stopped smoking tuesday. really need a fag.

[Ancient Citizen]

I'm disappointed in myself for relenting but I'm wise enough to know it isn't easy. I'd had a few to drink last night so my reasoning was shot. Smoked 6 fags last night in a couple of hours, that's bad by even my own standards.

It's the constant, nagging craving that's doing me. Seeing a nurse this week get some patches, anyone found them helpful?

What's the reason for you wanting to give up?

The irony being whoever donated that set of lungs on the left, is just as dead as the ones on the right.

 

[Goo]

It really is one of the hardest things to do in life, and gets harder the longer you smoke, it's not just the nicotine that is addictive it's all the things that go along with smoking, with me the smoking ban was great because it allowed me to be on my own with my thoughts releasing stress with the exhaled smoke, I never smoked in the house and loved wandering around the garden smoking (I have a big garden)

But it is so worth the effort, but you have to find other things to give you what the addiction gave you, with me it was serious life changes losing weight going to the gym etc.

Hope this all makes sense

Interesting to hear the thoughts of other ex smokers.

I had similar reasons for not wanting to give up. I thought I enjoyed being outside/being alone to relax/alone to think about thing etc. Looking back, it did nothing but impede all the things I thought it was helping with.

When I used to wake up in the morning I'd have a cigarette, and that first one in the morning always gives you a bit of a light headed feeling, and a bit of a rush. Those feelings are reactions to poison, and when I stopped and actually thought about it, not enjoyable in the slightest. When I first realised this I was very confused as for the past 5 years, that's what I thought I'd liked most about smoking. I carried on smoking for about 5 months after that realization and it was always the same.

As for relaxation, it doesn't do that at all. While you might be releaved of stress and tension while you're actually having a cigarette, the second it's finished, nicotine starts leaving your body and makes you very unrelaxed. It's the cigarette that puts the stress and tension there in the first place. I used to have to pause films for a quick one, run out of the pub at football half time, smoke 2/3 in quick succession before long journeys. Nowadays, with all the bans etc, having a day out can become very awkward because as a smoker I was mapping out where and when I could smoke so I wouldn't have to go without.

Finally, I used to enjoy being on my own for ten minutes, like a little break from whatever else I was doing. I was attributing that feeling of "break" to the cigarette when in actual fact, it was nothing to do with the cigarette at all. I still sit outside and read the paper with a coffee, and when I go out for a walk etc, I can walk for longer and enjoy the surrounding far more now I'm not thinking about how much tobacco I have left to keep me going until I find a shop.

Once I'd realised these things (and more) quitting became very easy indeed, because I didn't think I wanted one. My choices became, not smoke and no change to how I'm feeling now, or smoke, and feel dry mouthed/smell/become unrelaxed and so on.

Did this sort of thing happen to you Ducado?

 

[TCIB]

Just had a lung smashing ciggie, was great.

 

[Goo]

Just had a lung smashing ciggie, was great.

???

 

[Ducado]

Smoking (to me any way) was a form of procrastination, just have a fag to think about it, whilst I could have been getting on with it<br /><br />-- Sun Jun 17, 2012 5:54 pm --<br /><br />

It really is one of the hardest things to do in life, and gets harder the longer you smoke, it's not just the nicotine that is addictive it's all the things that go along with smoking, with me the smoking ban was great because it allowed me to be on my own with my thoughts releasing stress with the exhaled smoke, I never smoked in the house and loved wandering around the garden smoking (I have a big garden)

But it is so worth the effort, but you have to find other things to give you what the addiction gave you, with me it was serious life changes losing weight going to the gym etc.

Hope this all makes sense

Interesting to hear the thoughts of other ex smokers.

I had similar reasons for not wanting to give up. I thought I enjoyed being outside/being alone to relax/alone to think about thing etc. Looking back, it did nothing but impede all the things I thought it was helping with.

When I used to wake up in the morning I'd have a cigarette, and that first one in the morning always gives you a bit of a light headed feeling, and a bit of a rush. Those feelings are reactions to poison, and when I stopped and actually thought about it, not enjoyable in the slightest. When I first realised this I was very confused as for the past 5 years, that's what I thought I'd liked most about smoking. I carried on smoking for about 5 months after that realization and it was always the same.

As for relaxation, it doesn't do that at all. While you might be releaved of stress and tension while you're actually having a cigarette, the second it's finished, nicotine starts leaving your body and makes you very unrelaxed. It's the cigarette that puts the stress and tension there in the first place. I used to have to pause films for a quick one, run out of the pub at football half time, smoke 2/3 in quick succession before long journeys. Nowadays, with all the bans etc, having a day out can become very awkward because as a smoker I was mapping out where and when I could smoke so I wouldn't have to go without.

Finally, I used to enjoy being on my own for ten minutes, like a little break from whatever else I was doing. I was attributing that feeling of "break" to the cigarette when in actual fact, it was nothing to do with the cigarette at all. I still sit outside and read the paper with a coffee, and when I go out for a walk etc, I can walk for longer and enjoy the surrounding far more now I'm not thinking about how much tobacco I have left to keep me going until I find a shop.

Once I'd realised these things (and more) quitting became very easy indeed, because I didn't think I wanted one. My choices became, not smoke and no change to how I'm feeling now, or smoke, and feel dry mouthed/smell/become unrelaxed and so on.

Did this sort of thing happen to you Ducado?

Yes very much so

 

[BlueInCanada]

With the e-cigarette, how can inhaling water vapour be good for you? How long until 'they' say that the water in the lungs now causes blah blah blah etc?

 

[Goo]

With the e-cigarette, how can inhaling water vapour be good for you? How long until 'they' say that the water in the lungs now causes blah blah blah etc?

I suspect inhaling water vapor through an e-cig is about as dangerous as sitting in a steam room.

You could be right though, although I'm sure it's far better than inhaling known carcinogens, and all the other chemicals proven to be found in cigarettes.

Also it's not just the health factors that people get them for. You can smoke an e-cigarette indoors, it doesn't smell nor create ash/dirty waste, they're much cheaper than normal cigarettes, and you can get cartridges delivered to your door. If health and giving up the drug was the main concern for a smoker, they wouldn't smoke/intake nicotine full stop.

 

[goat boy]

I stopped on Tuesday when I bought an ecig in wythenshawe. See the 'bluemoon vaping club' thread. 0 cigs since then and tbh the taste of the e cig is starting to do my head in. I'll keep at it because I'm conscious that I didn't start with the e cig genuinely intending to stop the fags. However after 5 days, and my increasing dismay at the cardboardy e cig taste , I might just have cracked it while barely trying. Which makes the e cig the greatest smoking cessation device bar none.

 

[goat boy]

Nb the e cig has the same dry sort of flavour that you get if you inhale a whiff of stage fog (think theatre/ bands). I assume its similar stuff. That being the case, and that you've probably had plenty of said whiffs if you're an actor or muso type, over decades, then I guessing its safer. I hope to have lost any/ all dependency on either nicotine or the habit bsy the time the e cig dies out.

 

[StrangewaysHereWeCome]

5 days without a fag now! :D Am still craving like a twat though