One word: snus. Google it. Good stuff.
No, that’s tobacco, you’re just changing one addiction for another.
I have been told that Wrigleys DoubleMint gun (the kind with sugar) helps a lot. We’re rooting for you janis_and_c0, 
let us know how it’s going.
How’s it going?
Yes, how about an update?
Something to think about: My mother has struggled with her weight (trying to lose) ever since I can remember. But she quit smoking (having taken it up when she met my dad) when I was very young, and she said it was much easier than trying to lose weight because you still need to eat to live, but you don’t HAVE TO smoke.
I know that doesn’t address nicotine fits, etc., but it’s a philosophy that helped her, and it might help others too.
Good luck!
It’s not a bad philosophy. My sister in law who is the most casual of smokers (3-5 packs a year) likens it to eating cake. She says she loves chocolate cake, but she likes being healthy and thin more, so she only has chocolate cake every once in a while. Sometimes it’s hard to say no, but it’s not impossible.
She has better impulse control than I do, but its the same idea that got me to quit and the same idea that is presented in Carr’s book. I proved to myself that the worst of the addiction was actually mental and not physical, and then worked on dealing with breaking the mental addiction. Cigarettes don’t relax you, they don’t aren’t particularly interesting, and they don’t make people want to talk to you, so why smoke if you are stressed, bored or out trying to be social? Even if you like how they taste (and do you really?) they will kill you, and there are lots of tasty things in the world that won’t.
Speaking personally, I wasn’t able to quit until I didn’t want to smoke anymore. And I mean, actually no longer enjoyed smoking. Not “I should quit” or “I will be healthier if I quit” or “I will save money if I quit,” but actual, honest-to-god, “I don’t like doing this anymore.” YMMV, but that’s how it was for me.
Except when I was a smoker, having a cigarette *did *relax me, *was *something to do when I was bored, and *was *the way I met any number of my good friends. Bullshit reasons don’t help people quit.
My point was I had to come to realize that smoking didn’t actually relax me, entertain me or make me more interesting.
Nicotine is a stimulant, it actually physically does the opposite of relaxing you. The focusing on my breathing might have relaxed me, but not the cigarette itself. I thought it helped because I was feeding the physical addiction, but that isn’t the same. To use Carr’s analogy, that’s like wearing shoes that are too small because it feels good to take them off.
What is interesting about a cigarette? How does it cure boredom? I smoked when I was bored too, but I don’t know why. Well, because I constantly needed to feed my nicotine addiction, but other than that? There is nothing interesting about a cigarette, and smoking doesn’t give you something to do any more than drinking a glass of water does.
I realized also that I have no problem being social without cigarettes. I don’t actually need them to hang out and talk to people. Why would I? The cigarette isn’t generally part of the conversation.
But you’re right, you have to want to quit. All of the above were just realizations I had on the road to deciding that I wanted to quit. When you get rid of all the reasons you tell yourself that you smoke and start looking at what you are actually doing you start wanting to quit more and wanting to smoke less.
The secret to quitting is this: Instead of AAAA…rgh, I’m quitting smoking, you have to think of it as YAAAAAAAAY I get to be a non-smoker!
Being a non-smoker is fabulous! You get to smell good, all day long! You get to keep tons of money! You get to travel and be around people you love more because you’re not focused on how to get nicotine! You get to feel better and be healthier!
I am loving being a non-smoker, for almost 2 years, much, much more than I ever loved smoking. I highly recommend it!
Plus, eventually everyone’s going to quit. You don’t want to be the last one smoking, do you? How embarrassing, everyone looking at you, everyone fake-coughing when you light up outside fifty feet from them, everyone blaming you for any cigarette butts lying around on the ground… quit now, before you’re* the* person that still smokes!
A cigarette has more flavor and ritual to it. Maybe next you’re going to tell me I can’t have a glass of wine if I’m bored, either. :rolleyes: How about rewatching a movie or rereading a book when you’re bored? That doesn’t really get you anything, either.
My mom once bought me that Allan Carr book, though I never read it. If this is the kind of “genius” it’s full of, I’m happy I never cracked it open, or I’d probably still be smoking out of sheer spite.
It’s entirely possible to be social without cigarettes, yes. But they’re also a great way to meet people and/or start conversations. If I hadn’t been a smoker, there are several friends it’s entirely possible that I never would have met, and definitely a lot of fun times I would have missed out on. Which is not to say I wouldn’t have had just as much fun, but it wouldn’t have been the same fun.
People like this would make me want to take up smoking again, just so I could spot them for the express purpose of never, ever having anything to do with them socially.
A glass of wine will intoxicate you, which can be interesting. Also, it tastes good. Even then I rarely drink alone when I am bored. I might drink alone if I am doing something else, but I rarely find myself with nothing to do and no one to talk to so I pull out a flask and start drinking. Watching a movie or reading a book, even if you have already read them, will occupy your mind. None of the above is guaranteed to kill you. Hell even drinking water, while still boring, quenches thirst. The point is that the cigarette doesn’t actually do anything other than kill you slowly and feed your addiction. Why chose to smoke when you are bored instead of something non lethal?
Also, I am still not sure *how *smoking is interesting. Just because you do it when your bored doesn’t mean it alleviates boredom. At least it never did for me for more than the 30 seconds it took to light the cigarette and draw the first couple of puffs. I would typically light the cigarette and then try to figure out something to do. I rarely spent the 3 minutes it took me to smoke sitting around thinking about the cigarette.
Hell, I was, and still consider myself to be, something of a tobacco connoisseur. Look up some of my posts on pipe smoking some time. I get the idea that flavor and ritual can be involved, but I have to tell you, cigarettes taste like shit. I didn’t want to think about them all that much. There is no depth of flavor or complexity even in the pricey Dunhills I would occasionally indulge in.
Don’t conflate what I am saying with what Carr said. All I am saying is what worked for me. That’s it. It sounds like I am spouting platitudes, but I hope you do appreciate that I am just trying to quickly summarize some personal realizations that I came to on my own (with the help of Allan’s book, yes, but I still had to get there myself).
I had decided I wanted to quit but wasn’t able to make it stick. I smoked 2 packs a day for close to two years after I decided I wanted to quit. I tried to quit twice in this time, both times were torture. I told myself there were a lot of reasons why I couldn’t quit. It would be too hard to quit. Things were too stressful right then and I didn’t need quitting on top of it. Many of my friends were smokers and I wouldn’t be able to hang out with them if I quit. I really liked smoking and I only wanted to quit because I knew it was bad for me.
None of the above turned out to be true. It took realizing that none of the above was true for *me *to take the last step to actually stop. When I made that decision the rest was easy. The nic fits I had in past attempts to quit didn’t exist this time around. I went from 2 packs a day to 0 cigarettes instantly, and I was happy about it. I smoked my last cigarette in January of 2009 and I haven’t looked back.
Then maybe be more careful about making them personal instead of what seem to be general statements about The Way Things Are? That’s what pissed me off, really–what seemed to be your assertion that this is how it works for everyone, rather than this was how it played out in your individual circumstance.
Sorry, I thought that this was sufficiently clear that I was talking about myself.
ETA: that came of a bit more dickish than I meant it to. I have no problem talking about what worked for me and why I think it worked, or even debating how sound my own reasoning was, but I am not going to tell anyone that there is a wrong way to quit. As long as you quit I don’t really care how you do it.
janis_and_c0, mojo heading your way. I quit cold turkey more than ten years ago.
Good luck!
Well, yes, they do relax you, exactly in the way a dose of heroin relaxes an addict needing a fix.
Nicotine also causes you to be jittery and nervous, but that is relieved when you get your next dose. Over all, a smoker is not more relaxed than a non-smoker, in fact just the opposite.
You can do it!!! YOU CAN!
My grandmother smoked three packs a day and started when she was 12 years old! She smoked for 65 years and was able to quit with the help of a nicotine patch.
I hope you find exactly what helps you to do this. You will feel so much better and save money too!
Chantix worked for me. Two years now, smoke free. I can no longer stand even the slightest whiff of it. Best of luck!
Well, sure–but it’s one thing to *know that objectively *and another entirely to actually *feel *it. As long as it *feels *like the cigarette relaxes you, it’s for all intents and purposes the same thing, at least for someone who’s trying to quit.
When I finally decided I really wanted to quit smoking, it wasn’t really that hard. I used nicorette gum to get over the cravings while breaking the smoking habits I had. You know, smoke when I got up, smoke after eating, smoke with a beer.
I suffered from chronic bronchitis and other irritating issues. The final straw was when I had to have a medical checkup for my credentials to service systems a nuke plant. I had to have a lung air volume test and I had very, very low results.
I decided to quit that day.
Smoke free since 1987.