Posted on April 10th, 2009 12:22pm by Zac Crain
Filed under www.
Can I bum a cigarette?
(Kidding.)
For those of you who have quit smoking — which I am attempting now, aided and abetted by Nicorette — what worked for you?
53 comments
“Cold Turkey” with an unopened pack in the freezer. (It felt good to know they were there.) My rule if I ever decided I HAD to have one of those frozen sticks of joy was to wait 5 more minutes…and then 5 more minutes…and then 5 more minutes (rinse and repeat, you get the pictue). I never smoked one.
It takes 21 days to break a habit. You are going to miss them for a couple of years and eventually (to my surprise) they will start smelling horrible and be very bothersome to be around. Voila! A reformed whore is born.
@ 12:08 pm on April 10, 2009
Chantix! It requires a prescription from a Doc, but it’s well worth it. I smoked for 50 years. Never less than 2 packs a day. Using Chantix, quitting was easy. Like J Paul I kept a pack of my brand as insurance. But it was not in the freezer, it was on my back porch table–easy to quickly reach. Never did it. My first anniversary will be Aug. 2nd. Still miss the cigs and love second-hand smoke. I do not have the character and discipline required to cold turkey. Good luck to you, Zac!
@ 12:13 pm on April 10, 2009
Something tells me Zac isn’t going to take Chantix. IJS.
@ 12:23 pm on April 10, 2009
Zyban aka Wellbutrin.
@ 12:32 pm on April 10, 2009
Two packs a day to zero. Told everyone I knew that I was quitting, then didn’t want to look like I couldn’t. Good friends gave me a hard time when I cheated, it helped me get back on course.
@ 12:34 pm on April 10, 2009
The patch, and remember that coffee (caffeine) works to flush nicotine out of your system more rapidly, increasing your cravings. Use a stronger patch during coffee time to compensate and then switch out.
By the way, your wife, never having mentioned it before, will thank you for no reason. Don’t ask.
@ 12:35 pm on April 10, 2009
Took Zyban before. It’s personality Botox. Hated every minute. Ending up quitting cold turkey. That lasted about 10-11 months.
@ 12:35 pm on April 10, 2009
Pre-smoking ban, going to my favorite watering hole, the Loon, was torture. I could not stand having my drinks sans smoke. I went to a cigar store and bought a pack of cigarillos and smoked those. I only needed them for 3 weeks and then I was over it.
@ 12:37 pm on April 10, 2009
I cut down abruptly from a pack a day to three per day. Stopped smoking in the morning altogether. Gradually got to a point where I was smoking one cigarette when I got home from work. One day I decided not to buy the next pack. The whole process took about two months.
@ 12:42 pm on April 10, 2009
Smoking Ban + Chicago winters = easy to quit for good (I was a bar smoker)
I know that doesn’t help you, but if I were you I’d start trying to do some form of exercise. That way if you do slip up, you’ll be punished the next time you try to run.
@ 12:47 pm on April 10, 2009
Try smoking lots of weed.
@ 12:47 pm on April 10, 2009
don’t think in terms of quitting smoking. at this stage youre focus should be on transfering your nicotine addiction to a non-tobacco product, ie nic-gum or a nic-inhaler.
@ 12:52 pm on April 10, 2009
Staying out of bars helps. A wife who hates cigarettes, and will make your life hell if you displease her, doesn’t hurt either.
@ 12:56 pm on April 10, 2009
You should try chewing tobacco instead.
@ 1:01 pm on April 10, 2009
Cold Turkey for me.
I had a strange experience with Nicorette. I was in Costco buying some for my husband (smokeless tobacco fiend) and one of the employees there who serve food samples saw what was in my cart. She told me that her husband had recently died from cancer as a result of an addiction to Nicorette. He could not stop using it despite warnings from doctors. She told me she had lost her best friend. I put the box back.
My husband acknowledged the similar cravings to Nicorette, the shakiness, the need to increase usage, etc. Don’t trade one addiction for another.
Try Hypnosis.
@ 1:08 pm on April 10, 2009
http://www.whyquit.com
Learn what and how nicotine works. When I understood the monster I was fighting I could win. I have been quite for 1 year & 1 month. Knowledge is power!!!
I tried it all … cold turkey worked.
@ 1:09 pm on April 10, 2009
Has the “Now Zac Smash!” moment come yet?
@ 1:11 pm on April 10, 2009
My friend went cold turkey and took some advice from someone else to go jogging when he had the urge for one. I jogged with him to help motivate. He lost about 50 lbs too.
@ 1:12 pm on April 10, 2009
cold turkey is the only way to do it.
@ 1:23 pm on April 10, 2009
I quit cold turkey in 1994. Hardest thing I ever did in my life. But every day got a little easier, and each time I almost caved in, I reminded myself that I would have to start all over from square one. That kept me from lapsing. Good luck!
@ 1:24 pm on April 10, 2009
In my mind, Zac and the FB Offices are like this right about now …
See, it’s funny, because it’s got a grumpy Zac-like character, a spider monkey character, and a guy in a pink french-cuffed shirt. It works on so many levels!
@ 1:41 pm on April 10, 2009
Wellbutrin. Better than nicotine gum or a patch.
@ 1:42 pm on April 10, 2009
Smokers are the best people in the world, if it wasn’t for them the bloated and fat government wouldn’t have money to play with. The whole smoking crap is all about “funding” children health care. WINK WINK
@ 1:43 pm on April 10, 2009
I have this theory that there is conservation law of vices, i.e. total vices have to remain the same. So if you get rid of smoking you have to find another vice.
@ 1:49 pm on April 10, 2009
From the link provided by Teri:
What is nicotine addiction?
Nicotine is the tobacco plant’s natural protection from being eaten by insects. It is a super toxin that, drop for drop, is more lethal than strychnine or diamondback rattlesnake venom, and three times deadlier than arsenic. Yet, amazingly, by chance, this natural insecticide’s chemical structure is so similar to the neurotransmitter acetylcholine that once inside the brain it fits a host of chemical locks permitting it direct and indirect control over the flow of more than 200 neurochemicals.
Within eight seconds of that first-ever inhaled puff, through dizzy, coughing and six shades of green, nicotine arrived at the brain’s reward pathways where it generated an unearned flood of dopamine, resulting in an immediate yet possibly unrecognized “aaah” reward sensation. Sensing it would cause most first-time inhalers to soon return to steal more. Nicotine also fit the adrenaline locks releasing a host of fight or flight neurochemicals and select serotonin locks impacting mood.
Oddly, this makes me crave a cigarette intensely. Very intensely.
@ 1:51 pm on April 10, 2009
Botched the itals on account of I was jonesing something fierce.
@ 1:54 pm on April 10, 2009
Well, it’s like this. You befriend this guy named Doc Brown. He’ll be a little crazy, but he’s smart. He’s gonna steal some plutonium from some shady guys, and want you to meet him behind the mall late at night. When you get there, he’ll show you a car that travels back in time using a flux capacitor.
Now, knock Doc over the head, and steal his fancy car. Drive back in time to the day you first started smoking, and tell yourself not to.
If that doesn’t work, you’re gonna need to find some guys named Bill and Ted, and climb in the phone booth with them. Resist the urge to meet Lincoln.
@ 1:59 pm on April 10, 2009
You have to want to quit.
@ 1:59 pm on April 10, 2009
I’m going to try what worked for my friend Michael. The Alan Carr cruelly named Easyway book. I am super skeptical about things like this but Michael is a tough and boozy lad raised in the dingy carpeted pubs of Manchester. When the smoking ban happened in London, he would stand in frigid rain, handrolling cigarettes. He really liked to smoke and he loves to drink.
Then he came over for SXSW last year and after a few days made a reference to being glad he didn’t smoke anymore. Oh yeah, you haven’t smoked since you got here. What gives? He said the Alan Carr book worked a treat for him. Said he has never wanted one again. I almost want to try it to prove him wrong. But also I really want to quit before I sound like Patty, Selma, Batman or Bonnie Tyler.
Thanks for the link, Terri. It’s actually kind of fascinating, and it makes a compelling case for cold turkey — the only method I’ve ever endorsed, but then my credibility in the matter is hardly unimpeachable.
Try getting pregnant, Zac. The hormonal change will make you hate the smell of cigarette smoke. Then after 9 months you’re pretty much in the clear.
@ 2:10 pm on April 10, 2009
Here’s how it worked in 1991 for me after 20 years chain-smoking and several aborted (can we use that word?) attempts:
First, I made the decision to quit. Then I did this: I sorta split myself into left and right hand. Meaning, on the right side, I had decided to quit. On the LEFT, I coped with the result. Meaning I did NOT play ‘will I, won’t I’ fail to not smoke today each morning. My resolve on the right was absolute. And my energy went to COPING with my decision…as opposed to struggling with the can I/can’t I temptation struggles each day.
I kept cigarettes on me and a lighter for the first 6 months. That way, I knew I COULD smoke. But it made it easier for me to feel strong because, on that right, my decision was made. I won’t smoke. Somehow having the cigarettes on me made me feel more powerful. Like…’I know you’re there, but I’ll show you who has the ower here’.
Dedide to stop and cope with it. Let your energy go towards the dire witdrawal symtoms and unwinding habits like smoking on the phone, Etc. As I told you once before, a beautiful wife and kid….which you have in spades… are two of the best reasons I know to stop. But what finally worked for me…when I was going through the worst career crises of my then life no less…were as I post above. Go for it. The rewards are not enormous but they are many. Not the least of which is being free from the guilt. And the expense. Put that cigarette money in that college fund.
@ 2:41 pm on April 10, 2009
Honestly, you won’t stop if the people around you smoke. I’m not telling you to dump your friends, but if they have been considering it, now may be the time for all of you.
@ 2:44 pm on April 10, 2009
Bloody men are like bloody cigarettes -
A habit you’ll swear you’ll crack,
Then you find you’ve snuck out of the office
To suck one off round the back.
Clare Pollard
(I, have no solutions to offer because I have not quit.)
@ 2:46 pm on April 10, 2009
moiremusic has a point to a point. But if you have truly made the decision to stop, per my earlier post, other people smoking will be merely anecdotal. Right after I stopped I went to Santa Fe with a chain-smoking frau. Because my decision was made and my desire to be free was behind me, watching that besotted sow inhale to her knees made me more determined than ever to become free of my addiction. And for me it absolutely was full blown nicotine addiction…no less than the puffing that gas bag in Santa Fe.
@ 2:53 pm on April 10, 2009
Step 1: Decide you want to quit.
Step 2: Stop smoking.
Step 3: Join a soccer team.
@ 4:06 pm on April 10, 2009
Good luck to anyone ready to quit—those who love you will be so, so glad you make a step toward healthier living. They want you around and they worry that your smoking is going to take you away too soon.
What a great set of comments, with so much good advice and goodwill.
Rare these days.
@ 4:22 pm on April 10, 2009
@Bethany: Most realistic advice in this whole thread, methinks.
@ 4:35 pm on April 10, 2009
It has been a long time, but in 1976 I stopped after 15 years of hard smoking with a program called “Smokenders.” We met weekly for what was probably like an AA meeting, but it was mainly positive reinforcement in a highly structured but drug-free and shock-free program. I joked that it was a cross between Weight Watchers and Alcoholics Anonymous (neither of which I have participated in), but the 9 week course worked for me, and for a lot of other folks who had tried the other stuff. This was before the patch and Nicorette and lord knows what else. If the program is still around, I highly recommend it.
@ 5:09 pm on April 10, 2009
I did one hour of hypnotherapy along with behavior modification for eight weeks. On the last day said goodbye to the cigs and never smoked again. That was in 86. The key is to NEVER have another cigarette again after you quit. My thought is if I have a cigarette, I’ll just want another one in 20 minutes, so that gets me nowhere. Good luck, if you can go 11 months, you can go forever.
@ 5:09 pm on April 10, 2009
Zac:
This will sound obvious, but the only way to quit smoking is to never take another puff. Smoking is not like Bill Clinton’s definition of sex. One drag on a friend’s cigarette is smoking (and becomes more smoking just as night follows day).
Start thinking of your smoking self in the past tense. Mourn the fun you had doing it and (hate to say it, but it’s true) mourn the loss of the can’t-deny coolness of it. Get used to being not quite as cool. That might be the hardest part, but that’s the part you have to get through.
Sorry.
@ 5:31 pm on April 10, 2009
On November 4th 2007 I said
“Enough”
I listed all the reasons I hate smoking:
I hated being a slave to a box.
I hated “having” to do something over and over.
I hated hacking and coughing.
I hated smelling like smoke.
I hated having a mouth like an ashtray.
I hated having to leave a room or conversation to sneak a smoke.
So I decided I would remember the day
November 4th 2007
because I would never smoke again. No cheating, no sneaking a smoke… never again.
It will always be known as one of my better days. And everyday that I haven’t smoked since is a better day.
I find myself referencing that day all the time… “I haven’t smoked since …” you get the picture.
(though I am against the smoking ban)
@ 5:34 pm on April 10, 2009
To quit, I waited until I got sick with the flu. Being knocked out sick anyway got me through any physical withdrawl symptoms. On the third day I rose again a non-smoker.
A few weeks later I started with SNUS. I tried the kind you get at the 7-11. It sucked. Then I went to a local tobacco store. They only carry a couple of flavors but it was better than the 7-11 crap. Eventually I ordered it from Sweeden direct.
I haven’t had a cigarette in months. If I ever need nicotine, I pop in a snus. It is just a little tea bag releasing nicotine in to my blood.
You’re better off quitting all nicotine but in case u can’t yet, snus is a stealth and no offense way to quit killing your lungs.
I too have a soccer playing kids plus play in an adult league myself. Not smoking and stinking up the room has improved the quality of my life 100 fold.
@ 6:14 pm on April 10, 2009
Thanks for the advice everyone. The Nicorette has helped. Haven’t wanted to chew too much, because I honestly hate it, but it has taken the edge off. (I’m using the lower-dose version, by the way.)
Weird thing is: I haven’t honestly wanted a cigarette all day, but I think about smoking constantly. Not in a “if I see one I’m going to have one” way. It’s so tied up in my life that it’s strange not to be lighting up. But I feel good so far. Going away for the weekend, so there’s no chance of having access. Fingers crossed.
And again, thanks for the support and the advice.
@ 6:17 pm on April 10, 2009
My dad did hynopsis years ago. I never saw him smoke again. I think it has been almost 30 years.
@ 6:21 pm on April 10, 2009
Copenhagen.
But then that’s twice as hard to kick.
To do so, I just thought of all the corporate-types I was making rich everytime I put their poison (that sweet, sweet poison) in my mouth.
More than anything, I agree with BBB:
YOU HAVE TO WANT IT.
@ 6:54 pm on April 10, 2009
…to quit, that is…
@ 6:54 pm on April 10, 2009
Try picking up a healthy habit to replace the smoking. Go out for walks, go for a jog, go to the gym. I find that exchanging one habit for another helps, then I can be as OCD about the new healthy habit as I was about the old filthy one. Plus, the endorphin release from exercise mimics the dopamine satisfaction you get from a smoke – it works. Still sucks though.
@ 6:32 am on April 11, 2009
Good Luck to you, I think the answer is different for everyone as to the best way.
I quit dipping eight years ago and I am glad I did. I tried several “methods” that did not work and then finally one day I threw away a full can and never did it again.
@ 2:23 pm on April 11, 2009
The saddest thing that I’d ever seen were smokers outside the hospital doors.
@ 9:10 am on April 12, 2009
If you really want to quit smoking you must not drink as well. If you drink you will probably smoke. Once you have one smoke you will not think it so bad to have another.
So no smoking or drinking over the next few weeks. That should be easy, right?
@ 9:28 am on April 13, 2009
Actually haven’t drank since I started quitting. Figure I at least have a head start. And I know I can’t have even a drag.
@ 10:12 am on April 13, 2009
Try to change your mindset from “started quitting” to quit. (Not trying to pile on you.) Hang in there!
@ 11:38 am on April 13, 2009
FrontBurner® launched in March 2003, the first blog in Dallas run by a media organization. This is where the editors of D Magazine come to waste a tremendous amount of time.
53 comments
“Cold Turkey” with an unopened pack in the freezer. (It felt good to know they were there.) My rule if I ever decided I HAD to have one of those frozen sticks of joy was to wait 5 more minutes…and then 5 more minutes…and then 5 more minutes (rinse and repeat, you get the pictue). I never smoked one.
It takes 21 days to break a habit. You are going to miss them for a couple of years and eventually (to my surprise) they will start smelling horrible and be very bothersome to be around. Voila! A reformed whore is born.
Chantix! It requires a prescription from a Doc, but it’s well worth it. I smoked for 50 years. Never less than 2 packs a day. Using Chantix, quitting was easy. Like J Paul I kept a pack of my brand as insurance. But it was not in the freezer, it was on my back porch table–easy to quickly reach. Never did it. My first anniversary will be Aug. 2nd. Still miss the cigs and love second-hand smoke. I do not have the character and discipline required to cold turkey. Good luck to you, Zac!
Something tells me Zac isn’t going to take Chantix. IJS.
Zyban aka Wellbutrin.
Two packs a day to zero. Told everyone I knew that I was quitting, then didn’t want to look like I couldn’t. Good friends gave me a hard time when I cheated, it helped me get back on course.
The patch, and remember that coffee (caffeine) works to flush nicotine out of your system more rapidly, increasing your cravings. Use a stronger patch during coffee time to compensate and then switch out.
By the way, your wife, never having mentioned it before, will thank you for no reason. Don’t ask.
Took Zyban before. It’s personality Botox. Hated every minute. Ending up quitting cold turkey. That lasted about 10-11 months.
Pre-smoking ban, going to my favorite watering hole, the Loon, was torture. I could not stand having my drinks sans smoke. I went to a cigar store and bought a pack of cigarillos and smoked those. I only needed them for 3 weeks and then I was over it.
I cut down abruptly from a pack a day to three per day. Stopped smoking in the morning altogether. Gradually got to a point where I was smoking one cigarette when I got home from work. One day I decided not to buy the next pack. The whole process took about two months.
Smoking Ban + Chicago winters = easy to quit for good (I was a bar smoker)
I know that doesn’t help you, but if I were you I’d start trying to do some form of exercise. That way if you do slip up, you’ll be punished the next time you try to run.
Try smoking lots of weed.
don’t think in terms of quitting smoking. at this stage youre focus should be on transfering your nicotine addiction to a non-tobacco product, ie nic-gum or a nic-inhaler.
Staying out of bars helps. A wife who hates cigarettes, and will make your life hell if you displease her, doesn’t hurt either.
You should try chewing tobacco instead.
Cold Turkey for me.
I had a strange experience with Nicorette. I was in Costco buying some for my husband (smokeless tobacco fiend) and one of the employees there who serve food samples saw what was in my cart. She told me that her husband had recently died from cancer as a result of an addiction to Nicorette. He could not stop using it despite warnings from doctors. She told me she had lost her best friend. I put the box back.
My husband acknowledged the similar cravings to Nicorette, the shakiness, the need to increase usage, etc. Don’t trade one addiction for another.
Try Hypnosis.
http://www.whyquit.com
Learn what and how nicotine works. When I understood the monster I was fighting I could win. I have been quite for 1 year & 1 month. Knowledge is power!!!
I tried it all … cold turkey worked.
Has the “Now Zac Smash!” moment come yet?
My friend went cold turkey and took some advice from someone else to go jogging when he had the urge for one. I jogged with him to help motivate. He lost about 50 lbs too.
cold turkey is the only way to do it.
I quit cold turkey in 1994. Hardest thing I ever did in my life. But every day got a little easier, and each time I almost caved in, I reminded myself that I would have to start all over from square one. That kept me from lapsing. Good luck!
In my mind, Zac and the FB Offices are like this right about now …
Zac Quits Smoking
See, it’s funny, because it’s got a grumpy Zac-like character, a spider monkey character, and a guy in a pink french-cuffed shirt. It works on so many levels!
Wellbutrin. Better than nicotine gum or a patch.
Smokers are the best people in the world, if it wasn’t for them the bloated and fat government wouldn’t have money to play with. The whole smoking crap is all about “funding” children health care. WINK WINK
I have this theory that there is conservation law of vices, i.e. total vices have to remain the same. So if you get rid of smoking you have to find another vice.
From the link provided by Teri:
What is nicotine addiction?
Nicotine is the tobacco plant’s natural protection from being eaten by insects. It is a super toxin that, drop for drop, is more lethal than strychnine or diamondback rattlesnake venom, and three times deadlier than arsenic. Yet, amazingly, by chance, this natural insecticide’s chemical structure is so similar to the neurotransmitter acetylcholine that once inside the brain it fits a host of chemical locks permitting it direct and indirect control over the flow of more than 200 neurochemicals.
Within eight seconds of that first-ever inhaled puff, through dizzy, coughing and six shades of green, nicotine arrived at the brain’s reward pathways where it generated an unearned flood of dopamine, resulting in an immediate yet possibly unrecognized “aaah” reward sensation. Sensing it would cause most first-time inhalers to soon return to steal more. Nicotine also fit the adrenaline locks releasing a host of fight or flight neurochemicals and select serotonin locks impacting mood.
Oddly, this makes me crave a cigarette intensely. Very intensely.
Botched the itals on account of I was jonesing something fierce.
Well, it’s like this. You befriend this guy named Doc Brown. He’ll be a little crazy, but he’s smart. He’s gonna steal some plutonium from some shady guys, and want you to meet him behind the mall late at night. When you get there, he’ll show you a car that travels back in time using a flux capacitor.
Now, knock Doc over the head, and steal his fancy car. Drive back in time to the day you first started smoking, and tell yourself not to.
If that doesn’t work, you’re gonna need to find some guys named Bill and Ted, and climb in the phone booth with them. Resist the urge to meet Lincoln.
You have to want to quit.
I’m going to try what worked for my friend Michael. The Alan Carr cruelly named Easyway book. I am super skeptical about things like this but Michael is a tough and boozy lad raised in the dingy carpeted pubs of Manchester. When the smoking ban happened in London, he would stand in frigid rain, handrolling cigarettes. He really liked to smoke and he loves to drink.
Then he came over for SXSW last year and after a few days made a reference to being glad he didn’t smoke anymore. Oh yeah, you haven’t smoked since you got here. What gives? He said the Alan Carr book worked a treat for him. Said he has never wanted one again. I almost want to try it to prove him wrong. But also I really want to quit before I sound like Patty, Selma, Batman or Bonnie Tyler.
http://www.amazon.com/Easy-Way-Stop-Smoking-Non-Smokers/dp/1402718616
Thanks for the link, Terri. It’s actually kind of fascinating, and it makes a compelling case for cold turkey — the only method I’ve ever endorsed, but then my credibility in the matter is hardly unimpeachable.
Check it out, Zac:
http://www.whyquit.com/whyquit/LinksAAddiction.html
Try getting pregnant, Zac. The hormonal change will make you hate the smell of cigarette smoke. Then after 9 months you’re pretty much in the clear.
Here’s how it worked in 1991 for me after 20 years chain-smoking and several aborted (can we use that word?) attempts:
First, I made the decision to quit. Then I did this: I sorta split myself into left and right hand. Meaning, on the right side, I had decided to quit. On the LEFT, I coped with the result. Meaning I did NOT play ‘will I, won’t I’ fail to not smoke today each morning. My resolve on the right was absolute. And my energy went to COPING with my decision…as opposed to struggling with the can I/can’t I temptation struggles each day.
I kept cigarettes on me and a lighter for the first 6 months. That way, I knew I COULD smoke. But it made it easier for me to feel strong because, on that right, my decision was made. I won’t smoke. Somehow having the cigarettes on me made me feel more powerful. Like…’I know you’re there, but I’ll show you who has the ower here’.
Dedide to stop and cope with it. Let your energy go towards the dire witdrawal symtoms and unwinding habits like smoking on the phone, Etc. As I told you once before, a beautiful wife and kid….which you have in spades… are two of the best reasons I know to stop. But what finally worked for me…when I was going through the worst career crises of my then life no less…were as I post above. Go for it. The rewards are not enormous but they are many. Not the least of which is being free from the guilt. And the expense. Put that cigarette money in that college fund.
Honestly, you won’t stop if the people around you smoke. I’m not telling you to dump your friends, but if they have been considering it, now may be the time for all of you.
Bloody men are like bloody cigarettes -
A habit you’ll swear you’ll crack,
Then you find you’ve snuck out of the office
To suck one off round the back.
Clare Pollard
(I, have no solutions to offer because I have not quit.)
moiremusic has a point to a point. But if you have truly made the decision to stop, per my earlier post, other people smoking will be merely anecdotal. Right after I stopped I went to Santa Fe with a chain-smoking frau. Because my decision was made and my desire to be free was behind me, watching that besotted sow inhale to her knees made me more determined than ever to become free of my addiction. And for me it absolutely was full blown nicotine addiction…no less than the puffing that gas bag in Santa Fe.
Step 1: Decide you want to quit.
Step 2: Stop smoking.
Step 3: Join a soccer team.
Good luck to anyone ready to quit—those who love you will be so, so glad you make a step toward healthier living. They want you around and they worry that your smoking is going to take you away too soon.
What a great set of comments, with so much good advice and goodwill.
Rare these days.
@Bethany: Most realistic advice in this whole thread, methinks.
It has been a long time, but in 1976 I stopped after 15 years of hard smoking with a program called “Smokenders.” We met weekly for what was probably like an AA meeting, but it was mainly positive reinforcement in a highly structured but drug-free and shock-free program. I joked that it was a cross between Weight Watchers and Alcoholics Anonymous (neither of which I have participated in), but the 9 week course worked for me, and for a lot of other folks who had tried the other stuff. This was before the patch and Nicorette and lord knows what else. If the program is still around, I highly recommend it.
I did one hour of hypnotherapy along with behavior modification for eight weeks. On the last day said goodbye to the cigs and never smoked again. That was in 86. The key is to NEVER have another cigarette again after you quit. My thought is if I have a cigarette, I’ll just want another one in 20 minutes, so that gets me nowhere. Good luck, if you can go 11 months, you can go forever.
Zac:
This will sound obvious, but the only way to quit smoking is to never take another puff. Smoking is not like Bill Clinton’s definition of sex. One drag on a friend’s cigarette is smoking (and becomes more smoking just as night follows day).
Start thinking of your smoking self in the past tense. Mourn the fun you had doing it and (hate to say it, but it’s true) mourn the loss of the can’t-deny coolness of it. Get used to being not quite as cool. That might be the hardest part, but that’s the part you have to get through.
Sorry.
On November 4th 2007 I said
“Enough”
I listed all the reasons I hate smoking:
I hated being a slave to a box.
I hated “having” to do something over and over.
I hated hacking and coughing.
I hated smelling like smoke.
I hated having a mouth like an ashtray.
I hated having to leave a room or conversation to sneak a smoke.
So I decided I would remember the day
November 4th 2007
because I would never smoke again. No cheating, no sneaking a smoke… never again.
It will always be known as one of my better days. And everyday that I haven’t smoked since is a better day.
I find myself referencing that day all the time… “I haven’t smoked since …” you get the picture.
(though I am against the smoking ban)
To quit, I waited until I got sick with the flu. Being knocked out sick anyway got me through any physical withdrawl symptoms. On the third day I rose again a non-smoker.
A few weeks later I started with SNUS. I tried the kind you get at the 7-11. It sucked. Then I went to a local tobacco store. They only carry a couple of flavors but it was better than the 7-11 crap. Eventually I ordered it from Sweeden direct.
I haven’t had a cigarette in months. If I ever need nicotine, I pop in a snus. It is just a little tea bag releasing nicotine in to my blood.
You’re better off quitting all nicotine but in case u can’t yet, snus is a stealth and no offense way to quit killing your lungs.
I too have a soccer playing kids plus play in an adult league myself. Not smoking and stinking up the room has improved the quality of my life 100 fold.
Thanks for the advice everyone. The Nicorette has helped. Haven’t wanted to chew too much, because I honestly hate it, but it has taken the edge off. (I’m using the lower-dose version, by the way.)
Weird thing is: I haven’t honestly wanted a cigarette all day, but I think about smoking constantly. Not in a “if I see one I’m going to have one” way. It’s so tied up in my life that it’s strange not to be lighting up. But I feel good so far. Going away for the weekend, so there’s no chance of having access. Fingers crossed.
And again, thanks for the support and the advice.
My dad did hynopsis years ago. I never saw him smoke again. I think it has been almost 30 years.
Copenhagen.
But then that’s twice as hard to kick.
To do so, I just thought of all the corporate-types I was making rich everytime I put their poison (that sweet, sweet poison) in my mouth.
More than anything, I agree with BBB:
YOU HAVE TO WANT IT.
…to quit, that is…
Try picking up a healthy habit to replace the smoking. Go out for walks, go for a jog, go to the gym. I find that exchanging one habit for another helps, then I can be as OCD about the new healthy habit as I was about the old filthy one. Plus, the endorphin release from exercise mimics the dopamine satisfaction you get from a smoke – it works. Still sucks though.
Good Luck to you, I think the answer is different for everyone as to the best way.
I quit dipping eight years ago and I am glad I did. I tried several “methods” that did not work and then finally one day I threw away a full can and never did it again.
The saddest thing that I’d ever seen were smokers outside the hospital doors.
If you really want to quit smoking you must not drink as well. If you drink you will probably smoke. Once you have one smoke you will not think it so bad to have another.
So no smoking or drinking over the next few weeks. That should be easy, right?
Actually haven’t drank since I started quitting. Figure I at least have a head start. And I know I can’t have even a drag.
Try to change your mindset from “started quitting” to quit. (Not trying to pile on you.) Hang in there!