smoking

Keep trying though

45

9

It’s super hard to quit but I’ll tell you what helped me. I got altoids and every time I wanted a smoke I’d eat a mint. If I still wanted a smoke I’d eat another mint. At break I’d go out with all the smokers and I’d eat a mint. Driving home I’d eat a mint. It took a few containers of mints but I eventually got sick of mints (and cigarettes). After I quit I would still try taking a drag off a random cigarette and I absolutely hated it. Not sure if I rewired my brain or what but I was able to stay off the smokes. Good luck. You got this.

Pro tip: take your smoke money and save it in another account or a piggy bank or whatever. You will be blown away about how much your addiction was costing you.

35

I did the same with mixed nuts. I kept a big container in my car for stop-and-go traffic during my commute. It was the only way I made it through the first few months.

8
Yer i stay well away from it I've heard it does some pretty nasty things to you I have seen what it can do though my grandpa was a heavy smoker he died of a stroke

3
This sounds like excellent advice! I'll try it!

2

I smoked for almost 20 years. I lost track of how many times I tried - and failed - to quit. Last December I just felt done. Put it down and haven't gone back to it. I even had a few cigarettes while out with a friend in March and had no desire to go back to it after. I know a few other people who quit like that, but far more who have struggled with it for years and still smoke.

I have no idea what changed for me. Every other attempt failed, even if I felt really ready to quit.

17

This is my story, too. I'll have a few if I go out to a bar, but I'm done doing that shit all the time; having to go outside when I'm home, in my car, sneaking out at family gatherings, etc.

However, if I were to return to hanging out at bars a lot, I would absolutely become a full time smoker again.

4

I did. Pack a day since I was ..14?

20 years later, one day I just felt I was done. Threw the rest of my pack out, and didn't go back nor had the urge to after a week.

15

Same here smoked almost 20 years and was just done so I quit.

2

multiple attempts over the years like everyone else who smokes. smoker for 20years but i wanted to quit. life managed to interrupt my attempts fairly regularly but what got me was nicotine chewing gum. that really helped with the addiction so i could focus on separating the act of smoking from the addiction. this worked on so far as i realised I was addicted to chewing gum and had removed the act of smoking. addicted to chewing gum? what a stupid thing to be addicted to! the absurdity was quite clear and I stopped that day. 13 years ago. dabbled here and there but find it gross and disgusting. have vaped a bit of other people's, and even smoked for a week once. that was disgusting, my body felt awful my lungs hurt and i couldn't taste anything. so i guess this ramble is too say never give up and try to separate the addiction from the act to make it absurd. good luck

12

Used to smoke 2 packs a day. Quit 20 years ago. Quit because I figured I always smelled like smoke which greatly diminished the dating pool. I missed it every day until I managed to get hooked on nicotine pouches. Was using 10-15 of the 8mg On every day. Managed to do that in secret for years. Quit those about a year ago after my wife found out. Now I get to miss smoking AND nicotine pouches every single day. I love nicotine. I miss it every single day. I think about it all the time. If I ever found myself single again I would go back in a heartbeat. I am salivating just writing this. It is evil shit.

11

I quit smoking and got on the nicotine lozenges. I was eating a bunch of lozenges, almost constantly. Then I started kinda smoking again, but didn't stop the lozenges. Then I had a stroke which left me with a permanent disability, likely partially caused by wild blood pressure swings due to high levels of nicotine.

I quit by default after 3 weeks in a rehab center. The lesson here is... quit before the hospital. It's worth it.

8
Just imagine how cool you would have looked with supplemental oxygen dependency.

5
- I was semi-related to a guy who would drag his oxygen tank to the kitchen so he could smoke by the window.
  
  4

You kinda do, though. I've been smoking for 13 years. And I've been smoking quite heavily about, 1.5 pack per day on average.

I tried to stop several times and it didn't work out. Then one day 10 years ago, I realized how crazily much money I spend on that "hobby" and how I'll need that money for my wedding a year later. And then I just stopped.

I used nicotine free cigarettes as a crutch for a while, but that was it. It was surprisingly easy, when before I was almost shaking during a 2 hour flight because of nicotine withdrawal...

What this boils down to imo is, when you really want to stop, you can just stop. Try to find out why you want to stop and don't miss the opportunity window. If I hadn't stopped that day, I'd probably still be smoking.

11

I went a different way to this.

I smoked for about 15 years, i used rolling tobacco and would get through 30-40grams in 4 days, im not sure what the conversion rate is but i was smoking easily 10-20 rollups a day. (Never really counted)

I tried to swap to vaping a few times but always fell back. I tried stopping cold turkey multiple times but always ended up going back even harder and smokk g more every time.

Eventually a friend got me on to a new vape, one of thos big cloudy ones that makes you look like a prick. But it had just the right feel, had good flavours and low nicotine content. (Lowest you could get).

At first i was vaping alot, loads. But the number of opportunities i had to vape was the same as when i smoked. So i would be beholden to that schedule daily. This meant my jicotine intake was drastically reduced and didnt leave me ratty because i was still getting some.

It seemed that as the days passed i was missing opportunities to vape more and more, until one day, i worked straight through without even thinking about it. Its been almost a year now and i just dont miss them at all.

I think that everyone is different and half the reason so many people struggle to quit based on advice from others is that we are all different, we smoke different amounts, we smoke for different reasons and different lengths of times and we all have our own tolerance to maintaining our will power.

For some, the decision to quit is enough and our resolve will be strong, for others we need weening and gradual reduction in order to quit. And everything in between.

What works for you or me may work for millions of people, but not for millions more. The best we can do is pass on our anecdotal experience like we both have and let people do what works for them.

5
Yeah seems the hardest part of quitting any habit is really the resolve to do so.

4
So you're agreeing. “one does not simply stop, because one needs to be really sure that they want to stop for some reason or another”. The desire to stop doesn't come from nothing, yet it's the vital ingredient for stopping successfully. Unless you have it, stopping is really hard.

The contents of your message aren't a “no”, they're a “yes, and”

2

Quitting is easy, I've done it hundreds of times!

11

It's hard, but there are more adults in the U.S. alive today who have successfully quit smoking than currently smoke.

Check out SmokeFree.gov for free science-based resources!

10

Fuck they don't. Stop paying people to destroy your health! I stopped just like that. I take care of my father in laws who smoked until he was 75. Lost his leg due to poor circulation. Lost toes on second leg. Doctor was able to squeeze out circulation in one last hardening artery in his remaining leg. Told him if he didn't quit he would lose that too. He stopped smoking the next day. Still has that leg. We use nitro patches to keep circulation going on his foot. If he gets a sore or cut it takes months to heal.

Fuck smoking! Don't trade your later days for today.

10

Addiction isn’t simply “deciding to stop” dude. Congrats you were one of the exceptions but have a little empathy here. This is bootstraps nonsense.

7
- It was for my dad, he smoked from 16 till about mid 40s, then one day he said I'm done with the expense of this habit and never went back. My mom kept smoking till 60 then just gave it up. For some will power is enough
  
  1
- I do have empathy. It is a very steep hill. For some, seemingly vertical. I also care very much about people's health (and my own). Your health is more important than the urge or habit. My point is mostly that if we had the ability to be in our future bodies to feel the effects we all know are coming, that hill would be horizontal.
  
  1
That may have worked for you but for other people it's not so easy nicotine is very addictive and smoking also makes you feel good it makes you rely on it mentally and physically and you don't feel like yourself when you stop smoking also smoking is related to being social with your friends and having breaks at work witch are good for your mental health

7
- Nicotine is 7 times more addictive than heroin.
  
  2

One day at a time.

10

Funnily enough, that's exactly how I stopped smoking. I smoked for around 17 years and had been trying to quit for nearly 15 of them. I did everything from pills to nicotine substitutions, hypnosis, and even that laser therapy. It would work for a time, but eventually, within a month or two, I'd be back to smoking.

Then, one day, I was in a really foul mood and just didn't want to deal with people. I ran out of cigarettes right at the end of the evening before bed and figured I'd buy some in the morning. Woke up in a worse mood the next day and decided to just stay home and ride it out. It is best for me to avoid people when I get like that, so that's what I did. The following day, I woke up in a better mood and was about to head to the corner store for a pack when I realized I'd already gone near 36 hours without one, so thought why not wait an hour. An hour passed, and decided to wait another hour, and then another, and another. Before I knew it, I was heading back to bed for my second full day being cigaretteless.

At that point, I decided to continue my smoke-free streak and just quit. It's been nearly 6 years since my last cigarette, and it was one of the best decisions I've made in my life.

Context: I'm a disabled veteran with severe PTSD, anxiety, depression, and mood disorders caused by TBI's. I have days where everything seems to act up all at once, and I'll self isolate because it's just safer for everyone if I'm alone during those times. Furthermore, I started smoking while in combat to help take the "edge" off, and as such, the nicotine addiction was extremely difficult for me to get beyond because it got wrapped up in my PTSD and anxiety issues.

Basically, what I learned from my many years of trying to quit is no matter how you "try" if you don't truly want to quit, you won't succeed. You have to want to quit more than you want that next cigarette.

Good luck to anyone out there still struggling to break a nicotine addiction. Stay strong. You can do it.

9

My wife and I both quit cold turkey, independently of one another before we met. It was like we discontinued a hobby our ADHD brains got bored with.

3
- That's how I quit.
  
  Woke up one morning and didn't want a cigarette.
  
  Now they're basically sitting on the shelf with my warhammer stuff, my armada gear, boxing gloves, golf clubs, piles of video games etc.
  
  I wish i could stick a hobby haha except smoking.
  
  4

It is for certain people, but not typically. I know two people who quit cold turkey and my fiancee knows another one. Everyone else has fought and struggled, relapsed, or shifted to e-cigs.

Strangely this can be true for hard drugs too. As I understand it, biology is a big part of it, but psychological, social, and circumstantial factors are pretty important too.

9

I was one of those people and consider myself very lucky. My first puff was at 9 but I didn't start regularly smoking until I was 14. In a third-world country where the laws, if they even existed, were hardly enforced, it was easy to buy smokes as a minor. It was normal, even.

I smoked through my teens and 20s and into my 30s. Then one day, I decided to quit because I knew it wasn't healthy and I had seen pictures of smokers' lungs. I didn't experience any "jonesing" and didn't need to replace the habit with gum or patches or anything. It might have helped that I worked from home at the time and was addicted to video games, so I was very motivated to stay at home. I turn 50 this year and haven't smoked since.

1

It's quite easy to stop smoking. I've done it several times already

9

Stopping smoking is easy, i used to do it every time my cigarette went out, quitting on the other hand is a lifelong task, but it is worth the struggle. I still crave cigarettes to this day, but dont miss being a slave to that addiction. I would literally collect cigarette butts off the ground and reroll them. If i can quit so can you.

7

About 12 years now

7

I got a Juul and quit cigs surprisingly easily. Then the Juul was pretty easy to quit a little while later. I was ashamed at how easy it was.

6

I was very very lucky.

I turned 26 when I heard myself coughing like a 66 year old chainsmoker with cancerous lungs, found I was unable to run up stairs and out of breath after carrying groceries inside. I had to have a cig every morning so I would be able to have a shit at all, but if I did... that first drag sent me rushing to the bathroom, it got so bad, I had to light the first one while sitting on the loo, or i'd shit my pants.

That's when I found myself disgusted with myself. I stopped, I simply stopped. From 38 cigarettes per day to 0. I am so happy it worked, because I am a very easily tempted personality and tend towards addiction in anything that gives my brain pleasure.

It took a year before I completely stopped coughing and two years before I could run up those stairs again, but one day I simply realized "Oh my! I'm not out of breath. What... what happened? Oh, yeah I quit smoking! Damn this feels nice!"

6

Nonsense. You got this. I believe in you.

5

Anecdotally, I found that ease of quitting was inversely related to the amount of pressure I put on myself to quit. I smoked for 15 years and always vowed I would never be a self-loathing smoker. I think so little of my attempt to quitting successfully that every time someone brings up quitting cold-turkey I need to remind myself that I attempted to quit on multiple occasions. - I simply didn't feel bad when a strategy didn't work out.

Ultimately I weened myself off of nicotine by vaping and stepping down the concentration of nicotine over a long period of time. I quit vaping in early 2020.

5

im trying very hard to quit smoking weed... i know it's not the same as nicotine addiction but it's still a struggle. I smoked weed almost every day for like 6 years or something.

its annoying cus like i will be reminded of it constantly, weed culture is everywhere, memes and shows and movies and books. I get reminded and i want it, I get the urge and its hard not to smoke a little. i will go days or weeks without any but then I will fuck up and smoke again and suddenly i will be smoking every day again for a few weeks.

edit: i wasn't asking for advice, i have a therapist I am working with please stop trying to give me advice its not what I want or need and I don't like it, it makes me super incredibly uncomfortable. Its not helping. Thank you

4

Hey I've been there, and after reflecting on it, the truth is, (at least from my perspective), you don't really, truely want it yet. Don't take that as judgement, I'm certainly not in a place to judge, but I've kicked severeral multi-year addictions, and weed was one I had the pleasure of just "deciding to quit". For me quitting weed came with breaking a friendship of the longtime smoking buddy I had, though after getting off of it and reflecting, I realize he was just using me as a convenient spot to store his weed. YMMV, but I think you got this, and hopefully my experience lends some light onto your difficulties with quitting.

6
- i wasn't asking for advice and its not welcome
  
  -12
My fella found this talk useful. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gnSEbLX94Tk He used to smoke the mild stuff (low THC), but it's the cigarettes he's been struggling with. He's on his third attempt, but after using the technique (TL;DW: your brain doesn't understand negative commands, replace it with a positive command. Instead of "I need a joint", try "I need air" or "I need clarity" or whatever feeling you're aiming for) he's feeling a lot more positive that he'll stick with it this time. I tried to get him to read the Allen Carr stuff, but he's not much of a reader. Other people swear by it though. It's available on a certain library beginning with z if you want to give it a taster. Also learning a new skill can give you the same dopamine hit that your addiction does, so take up a hobby, learn a language, etc.

Good luck!

2
- Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
  
  https://m.piped.video/watch?v=gnSEbLX94Tk
  
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  
  I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
  
  2

It’s simple, but it ain’t easy.

4

I did exactly that.

The traumatic brain injury may have had something to do with that, though.

4

I'm doing it for the bit, a week ago i got high and thought how funny it'd be to stop smoking because drugs told me to. So i did lmao

3

I don't smoke and I never will and I'm just here to emphasize how disgusting smoking is for non smokers. I literally can hardly breath when someone smokes next to me. Sadly, my nearby city has a lot of smokers.

Whenever I need to pass by someone that smokes, I hold my breath for as long as possible. I understand you're addicted, but come on, stop using that poison. If not for yourself then for others at least, or maybe at least while in public.

3

I hear you. I had cancer in my neck and radiation to the throat, not from smoking ( i am a non smoker), but if I even smell smoke or on a heavy smokers clothing I start coughing. Same with smelling vinegar --go figure

3
My guy they (formerly I) know. After you're hooked it feels out of your control. It becomes a mechanism your brain uses to alleviate stress or to relax. For me, for a long time, it helped me socialize, as I was alone in a new city, working a serving job. After it became a part of who I was, stopping wasn't just ceasing buying and smoking cigarettes, it was now changing my identity and my personality.

I've quit now but I'm here to tell you its big ask of someone, and you shouldn't judge folks who try and fail, but treat it as a vallient effort, and encourage them to try again.

I hear you though, having been a non smoker for a few years now I can smell it and I know what you mean. Just try to remember those are real people behind the addiction, and that for those of us old farts, some of us thought it made us look cool, and were led into it, despite the warnings.

3
- I know that. It's an addiction and I hope people get better.
  
  1

"Gondor has smo king, Gondor needs smo king?"

3

First time I quit I’d get the occasional craving, the second time I have maybe had a craving once. I think what helped me the second time was a minor health scare, (why is my tongue sloughing?), first kid on the way, and I reallly got into cardio

Edit: I smoked from 2007 to 2014? And then 2017? To 2020 Amount varied widely, but I probably went through a pack in 3 days average. Only hit a pack a day during finals week heh.

2

How else do you do it?

2

The Allan Carr method. That is all

1

Use the gum. Get rid of all the ashtrays. Chew and park it. You can quit but you have to understand it's forever

1

Ask your GP for Bupropion.

1

What I don't understand is how people get addicted to smoking in the first place. It hasn't been "cool" to smoke in my lifetime. Going near a cigarette as a non-smoker is gross as fuck. Who decides "I don't care about my health or the gross smell, imma do this thing with no upsides" before being addicted?

-3

All it takes is one low point, friend. I'm glad you've never been there around the wrong person at the wrong time but understand that its not just a "hmm I want to smell terrible today ❤️" situation.

7
Because it's a drug that gives you a feeling. Some people enjoy the feeling that smoking gives them, the addiction slowly follows after.

The same works for just about any drug. I can assure you that heroin and crack addicts didn't suddenly decide they wanted to be addicted to those drugs. Curiosity gets the best of people sometimes.

6
- How do you get that feeling without making a decision to do something really gross? Why did they choose to smoke that first gross death stick?
  
  -1

Sounds like a lack of will.

-9