Quitting smoking

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!