG high school" or whatever

kiu E!!

it's been a little over 8 months for me. smoked a pack a day easy. i just went cold turkey and never looked back. i gotta say it was pretty hard for me at first but it got better and better, where now i really don't even think about the things. I'm able to hang with friends who smoke and all that with no problem.

may have already said this but my strategy so far has been to chew lots of gum (just regular trident, not nicotine gum), eat twizzlers and drink coffee like a fiend. and then when all that isn't enough and my brain starts bouncing against the walls of my skull and I just need to get away, I step out for a short walk around the block at the briskest pace I can possibly muster.

my neighbors must think I'm crazy. but at least I'll still be crazy when they're all dead, mwahaha!

one thing i did was get myself a bag of dirt w33d and rolled doobs up to smoke a few times when i needed something jsut for the action of it.

yeah, this thread (and other things) have inspired me to seriously cut down from 1 1/2 packs a day to ideally half a pack? less than that? Right now i feel like all the joy has been sucked out of life and i feel crappy. How long does this last?

That's sad! Do you have things to look forward to in your day BESIDES cigarettes? Maybe you need to create little incentives for yrself that aren't smokey-centric. I don't know what. 10 minutes of nap or meditation? A walk outside even if you have "too much" to do?

Oh there are lots of things I like doing that don't involve cigarettes! Yesterday I made a mental list of these things. But right now I just feel defeated and powerless. I'm hoping this is just a temporary withdrawal thing?

It is!!! I've been doing some reading into it this morning and depression and lethargy are definitely withdrawal symptoms.

Did it say how long they last?

I think about a week or two. After that, it's all about not having cigarettes while drunk.

Oh, but just cutting down may not really ever get the sad out of your system. This is why I think gums and patches are BS.

I think I was already depressed and lethargic FROM smoking & boozing so I didn't rly notice that stage? I kinda skipped over it and then it seemed like all of a sudden I was feeling really good.

gums and patches are great tools for people who 100% want to quit, yet need to disrupt their smoking routine before dealing with the nicotine withdrawal. I used the patch to quit 16 months ago. Some people have expressed surprised that it worked for me, but I find that those people aren't truly ready to give it up yet. The patch can only do so much.

one thing i did was get myself a bag of dirt w33d and rolled doobs up to smoke a few times when i needed something jsut for the action of it.

― Aerosol, Wednesday, April 20, 2011 4:56 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

I'd just straight up want a cig if stoned, just like if I was drunk or high on anything else. It's a trigger.

been doing really well except for the 1-2 cigs per day i've been stealing from my bf. the fact that he smokes makes it easier for me to cheat. if i think about it as an opportunity to manifest my decision to quit more often maybe that will help. my runs the past few days have been so much easier and better, and i've already noticed a big improvement in general well-being. got stoned last night, which is usually a trigger for chain-smoking, but i only had two cigs. feels like an accomplishment, or at least indicative of a change.

anyway, sorry for blogging here, just typing this all out in an effort to gear up for the weekend.

congrats! How much were you smoking before you decided to quit?

thanks. a pack a day.

also helped that i ran out of money on monday and didn't get paid until today, and no bank i know of would let an overdraft ride that long!

; )

underrated earosmith bootlegs is truth bomb crazy here!

it is like nowhere near as hard as plenty of other stuff you've probably already done

^^^so OTM – I can barely do anything ever, failure is my freaky conjoined twin that I eventually just learned to bro down – but transitioning to not smoking was no biggie w/the help of that Carr book. If I can do this shit anyone can!

You guys are gonna love breathing, it is p fucking sweet.

One thing that was hard for me – was missing just this opportunity to step outside at random (was always an outside smoker). So I found one cool flower or bird nest or something I could just go stare at all Blaked out for a few mins at a time & do stretches. You aren't giving anything up when you stop smoking.

16 days

four days without smoking inside the apartment, except for out the kitchen window. i work from home most of the time, so this is significant...though not as significant as those of you who are quitting entirely

tbh I have secretly wanted to start again because I am thinking maybe it was the reason I was not-fat for four years.

That and poverty.

Oh man when I finally started working a day job again after over a year of unemployment, my body was craving the richest foods SO BAD. Being so hungry that you can't sleep and you can't get warm so you just cry is no way to lose weight.

11 days.

w00t

tbh I have secretly wanted to start again because I am thinking maybe it was the reason I was not-fat for four years

So otm it hurts. but I can't: otherwise I can't use my migraine pills anymore. :-(

Yeah on that front I ultimately decided destroying my body w/cigarettes to weigh less when I am a healthy weight right now would be a fucked-up capitulation to an intersection of many unhealthy ideas that I don't even believe in (or want to, anyway).

A slight tangent: Does anyone think e-cigs are a sign that the tobacco industry is preparing for possible prohibition? No tell-tale smoke emitted, a small, easily concealed device, and the nicotine is a liquid that can possibly be disguised as something else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vm31xBjfMNY

We need to talk. - Mom

ENBB u still doing this?

haven't had a smoke since new years eve... until yesterday. what if i keep it to 2 a year

Honestly if you can keep it to 2 a year then I think that's fine. It's just that some people can't. I'm not going to kill myself if I wind up having a couple every couple months or whatever.

But, to answer Aerosol, yes I am still doing this. It's been a little over three weeks I think. So far so good. :)

rah!

(xp) time to join the running thread imo

woaaaaaaaaaaah slow down buddy - one run (very slow jog if I'm honest) does not a runner make

props to you !
i know it's not easy
i dont know if i'll ever be at a place where i could like have one smoke a year or something like that. i really like smoking tbh so i gotta just stay away

I remember being told that the body can repair the damage done by up to three cigarettes a day. I suspect that it's actually less than that, but, honestly, I don't see how a few a year can be a problem--at least, as long as you can keep it down to that few.

just cough it all out while running!

5 weeks, not recovering quite as quickly as i have in the past but not feeling any inclinations to go back which is good

Reading the Allen Carr book before bed every night. Should be done tomorrow, I think.

Is it working? The plan for me is to quit tomorrow, but I'll probably run out and have a couple just to escape the sound of God laughing.

i always *think* i want a cigarette when i'm anxious/stressed, then i buy a pack and i'm all "ayo, this is disgusting and now i have a headache." however, the e-cig might help in these situations.

i saw katherine heigl hawking one on letterman and it just looked so dang sexy.

esoj how u doing

4 months clean, occasional jones but no slipups..

*\0/*

I put one in my mouth for laffs recently and just the smell of the filter about did made me gag. The pack may as well have played Beethoven's Fifth when I opened it.

I gotta stop editing my posts in mid-post.

big fan of the e-cig here. the trick is to actually spend the money on a good one rather than just get some shit at the gas station; I have one of these and it:

- holds a battery charge for a week
- holds a shitload of nicotine juice (you can also buy specially flavored juices - right now I'm smoking snickerdoodles)
- can be easily charged through a USB passthrough
- doesn't look anything like a cigarette - this is actually good since you can puff away on it in public & people assume you're doing something else
- doesn't make you reek of smoke, doesn't kill yr sense of taste, etc.

right now I'm smoking snickerdoodles

You are a girl.

i really, really need to quit.

really.

REALLY.

It's been since last Thursday for me (yeah, so not that long...). I get hit with waves of sadness, but I think the worst of it is already past. The trick for me is not doing the "it's been a month, so I think I can handle having one cigarette when I'm drunk" thing.

my pretty face is going to hell

the thing I told myself when tempted by the "one cigarette when I'm ____" is: What's the point? Maybe you get a nice light-headed nic buzz for a minute or two, but that isn't really the point of smoking. The point of smoking, once you're an addict, is to feel normal. If you aren't going to let yourself slide back into addiction, then is the little one-minute buzz really worth the cheat? Every time you cheat it brings you a little closer to where you were when you first abstained, and that is why your brain wants to smoke again. Ask yourself would you smoke a nicotine-free cigarette if it were offered to you the next time you went out drinking? What would the point of smoking one of those be?

a whole whopping 36 hours. going for a run

I have an e-cig, but it doesn't appeal to me. I'd rather have the nicotine out of my system completely. And my one prior attempt with it consisted of being constantly reminded what I wasn't having.

The Carr book isn't earth-shattering, it's telling me things I already knew (addiction, not missing out on anything when not smoking, etc.) but it does reinforce a lot of the things I feel when smoking (I'm not actually enjoying this, I'd never miss anything if I hadn't started, etc..).

I'm not quitting, just trying very hard not to smoke. it's not working out too well and I'm generally grumpier than usual.

it's going to be a year for me next week!!!

I honestly can't remember when I quit. Really. I do still crave it, but I think I'll stick to not smoking. It is much easier and quite frankly. Also, I would have to stop the pill and my anti anxiety medication which would be a major dud. But I still long for'em. I think it'll always be like that, I just have to learn to live with that (occasional) feeling.

I haven't smoked a thing since September 1st last year and my phone app tells me I've avoided lighting up 7,084 times.

Wow! Congratulations! My worst cravings are when I am in a stressful situation (like "discussions" with my husband). So very very few. Thank god.

I had quit for 4 years but had about 5 last night. which kind of sucks.

i'm so shit. by only tuesday night i was ready to kill anything or anyone i saw.

I was watching some home videos last weekend and I can't get over how much my friends and I used to smoke indoors. Just sitting on the couch, lighting up a cigarette, watching a little TV. Some time around 2000, I don't know why, my little crew and I start going outside to smoke [tobacco]. I'm sure I must have felt so put out at first, but it just seems like craziness to do it the other way.

It's like when my libertarian side got all upset when my state outlawed smoking in restaurants. But suddenly, there were all these sections of restaurants opened up. You don't smell smoke while you're trying to eat a pizza. And now that we've got kids, I'm completely okay with it.

Especially since the state came up with this weird compromise where restaurants can still allow smoking as long as they don't allow anyone under 21. Whole sections of those places have opened up to, except they all have ashtrays on the table. I still go to places like that for the food, and it's so weird for me to see someone walk up to the bar, grab some matches and light up.

My point to all of this is that you'd be amazed at what you get used to. Quit now, go through some withdraw pangs, and within a year, you'll be "I used to do this?" I'm completely simplifying this sentiment, but I'm not as far off from it as you'd think.

PP, I totally feel that sentiment. I still smoke (though I am quitting in two weeks, picked a date etc. And I will not fail), but I still remember how ten years ago I still smoked in my office. I honestly cannot fathom that any more, working in a smoke filled room (have an office room for myself). The stench must have been dire, and I probably didn't even notice it at the time. It's crazy.

urgh i can't do this

three months tomorrow. i did something!

congrats and good job!

Matt P, you are a great nin-smoker!

lol NINE INCH NAILS smoker
I meant non-smoker

https://encrypted-tbn3.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTD6V1xyEoFNxOELOmu8OyjTRKqXFX9yqKlXOlBpXYRtA7qn19GBg

^^trent reznor the best thang smokin'

8 months, though i reckon i'll have one more fall off the wagon before 2012 is out

was never a huge smoker, but i was buying a pack a week for about two years. then i got a pneumonia and suffered through a week of fevers in which maybe it'd be an exaggeration to think that i "wanted" to die, but i could certainly see the appeal. sort of a weird notion i've never been able to reproduce. this was followed by 2 months of incessant and unbelievably productive coughs, like small organs exploding out of my mouth every time for periods of 9873290872 times a day.

so yeah, that's how i quit smoking.

Smoking was nasty, but nicotine is a godsend.

Interesting factoid from Smoking and Schizophrenia:

Approximately 85% of people who have schizophrenia are also heavy cigarette smokers (and 60% to 70% of people with bipolar disorder) and they smoke two to three times as much as an average smoker. In fact it has been estimated that 44% of all cigarettes used in the US are smoked by the mentally ill.
Research now suggests that people with brain disorders smoke at a high rate partly because nicotine reduces some of the cognitive dysfunction that is a common symptom.

I'm prone to anxiety, and (as mentioned above_ use snus imported from Sweden to help manage it (the American brands are vile), but used to go through a half-pack of Camel lights a day. Snus lacks the carcinogens in smoked and smoke-cured (American oral) tobacco, so its estimated as less than 10% as harmful. It also costs (at my usage) about a dollar a day, vs. the $3+ for cigarettes.

Was so proud of my ex for quitting, he lasted about a month, cold turkey (for him, a REALLY big deal), then xmas/new years parties happened and drinking and BAM and now he keeps stealing "just one" of my smokes, and I feel like an enabler and it is awful :(

According to my app, it's 504 days since my last one and I've not smoked 9,584 since then.

is it the 'since i quit' app?

i use it and it's the best thing ever. i've been 43 weeks, 4 days, 18 hours, 13 minutes, and 20 seconds free of cigarettes.

(this is like my 4th time quitting btw.)

I quit smoking a year and a few months ago. I didn't mean to; I started dating a wonderful person who didn't, went on a weekend trip with her and realized that, thanks to all that tIme spent with her and without cigarettes, I had gone 3 days without, and decided to ride it out. That same person broke up with me almost three months ago.

The last year and change wasn't good. I loved (and still do) her with all my heart, but it's the most depressed, anxious, and unfocused I've ever been, in a life defined by depression, anxiety, and lack of focus.

I was drunk the other nIght, and bought a pack of fancy cigarettes. I had one that night, and another one last night. I've been a little bit happier and much, much more able to handle almost every little problem and obstacle in life quickly and competently without the usual paralysis.

Do I just need nicotine? I started smoking when I was much younger (16), and I wonder if, in concert with my natural depression stuff, I unwittingly wired myself to need this substance to be a marginally functional person.

I don't want to be a smoker again. But if my choice is between a functional smoker and a non-functional non-smoker, I'll choose the former.

Anyone know what I'm talking about?

unfortunately I do

Six days fag free. Promised my wife I'd stop at the end of the football season. Tetchiness diminishing. Hope I can keep this one up. Have given up for three separate periods of three years plus before, and each time allowed myself to think "Ah, one social cigarette won't hurt!" And been sucked back in.

@energy food: i don't think that smoking solves any problems. it's all in your mind, you tell yourself a story which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. but if you think your depression goes away if you smoke and it works, why not continue smoking? one question though. how did you feel before starting to smoke? have you been depressed before discovering nicotine?

I swear to god the electronic cigarette was working for me for a while...then I lost it somewhere in the house.

I was on a medication once that helped me quit cold turkey. Some anti-depressant, can't remember which.

That would be bupropion (brand names Zyban/Wellbutrin in the US).

Alex, it's a bit more complicated than that. I'm not claiming smoking as a magical depression cure. It's more that, and this makes some sense biochemically, this last year and change, far more so than was the case when I still smoked, my anxiety and hemming and hawing over the most basic of everyday decisions and problems (to say nothing of bigger decisions) has gotten out of control. Having a stimulant in my system that affects neural pathways in a way that we don't fully understand seems to have alleviated that a fair amount. And that anxiety/over-thinking/paralysis is not the key to my depression, but it is one of them.

I don't think I'm actually going to start smoking again, I'm just venting how concerned by this positive effect I've seen in the last two days and it's correlation to inhaling a couple Flaming Stix of Deth.

Yes! It was Wellbutrin.

I found another miracle product. This store near me sells $2 (US) cigarettes. They are not bad, like some toy cigarette you'd smoke in high school. Just crappy enough to deter smoking too many of them.

It's weird, you'd think the high prices of other brands would be a deterrent.

I've quit before and I'll quit again. Now that the weather is warm and I'm outside more it should be easier.

Doing this again.

Gah.

yeah, getting ready to do this but think I will also need to quit drinking for a while as the two are inexorably linked

god, when i quit smoking my drinking went through the roof. i would have been unable to do without both.

8 years next month.

Last week I quit caffeine too. Feeling pretty good.

normally after 3 days without I'm in pretty good shape but it's been 5 and I am still really, really struggling. possibly having to do with being unemployed. would have given in but there are significant health issues that might be helped if i stop immediately.

It's been two weeks into this and still hard. I know cigarettes don't relieve that but they provide the chemical and ritual illusion of doing so. WhatI am feeling is the feeling of unmitigated stress, just because of life. It's just a crummy feeling. Feeling and acknowledging it doesn't make me stink and spend money and stigmatize myself socially and someday probably die of lung cancer, all the things the cigarettes do. Coming home from work is the hardest – the long commute home on a wee scooter with terrible shocks, and then just being at home where I would once smoke. The 2-3 hours after work are hard. EVerything else is ok and I'm not coughing anymore.

It was dumb that I ever started again. I can't just start every time I have a stressful life event. I (presumably) have many years of life ahead of me with pain after pain ahead. Job loss. Family death. They'll all happen someday.

maybe replace just-got-home cig with some other small and pleasant thing that can become routine?

i can't even remember the last day i smoked anymore. it'll be a year sometime in october. it's awesome not to even think about it or care at all! my stress reactions are totally re-wired. my boyfriend still smokes, and i sure as hell wish he would quit, but i absolutely know the decision has to be his so i never bug him about it. luckily it doesn't gross me out unless he leaves the door open while he's smoking on the porch cuz all the smoke comes drifting inside and stays for a day or two *shudders*

crabs it's worth staying the course and you can do it. i know it's not for everyone but running really helped me. similar lizard-brain fix in the form of serotonin imo.

yeah it's when I go for a long walk at night that it falls out of my head. It's just too hot here in the desert to go out any sooner tho.

after 4 years of not smoking i am still struggling with my burning throat. cravings still come occasioanlly and they can be bad but it is like meditation where the best way to not think is to let thoughts come and wait until they go again which they always do.

so i've been smoking american spirits the past ~3 months, averaging about a pack a week. i decided to take a break and try some kools extra-longs - they were fucking gross, almost because they were so god damn pleasant. they literally tasted sweet - it was bizarre to me, and kind of sick. as such, i bought a pack of spirits this morning and am finding myself equally repulsed by them - as if they're too harsh, and kind of gross to be holding within my lungs. i gave the pack to a friend after being pretty repulsed by the 4th cigarette i felt like i was forcing myself to smoke.

so there's a way to quit, i guess.

Prepping myself to do this. Been trying every other year to quit but I usually only last a few days. This year the wifey is pretty adamant about it so I'll try harder. Still not sure whether it's better to set a specific date for quitting or to just wake up one morning and quit cold turkey.

It's been 2.5 months now, for me, without a speck of tobacco. It's been tough, I feel on edge, STILL, but it's getting better slowly. I planned to (and did) quit after a week-long blow-out with lots of smoking. I really hope this time is for good.

It was dumb that I ever started again. I can't just start every time I have a stressful life event. I (presumably) have many years of life ahead of me with pain after pain ahead. Job loss. Family death. They'll all happen someday.

― ms fotheringham (Crabbits), Thursday, September 6, 2012 11:14 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I totally get this, Abs.

So I lapsed (and by lapsed I mean had <5 a day for a couple weeks - haven't actually bought a pack in months now) a while ago but have been back on the wagon for the past two weeks barring the 3 I had last Saturday night while drinking/hanging out with smokers.

There are things I want to do soon that will mean I can't smoke at all so I really need to just never smoke but part of me is still like FUCK YOU LET ME HAVE MY 2 A WEEK etc. It's really dumb too because I don't even enjoy them that much anymore. I mean after a couple weeks of not smoking the first few drags are just gross.

Bah. It's OK. Not seeing any smokers this weekend so it won't be too tough.

Yes it was hanging around smokers that was another big factor. This attractive guy in grad school who started just sharing his cigs w/me when he smoked. "I know what you want," he'd say. And I bought a pack in mind of paying him back but I didn't see him that weekend so I smoked it myself –––– dumb. I never see this guy anymore though or any of his unfiltered-cigarette-loving hipster friends.

i enjoy a good smoke

shut up, buzza

jk <3 u

i don't smoke

― buzza

lol

Crabbits (seems odd to use this handle) I am sorry you are having to struggle so much with this, but you are not alone. Every tobacco smoker who ever decided to quit has to deal with this shit. My bro had to quit four or five times before he managed to really quit. My dad, too.

Nicotine is a very insidious, deep-seeping, deep-hiding drug, so much so that it is hard to understand just how much it entwines itself into your psyche. But please believe me that however many times you backslide and however steep a hill you have to trudge up to quit again, it is worth it.

Emphysema, lung cancer, throat cancer et. al. are just a nasty painful place to end your life. You've got too much value to risk that kind of future. If you need encouragement, come here and get some. We ALL will be glad to give it to you.

So lately I feel like I've had trouble breathing and my heart keeps doing this skippy thing. It's been doing this on and off for a couple of days now and today it won't stop and I'm terrified! I only smoked like three fags yesterday but was pretty much chain smoking on Saturday... I feel wrong though, kinda frightened...

I wish there were some sort of drug you could take that just purged all the tar and crap from your body in one go so that you could quit and notice the effects of quitting almost immediately!

tbh the effects of quitting i got were 'loss of sense of smell' (three years now!), 'discovery that i had asthma', and general lung-related crap forever.

but now sometimes i drunk or stressed bum a cigarette and even one leaves me feeling like shit, so there's that.

I've had that fucked body feeling before- usually after clubbing where I've probably been fairly heavy smoking for over 12 hours. Not nice.

Wish I could quit. The thought of a cigarette doesn't cross my mind until I get out of work at which point my cravings become kind of insane. If I just go to bed and read or watch TV- I'll be fine, but that never happens, and I don't want evenings like that anyway. So I go hang out with people, band practice, go to a bar, make some music, out of for a meal and I'll smoke 5-10 cigs, easily. And that's probably waaay worse than smoking 5-10 cigs throughout the whole day. SUCKS!

I stopped bringing cigs to work and that helps. I think I could prob give up roll-ups if I could still smoke the odd splff but that has tobacco in. Might get a pipe or some nonsense.

we were just saying at work if you wanna quit you have to go to a cigarette free island for a while - otehrwise you will get dragged back in

http://i.imgur.com/hd0Fx.jpg

this looks promising. trying out the patch now ... withdrawal is the hardest part, i'd be happy to never smoke again. if that doesn't work, maybe i'll go in for a few good zappings.

I have heard people say quitting is not so bad but not going back after a few months is what is hard

I think I could prob give up roll-ups if I could still smoke the odd splff but that has tobacco in.

you can smoke weed without tobacco fyi

yeah, it's so tempting cuz you're like, we'll i've quit for so long, i'm over the addiction -- one cigarette can't hurt, just to be social. that's foiled many of my past efforts to quit xp

exactly. patterns are very difficult to break - you must drive out the old habit with a new one - have you tried sniffing glue?

i addressed that problem by deciding i couldn't say that i've successfully quit smoking till it's been like 5 years. i think that's actually helped, psychologically. alcohol helped too

I hope they soon invent a kind of non invasive lobotomy - nano nicotine shit

That few months later thing got me every time. Up to about 2.5 months now, though!

Painless Laser Therapy of Manalapan, supporting Master Musicians of Joujouka.

yay ― schwantz,!!!
keep at it! its worth it

Thanks! I think it might actually stick this time.

OMG I just realized that I have smoked, but NOT SO MUCH in a CLUB! Most clubs I've been to have weird ventilation systems or dry ice and it deters you from smoking. I just realize that because why do I associate clubs and dance with smoking. I now recall that no...it discourages it. So does being semi-drunk.

I'm an on and off "sneak out to have a smoke because I'm frustrated" type of person. Don't find it hard to quit when I'm fit and the pressure is off.

Had eye surgery recently and just popped pain pills and stayed off the shit for three whole days. Hate it, switched to these natural cigar things that seem less addictive. I'm trying to turn my health around...

yeah I've quit seriously twince in the last 10 years and relapsed after 6-12 months thinking I could have just one "cuz it's a special night" or some bullshit.
Anyway I really feel like quitting now but not sure if I should try yet another nicorette product or not - might be easier to withstand teh withdrawal but in a way I fear it maintains this connection with nicotine somehow.

i am sorry to say but i think unlike the umbilical cord the nicotine connection will never be cut once you have established it by smoking heavily for a couple of years. after 4 years without fags, there are times where i think the connection is broken but there are others where it is stronger than ever... ;-(

Tobacco plants - the human parasite

i'm getting close to my first week quitting smoking, after about 3 years of a half pack/pack daily. for some reason my muscles and body feel way weaker than they did while i was smoking... i thought i'd feel like superman or some shit right after i quit. i did an easy workout today, but it was a lot more difficult than anything i've experienced during my smoking years. on the flip side i was able to cycle uphill way faster than before, which felt pretty great.

what's up with this?

i dunno -- every time i quit in the past, i would catch a cold or get the flu. it was weird! maybe your body's working through its addiction? you'll feel better soon, though. congrats!

It's normal, it's temporary, it's shitty.
http://quitsmoking.about.com/cs/cravingsandurges/a/withdrawal.htm

I took Matt P's advice and started running, which I hadn't really done since I was 14. It's cathartic! Some Maniac McGee shit, you know? Also makes me feel good like hey my cilia are growing back, I can breathe again. Which I was defs not feeling a weeks after I quit.

Quitter's flu!

I want to have quit by 32. This is the beginning of October. I was doing okay and was down to just one a day in the evening by bumming them off my housemate, but yesterday I felt like I was going to explode or something (this has actually been one of the most stressful, bad-news fortnights of my life tbf) and somehow I figured I couldn't keep nicking fags off my mate so I bought a pouch :-( :-(

I want to have quit by 32
Thinking and writing a sentence like that means that you won't do it, sorry. It's the old story, why do something today if I can procrastinate till tomorrow...

i quit smoking in febuary. it's great to be off that shit! i quit once in 1991 for 1 year, once in 1996 for 2 years, once in 1999 for 3 years, once in 2003 for 8 years, i'm hoping this will be the last time! or at least stretch it out to 25 years this time, at which point i'll probably be pretty much ready to die anyway

it's frikkin hard, but doable. the 8 year stretch was practically the easiest - once you get past the first year or so, all you really have to remember is *YOU CAN'T SMOKE A CIGARETTE AGAIN, EVER* and *YOU WILL DESPERATELY WANT TO SMOKE A CIGARETTE EVERY TIME YOU SEE SOMEONE ELSE SMOKING ONE, IN FRONT OF YOU OR ON TEH TV, FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE* but once you get past that stumbling block it's actually pretty easy most of the time. helps if your roommates and girlfriend don't smoke. it's worth changing roommates or girlfriends to quit, too.

*YOU WILL DESPERATELY WANT TO SMOKE A CIGARETTE EVERY TIME YOU SEE SOMEONE ELSE SMOKING ONE, IN FRONT OF YOU OR ON TEH TV, FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE*

This isn't true for me at all and I smoked roughly a pack a day for approx 17 years. If I see/smell people smoking during the day now it seriously grosses me out. The only time I really want them is if I'm around other people smoking at night or if I've had a drink. Admittedly I REALLY want one during those times.

ok, been trying nicotine patches to ease withdrawal, but these things make me want to rip my skin off. i had to take it off in the work bathroom and will now try cold turkey. nicotine's an evil substance.

cold turkey worked for me. you just need a little patience and it will get better.

yeah nicotine substitutes always seem like tearing out a bandage really slowly instead of just ripping it off once and for all.
In any case I've found the nicorette plastic ciggies more useful

I found the mouth spray really helped me. But then I had an extremely extended "cutting down" period, like, over 10 years of being a social smoker. This year I decided I should pack in the fags completely but couldn't seem to get round the intense cravings once I have a beer, the spray was a quick and not that unpleasant way of circumventing that. I hated lozenges and gum cos they tasted gross and took quite a while to get through, the spray isn't much nicer but it's just one quick shot and quickly washed away. Then I gradually stopped using the spray as much when I went out until a couple of months ago I stopped using it completely, and now I seem to have broken the habit. Hopefully it will stick...

never heard of that method - what is it? a nicotine mouth spray? Must be slightly awkward to use in social settings, no?

Yes, a nicotine mouth spray. It's not really awkward to use at all, or maybe it is and I don't realise :/

from a random reuters article

"Dependence on tobacco encompasses other factors -- factors that exist far longer than nicotine withdrawal and that, over the long term result in relapse."

Smokers who are highly motivated to quit, and get themselves out of the social environment that feeds their habit, may have the best chances of lasting success, according to Connolly.

Even with combination therapies, kicking the smoking habit is often an uphill battle. The ALA estimates that it takes the average smoker five or six serious attempts to finally quit.

And according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 36 percent of the nation's smokers try to kick the habit each year -- but only three percent succeed in quitting for six months or more.

pretty depressing stuff - esp the part about the need to get out of one's social environment. Not only do you need to give up on smoking but you also must shun your frends and stay home.

Over the passed week I've cut back my smoking to a few a day, and like the previous time I tried to quit ,I am sick. Ugh, I can't even hold August now. I really do want to quit and maybe when I come out of being sick I'll be stronger. Wish I had a good way to deal with the extreme grumpiness.

The good part is how much of a hassle I have made smoking for myself since August was born. I have a smoking shirts to wear, always washing my hands and beard, showering often. But I've realized I'm still putting August's health at risk and hate myself with each smoke. I never thought I would be a parent that smokes, Ugh

i realized i spend $500 a month on smoking (pack a day on average, occasional pack and a half + expensive cigarettes).

i have a no fail plan: i'm not going to buy cigarettes but i will buy a vanilla primetime to smoke if i really can't live without nicotine.

pros:
- cheaper
- i will have to travel to get the primetime and during that time i can hopefully convince myself not to fucking get one.
- tasty. vanilla flavor.

cons:
- i've smoked five vanilla primetimes today.
- unfiltered, so they're pretty harsh.
- i have a hypermasculine image-- the only people i know who smoke vanilla primetimes are 16 year old girls.

your thoughts?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_GuYvJ2wzw

i will use that video when i finally need to quit smoking vanilla primetimes.

What's scary is how easy it is falling back into smoking, really just one, and you might as well have a pack a day. At least that's where I always end up. I hate this.

My quit date is tomorrow.

Wish me luck.

you can do it. it won't be easy. but it'll be worth it.

craving a fag for four years, 4 months, 15 days.

You likely quit eating sugar directly from the packet. You'll do fine with this.

how much did you smoke a day, elmo?

i really, really need to quit.

really.

― king of torts (strongo hulkington's ghost dad), Tuesday, August 16, 2011

lol recidivism and laziness

good luck and strength, elmo

i'm on day 2. it's going... okay.

i would generally smoke ~15 a day, maybe more depending on stress levels and alcohol consumption

i've got the patch on. even so, I'm experiencing some mood swings and feeling a little twitchy. also, i woke up about a full hour early this morning and could get back to sleep, but i think i can attribute that to wearing the patch at night (as directed)

on the upside, i'm brushing and flossing and using toothpicks a lot to deal with the oral fix, so my breath is sweet and my smile will soon be dazzling and pearly

(i'm not overbrushing, it's ok)

i'm participating in a smoking cessation study through brown u. so there's a certain level of preparedness and accountability built in to this quit attempt, which is good.

i go in once a week for a counseling session, and i have to fill out a battery of mood assessments and have to blow 2 breathalyzer tests: 1 for alcohol (if i've any alcohol in my system i'll be asked to go home) and 1 for carbon monoxide

yesterday was my first day without smoking, and the CO breath test came back with 3 parts per million -- my last cigarette had been about 18 hours before. before my quit date, i was getting 15 ppm. it's pretty cool to see that -- a pretty dramatic change in a very short time!

good going, man. in my recollection the first week is always the worst.

i have 16 left in this pack and i think that might be it for me. mostly because i can't justify buying another pack right now. but also maybe it's just time.

starting a new job and quitting smoking at the same time seems like a recipe for either suicide or immense character-building. i guess we'll see.

i've been cigarette free for about 6 months now, tried to have a cigarette about a month in and found it disgusting.. haven't really had the desire to smoke since.

this would be great and all if i hadn't just replaced cigarettes with swedish snus, which i've been doing daily since i quit.

I'm on day three. Again. I stopped for a couple months but was then around people who smoke and blah blah blah. Hopefully this will really be it this time. Stupid smoking :(.

I'm not quitting, but I will say in the first days after my accident when I was really weak, I realized how much energy and healthful feeling each cig was taking out of me. Normally it just feels like a slight lessening of "nervous" energy but when I needed every speck of health it was devastating. I still feel noticeably shaky and worse after smoking, am down to 2-4 per day, in the evenings.

I still feel noticeably shaky and worse after smoking

When I have quit and then started again I totally notice how bad I feel after one.

Quitting at the same time you change up a routine is actually a pretty good and effective idea. The longest I went without a cigarette was a result of a new relationship where I was spending most of my time with a different person at a different place. So, immediate stress stuff aside, quitting when you're starting a new job might be a great thing!

the study i'm in is about "positive psychology" and all my counseling sessions & quit strategies are focused on the affects of positive mood on behavioral changes. this basically means that i have what you could call "happiness homework" -- doing tasks which research has shown to elevate mood -- which sounds corny, and it is corny, but it's also somewhat effective.

i remember back in early 2011, i quit for about a week, mostly because it was just too damn cold to smoke outside, and when i finally broke down again the head rush from that first one made me feel like i was legit high.

not as effective as nicotine replacement, but anything that helps, right?

does anybody else find that the effect of a cigarette varies w/ the amount of food you've eaten

yes absolutely

smoking on an empty stomach makes me feel all jittery and nervous but after a really big satisfying meal -- my friend in hong kong taught me a cantonese saying "smoking after a big meal makes you feel like a god"

I quit in 2007, started again briefly in 2009, quit again, started again in summer of 2011 as a social activity, graduated to a non-social activity in summer 2012, and I am quitting again. I am on day 5.

"smoking after a big meal makes you feel like a god"

grr. this is not helping right now.

Yeah, this thread is only allowed to talk about how feeble and weak smoking makes you feel. Get back to it, lackeys.

giving up smoking after eating is one of the things i'm most worried about

also eating more in general

hah sorry. anyway I quit again on my birthday as a ~present to myself~

I am hoping since I was only smoking 2-3 a day on average that it'll be easy to give up.
When I quit in 2009 I was pretty motivated and smoke actually disgusted me for a long time. Then I started going to clubs and wanting to eavesdrop on conversations on the smoking patio. Oh, it sucks to be a voyeur.

After decades of begging I finally got both my parents to quit in the last 2 years. They both got cancer. /douchebag

(But it is true.)

fwiw I was a 2-a-day smoker for about 4-5 years and I basically just stopped cold turkey with very little backsliding

2 packs?

lol no, two cigarettes

dating someone allergic to cigarette smoke really helps you keep that shit down to a manageable level

lol @ 2 a day

sorry, I'm just cranky because I want a cigarette

You know what will help you guys is this amazing thing tylerw just posted over on ILM:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXn1K36w4Bk

That's atrocious and I hate you now. OK, I don't really hate you but it's still horrible.

Did I mention I also thought this would be a good week to cut out carbs/sugar? Awesome ideas. I'm full of them.

http://www.wearysloth.com/Gallery/ActorsB/2065-354.jpg

gl and s, homo

third time trying to quit. made it to day 3 today but can't do it any longer. withdrawal is driving me nuts! doesn't help there's way too much other shit going on right now ... think i might need a lull to finally get rid of these things.

When I quit it seemed to be a three-stage process. Getting the nicotine out of my system was a hueg hurdle, but took somewhat less than a month. After that it was mostly dealing with the thousands of mental triggers that told me it was time to have a cigarette. After that, it was down to fighting against a certain nostalgia, that golden-hued sense that, once, long ago, I had a beautiful relationship with cigarettes, and they were waiting for me to come back and hug them.

dear god, what has Rachael Leigh Cook been reduced to?!

omg the slide guitar

okay when he "straightens" the frame: lol

only stupid people are breeding otm

"2-a-day smoker" would inspire some "I used to suck dick for coke. Now that's an addiction"-style grouching from me when I'm quitting.

So relapsed hard after quitting for 3-4 weeks. During that time I allowed myself a cig once in a while during the occasional drink. But then Xmas parties and all that did the rest to bring me back into the fold. Urgh

I have sworn that I would quit by my 30th birthday, but as it's four days away I don't feel I can do it. :(

Just passed the 6-month mark with not a speck of tobacco. Actually feeling sort-of over it now. Hang in there, quitters!

2 weeks as of yesterday! And oops, I forgot to put on a new nicotine patch this morning but I'm actually doing ok?

w00t

fuuuuuuck 2 years basically clean, then took it up over holiday season for a couple of weeks; quit yesterday, today is bad, back at work, ultratense, everything a bit near the surface. Stupid mistake, time to pay for it. STAY QUIT QUITTERS.

Everything fucking sucks right now and I really want one so bad. Tell me not to go get a pack.

don't go get a pack.

Thank you, Strongo.

do as i say, not as i do.