Trying to Quit Smoking

stop yourself at the cash register

@Wolverine said:

I started to smoking about six months ago, about 4-10 cigarettes a day. Anyway, I smoked a cigarette before work today and afterwards I realized my throat really hurt and I couldn't take a really deep breath.

IT FREAKED THE SHIT OUT OF ME. I need to quit! The thing is I'm sort of addicted. I haven't smoked this morning. I need your help. Should I throw my cigarettes out? I've done this before and bought another pack. Any advice would be great.

Also, since I haven't smoked for that long, my lungs can recover if I quit now right?

Your lungs are ruined. You clearly have the cancer.

I quit yesterday afternoon, funny that.

Solidarity duder.

You should give Allen Carrs Easyway a try. A few years ago one of my friends (a heavy smoker) read it and gave up straight away. A few more friends picked it up and also quit. All of them heartily recommended it.

I'm reading it right now, and I reckon today is my last day as a smoker.

Good luck duder.

@TyCobb:

I said suicide so that it sinks into his brain. If you don't care about what happens to you, don't sway his decision with B/S reasoning like that. Comparing smoking to driving? Driving is a necessity! Smoking is not. You gain nothing with smoking and only have everything to lose. You're addicted and it's obvious by how prideful/defensive you are about your tobacco life-lines. Keep living in the present. future is right-around the corner and regret is a bitch.... Especially with a fucked voice-box, lungs, organs, and charred brain.

So bro, learn from this fool and leave death out of your hands.

@TheDudeOfGaming said:

Quitting cold turkey isn't possible.

I did it. Smoked for 3 years and stopped. First week sucked ass. Still had cravings for the first month but nothing compared to that first week. After that, cakewalk. 3 years clean now.

I was able to quit cold turkey and aside from the annoyance of wanting to do something with my hands a lot it wasn't a huge deal for me - but I didn't smoke that much and was only a smoker for about a year and a half. Varies for different people. If you're getting headaches and chills consider nicotine gum but otherwise it's just mental willpower to tell yourself no.

Buy a ticket for the last train outta Flavor Country.

If you want to stop doing something, then stop doing it. I did.

I used nicotine gum for about a month. Haven't had a smoke since March.Buy generic ones at Walmart and save yourself some cash. The only way you will be successful is if you REALLY want to quit.

How anyone can start smoking in this day and age is beyond me, considering the information that's out there. As long as it doesn't affect me I don't care what you do with your body, but fuck all of you smoking in public places. I shouldn't have to adapt to your bad decision.

Best of luck to everyone trying to quit, you can do it!

I almost got addicted to smoking when I was 17. At the time I was going through a huge depression, and smoking helped relieved alot of stress. But then 1 day my brother caught me smoking. He got pissed at me and threw out my pack of cigarettes. That same day I hanged out with my friend and told him what happen. My friend was very surprised to hear that I started smoking. He decided to talk to me saying how I'm becoming a different person. That my problems shouldn't change my way of thinking.

He felt like I was leading my life in the wrong direction. Told me smoking will be just the start for more problems to come. After I had that long conversation with him I decided to quit. There was days I felt urges to want to smoke. It was usually because of stress was starting to get to me. But then I knew if I started smoking again I wouldn't be able to quit this time.

So I found different ways to help relieve stress to control myself. Playing video games and watching porn was my main stress relievers. Overtime my urge to smoke started going away.

Your lungs can recover from any amount of smoking, it just takes longer the more you've smoked. I'm a smoker myself, and I know quitting is really hard. But it is possible if you just have the right motivation and enough willpower. My tip is to just quit, plain and simple. The first few days will be rough, but after about 4-ish days (for me at least) it gets a lot easier. The thing is that even if it gets easier, the craving for cigarettes won't go away for a while, but it gets easier to handle as time passes.

@falserelic said:

So I found different ways to help relieve stress to control myself.

Like...Lunch trays?

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.

@Cloudenvy said:

@falserelic said:

So I found different ways to help relieve stress to control myself.

Like...Lunch trays?

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.

I swear I regret making that thread I really do. Its like having a curse that will eat my soul.

I have found the best way to at least start quitting is to give a trustworthy friend who you see often a decent bit of cash (I tend to do $300) and make them give it back to you in, say, 6 months if you don't smoke.

This does have the obvious problem of allowing you to start again after 6 months, but so far I have cut out my pack a day habit for 3 years, with occasional week-long smoking benders before I restart it. Not a permanent solution, but it's the only thing that I found worked for me at all.

Kick up another addiction, as bad as that sounds. If you already drink Soda/Coffee, start drinking it more religiously until you feel you can go without it. You need a lesser addiction to fight a greater addiction, in my opinion, it can be studying, it can be Soda, either way I feel you need one.

I tried smoking and I could see why people would like it, but I didn't make a habit of it. Anyway good luck to you in quitting.

Once a smoker. Always a smoker. That said, just be the kind of smoker, that doesn't smoke. Don't buy any smokes. Don't ask for smokes. I was smoking on and off for like 15 years, and quitting wasn't easy.

Not that I'll ever be a not-smoker, but I'm only smoking about one pack a year these days. Smoking happens when I go out drinking with friends that smoke. I usually just buy a pack for the occassion and pass it on at the end of the evening. Albeit I guess I'll quit completely, since smoking even a little puts a noticable strain on my throat - bar the occassional drag or two of a post-sex cigarette or so.

Anyways - I like Tic Tacs. Minty fresh breath, rather than a dragon's breath - so that'd be my tip to you. Always carry a pack of Tic Tacs on your person, and enjoy exhaling your minty fresh breath.

@Wolverine: Quiter!

Although i have no helpfull advice.

Good luck though.

@Everyones_A_Critic: Have you tried using a vaporizer? I hear that it really isn't bad at all for your lungs.

@cspanick said:

Dont quit smoking, just switch what you smoke.;)

This, I use to use tobacco and realized how harmful it really was and that it wasn't worth smoking. It was cigars and cigs everyday for a few months and then I just quit. My mom smoked cigs for about 15 years and also quit cold turkey. I think it's the best way to go, maybe the hardest for some though. Now I just smoke something much better, in terms of enjoyment and health wise.

I had been a smoker for a couple of years and the best way for me to stop was cold turkey. Limiting the cigarettes you smoke on a given day and decreasing the amount over time still feeds your nicotine addiction so in actuality you aren't quitting at all. Don't buy products that don't work like gum or a spray or bandages or whatever, all they do is cost you money and they don't solve anything.

Just stop cold turkey but make sure you have a packet of cigarettes at home. If you are like me you'll won't buy a new packet when you're on the go and craving for a cigarette because you still have a packet of smokes at home. By the time you arrive the craving is hopefully gone.

Cold turkey is definitely the way to go.

It's been over two years now since I had a cigarette. I smoked for over ten years, about a pack a day, before I quit. I tried and failed several times to quit before. The last time I quit, I had a really strong notion that I was really done with smoking. That notion didn't help the withdrawal very much. The first 3 days are absolute hell. The next few weeks aren't much easier. It does eventually get better though. Sometimes I forget now that I even used to smoke.

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

@Xolare said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

I just started smoking. It helps with the stress.

That doesn't help this guy quit smoking no does it?

Ummm.. It also makes me smell bad, so I have to spray axe on me and axe smells horrible. My teeth are also turning yellow maybe... that's a thing right? Ummm.... It's also really expensive and a lot of people generally don't want to be around smokers. Uh.... Good Luck :3

You know that stress advantage slowly disappears the longer you keep it up right, you up set your normal emotional balance that eventually all it does is restore your equilibrium.

@Korwin said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

@Xolare said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

I just started smoking. It helps with the stress.

That doesn't help this guy quit smoking no does it?

Ummm.. It also makes me smell bad, so I have to spray axe on me and axe smells horrible. My teeth are also turning yellow maybe... that's a thing right? Ummm.... It's also really expensive and a lot of people generally don't want to be around smokers. Uh.... Good Luck :3

You know that stress advantage slowly disappears the longer you keep it up right, you up set your normal emotional balance that eventually all it does is restore your equilibrium.

Though the psychological implication of needing to smoke when stressed stays so you will only consume more cigarettes without any result.

This video has some helpful pointers. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TL2Vh7goJc

Once you've smoked long enough, you're always at a higher stress level than a non-smoker. You can never feel that relaxation you can as a non-smoker. Once you realize that, everything about quitting becomes a lot easier. Cold turkey is the way to go.

@rebgav: Meh, I don't think it's about self-righteousness. My boyfriend is a smoker and cigarette smoke stinks. It gets on your clothes, in your hair, it's just gross. Not only that but there is a change in the air when someone lights up a cigarette, so acting as though it's irrelevant in comparison to industrial pollution is silly. I don't walk around coughing 24/7 but I can guarantee that 99% of the time if someone lights up a cigarette near me I'm going to cough (curse them!). This being said I'm not someone to complain to people about their habit. Then again, if a chav ever lights up next to my nephew I'll punch him in the face with my child hands. Damn right I'm hard!

Anyway, Mr OP. Just quit. If you seriously want to stop smoking you will stop smoking. The benefits of being a non-smoker are much higher than, wait, are there any benefits to being a smoker? But seriously, I'm one for the cold-turkey approach. Good luck, whatever you decide to do. =]

@rebgav said:

It is not often that you're going to be forced into a broom cupboard with a smoker and made to endure their habit.

Oh, if only you knew . . . if only you knew. ='[

=P

I was recently in a terrible car crash that destroyed my leg and left me in a hospital bed for a couple weeks. If you're getting really desperate to quit, that's how I did it! Also stopped my drinking, too!

@rebgav said:

@Galiant said:

As long as it doesn't affect me I don't care what you do with your body, but fuck all of you smoking in public places. I shouldn't have to adapt to your bad decision.

Yeah, enjoy that clean air being pumped out by all industry and transport. Sure, "second-hand smoke" has consistently been proven to have so little effect (if any) that it's statistically irrelevant as a cause of respiratory illness but as long as you can target your anger you can feel all warm and cosy in your self-righteousness, so there's that!

In other news; I've started punching people who wear too much cologne. Filthy bastards.

Do you smoke? Disregarding your derogatory comments and silly comparisons: I don't want to be exposed to secondhand smoke. It's harmful. It smells horrible. Why should I have to adapt? Why should I have to risk cancer or otherwise damaging my lungs when I'm not the one smoking? Enlighten me, please.

According to this document: "There is sufficient evidence that involuntary smoking (exposure to secondhand or 'environmental' tobacco smoke) causes lung cancer in humans". I'd like to see your source regarding the "consistent proof" that second-hand smoke is "irrelevant".

A close friend of mine is currently recovering from cancer. He had a huge tumor in his chest. He got a stem cell transplant recently and he's doing okay at the moment. I was very worried about him, and I still am, because the cancer could still kill him. If there's even a remote chance that secondhand smoke could cause cancer (as this document implies), what right does anyone have to smoke in public? If you smoke, you should adapt, you should avoid people that don't want to smoke, not the other way around.

@Wolverine said:

@Everyones_A_Critic: Have you tried using a vaporizer? I hear that it really isn't bad at all for your lungs.

Vaporizers are virtually harmless and everyone raves about them getting you super high with a fraction of the bud but having owned two of them and trying even more I've kind of given up on them. They just don't get me as high as burning it so I just shrug and say fuck it. Even if you are smoking weed there's never been any conclusive evidence indicating a relationship between Marijuana and Emphysema.

Everyone I've known who has quit smoking just stopped cold turkey. That's probably what I would do. Just stop if you want to stop. JUST STOP MAN YOU CAN DO IT.

You can't quit after just six months. You haven't even gotten to the green-lung-biscuit-in-the-morning phase.

@Xolare said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

I just started smoking. It helps with the stress.

That doesn't help this guy quit smoking no does it?

Ummm.. It also makes me smell bad, so I have to spray axe on me and axe smells horrible. My teeth are also turning yellow maybe... that's a thing right? Ummm.... It's also really expensive and a lot of people generally don't want to be around smokers. Uh.... Good Luck :3

Quitting smoking is one of the easiest things to do, I've done it hundreds of times.

@Shivoa said:

I think it's 5 years to fully recover (and return to previous cancer risk level) but maybe it's 10 (the point where basically your entire body is new cells and any sludge in your lungs is going to have been passed)

This is nonsense I'm afraid. You can never return to a cancer risk level of a non-smoker. And it doesn't matter if your body makes "new cells" because these new cells that are made have already suffered severe DNA damage from the tar in the cigarettes.

I've never been a smoker, but I could never understand why people have such difficulty quitting smoking. If you want to quit, just stop buying cigarettes. I can understand not being able to resist temptation if you have cigarettes with you, but if you don't have any cigarettes, there is nothing to give in to.

READ OR LISTEN TO ALAN CARRS EASYWAY TO STOP SMOKING or at least watch this

sorry about the caps but just wanted to emphasise that this book/audit tape turned me from a 20 a day roll your own tabacco smoker for over 15 years to absolutely ZERO over night with no patches, gum, e-cigs or willpower. i just stopped smoking, like someone switched the smoking switch in my head off.

that was 9 month ago and i don't even think about smoking anymore. im not craving or missing anything. and i know i will never smoke again

i have no motive for recommended this other than you have nothing to loose and sooooooo much to gain from being a non-smoke.

Six months. Hah. I smoked on and off for 10 years. I finally quit after I both got married and started to develop asthma. Its easy enough to do. Just don't buy cigarettes or hang out with othr folks who smoke for a while. After a couple of weeks, the cravings will mostly go away.

I started smoking when I was 10 years old (that dumb shit you did when you were young), and I was addicted for almost 7 years. However, before I graduated, I wanted to quit and I thought about it for a long time.

I started decreasing the amount of cigarettes I smoked every day for every passing day, until zero. Then I spend a day without smoking. After that, I continued several days without smoking, until I had to take one. It took about a month, and I was clean.

@rebgav said:

The continued proof that second-hand smoke has no relevant effect on health is that, despite technological advancements and changes to practices, studies have shown and continued to show the full range of possible outcomes in approximately equal amounts. A study is no more likely to show a connection between second-hand smoke and various health risks than it is to show a potential but unproven connection or the complete lack of a connection. Given the volume of work in this area over the last five decades, this phenomena is statistically consistent with a lack of correlation. It seems likely that if it weren't for both the political and financial interests involved it would be rather difficult to justify continuing to flog this particular corpse.

Now, that doesn't mean that I think that you should be forced to endure someone else's vice. If a smoker is going out of their way to inconvenience you, smoking around the entryway to a building or in another heavily trafficked area then they're obviously being an antisocial asshole. By the same logic, I don't see why a person who chooses to smoke should conform to your personal preferences in a public place, beyond observing basic thoughtfulness and civility.

That's not a source.

My personal preference is not to be forced to inhale someone's secondhand smoke, which I consider to be far beyond "observing basic thoughtfulness and civility". Do you think I can convince a party of smokers to move from the bus stop when I'm waiting for the bus? Tell them to step away from the roof when it's raining because I don't want to inhale their smoke? When I'm waiting for my train and every third person on the platform is smoking a cigarette, spread out evenly so I can't avoid them wherever I go? Am I supposed to tell the guy with the lit cigarette walking past me on the sidewalk to take a detour out on the street? I pass people smoking while riding their bicycle while I'm riding my own bicycle to work, for fuck's sake.

You know what I do? I hold my fucking breath when they go past. It's all I can do. If they smoke at a bus stop, I stay away. Light one when I'm there? I move. It shouldn't be like that. It feels wrong.

Who are you, or they, or anyone, to tell me that I have to take a detour because someone else decided to smoke and I don't want to take part in it? Smokers should have to conform because they are the ones doing harm to others, not me, but you obviously don't agree with me on this.

You never did answer me if you were a smoker or not.

That's about as far as we'll get with this, I reckon. We disagree. I still say: Fuck people who smoke in public places.

@ll_Exile_ll said:

I've never been a smoker, but I could never understand why people have such difficulty quitting smoking. If you want to quit, just stop buying cigarettes. I can understand not being able to resist temptation if you have cigarettes with you, but if you don't have any cigarettes, there is nothing to give in to.

Because you start going through nicotine withdrawal and get massive migraines the first couple of weeks and it sucks.

Edit: Also some people get anxiety attacks from not having a cigarette to calm them down.

Edit 2: @Wolverine I used an electronic cigarette to ween myself down. I used to smoke menthol so I made my e-cigarette liquid extremely strong menthol wise, and not nicotine wise and that helped. The taste of the tar and tobacco in normal cigarettes makes me sick now. I can't really recommend you do anything other than try to quit cold turkey after only 6 months though, as it's not consumed your life yet like it does to people who have been smoking for years and years.

@TooWalrus said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

@Xolare said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

I just started smoking. It helps with the stress.

That doesn't help this guy quit smoking no does it?

Ummm.. It also makes me smell bad, so I have to spray axe on me and axe smells horrible. My teeth are also turning yellow maybe... that's a thing right? Ummm.... It's also really expensive and a lot of people generally don't want to be around smokers. Uh.... Good Luck :3

So does it offend smokers when I say something like "dude, you reek, don't stand next to me." There's a dude at work who does this, he sits in his car and smokes before work, then he tries to cover it with tons of Axe, but really he just stinks like cigarettes and Axe. Meh, nevermind, I suppose I don't really care if it offends him, the truth hurts.

It wouldn't offend me, I mean if i'm around you all day and you're the one who has to smell me then you should be able to speak the truth about my smell if it's bothering you. I don't do this anymore though, I use old spice and I don't smoke box myself anymore. Holy shit... where do you work? O_o

@Blue_Cube said:

@Korwin said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

@Xolare said:

@NlGHTCRAWLER said:

I just started smoking. It helps with the stress.

That doesn't help this guy quit smoking no does it?

Ummm.. It also makes me smell bad, so I have to spray axe on me and axe smells horrible. My teeth are also turning yellow maybe... that's a thing right? Ummm.... It's also really expensive and a lot of people generally don't want to be around smokers. Uh.... Good Luck :3

You know that stress advantage slowly disappears the longer you keep it up right, you up set your normal emotional balance that eventually all it does is restore your equilibrium.

Though the psychological implication of needing to smoke when stressed stays so you will only consume more cigarettes without any result.

You guys are my Oprah :)

Seriously though, i'm already sure my emotional balance is already upset. That ship has already sailed, might as well enjoy the little good that might be able to come from it.