Well, I downloaded the QuitTime thing and started it up at 12 noon today. I’m not making any promises, but we’ll see what happens. As David Simmons put it, I’m just not having the next one. Good luck to all, and thanks for starting the thread.
I smoked for over 20 years and if I can quit, so can you!
Cigarette free since 00:00 1-1-2000
5 years, 1 month, 3 days and counting!
I bought a motorcycle with my cigarette money (It’s almost paid off :))
I figure it’s less of a risk to my health.
You Are Worth It!!!
Congrats, indecisive1! This thread has been an inspiration for me too. And everyone else, you’re doing great!!! Hang in there, Ultraviolet, you’ll make it.
As for me: sigh
Those first few days on the Wellbutrin were horrible. I didn’t think I was going to be able to stick with it. I felt, well, quite odd. Sleep screwed up, took a significant dip in mood, and felt physically not right. Then it evened out some. Now, I’m starting to feel what I was supposed to be feeling. The urge to smoke really is fading away. Amazing!
Ran out of smokes three days before my Official Quit Date (which is today, BTW) and thought, well, I’m close enough, may as well quit now. That lasted almost a day and then I bought a pack. That lasted about a day and then I ran out the next day. That was the last pack I bought. Smoked one of my friend’s nasty Camels last night and that did me until I got home. Then I did something really horrifying.
I rummaged through the trash can for butts. Found a lot of partially smoked cigs, too. I feel ashamed, but I’m glad I do. One day, I’ll look back and tsk, tsk about the depths to which I would sink for a smoke. It reinforced the fact that I am going to quit. Fucking cigarettes. So, the butts (about a puff from each) have gotten me through the day. The hardest part: sitting at my computer and not chain-smoking. A favorite customer of mine gave me a goddawful Winston tonight to get me through the night. I realized that I haven’t once had the urge to go buy a pack though. And sometimes I even find that I’ve completely forgotten about smoking.
I’m getting there. But I can’t decide when or if I’ve already quit. I’m still smoking, but not even close to what I usually do. Including the one-hit butts, I’ve maybe had a total of 3 and half or 4 cigs in the last two days. That’s something! Down from 15-20/day.
I’m happy. It’s working and I’m not all panicky about it. I’m still upbeat and that is something that would not be happening without the Wellbutrin. Praise pharmaceuticals! Hallelujah!
Keep up the (mostly) good work, y’all!
Cinnamon Girl, did you make good on your threat to buy the Allen Carr book? If so, what happened? 
What am I - your mother?
Well, I bought the book with another one. I started reading The Success Principles by Jack Canfield, but I haven’t gotten to the Carr book. I guess I was afraid I was going to be disappointed from all the hype over it. But then again there’s yet another who said it helped. Note to self: Must start reading it tonight at bedtime.
No cigarettes today. Ran out of butts last night. Feeling a little needy right now, though.
Way back in nineteen and 41 My folks and I went out to my uncle’s farm on Armistice Day, which was a Friday. The folks went home and I stayed intending to come in to town on Saturday with my uncle. During the night one of the worst blizzards in years came in and we were snowed in for 4 DAYS!
I had about a half pack of cigarettes, my uncle had a can of pipe tobacco and my cousin had some cigarettes. We all smoked. We also got down to smoking butts. And we tried rolling the pipe tobacco in newspaper which turned out to be unbearable.
Being addicted to tobacco was such fun!
Bump - how’s everybody doing?
Tough day for me today; for some odd reason, some of my cravings have returned and I really want one. I won’t have one, as I can’t even stand the smell of other smokers now (did I really smell that bad? ew…) much less the smell of cigarettes, but the want is still there.
1m 1w 6d 05:35 smoke-free, 886 cigs not smoked, £221.50 saved, 3d 01:50 life saved
I’ve been dealing with my cravings very differently this time (Oh, yeah. This is like my tenth quit. Raise your hands out there if you can say, “I’m very good at quitting. I do it all the time!”), and I believe it’s made all the difference.
When a craving hits (and 6 weeks into it, I still get them occassionally) I say to myself, “I am having a craving. Hmm. What’s really going on?”
And then when I think about it, I realize that I’m bored. Or I’m angry. Or I’m frazzled at work and I need to walk away from it for 10 minutes. Or I’m tired of “office courtesy” and I wanna go be a rebel, man!
It’s always something emotional going on that I want to deal with/avoid with cigarettes. In six weeks there have been two times that I was just so overwhelmed that I chose to deal with my emotions by smoking. Oddly, the situations that caused me to be so unhappy didn’t just blow away like so much smoke… “Huh,” I thought to myself, “So smoking really didn’t seem to help. Guess I’m gonna just have to deal with it.”
Plus at this stage smoking a cigarette just makes me physically ill. Much worse feeling than any craving. That nausea/headache combo lasts a lot longer than a silly craving! 
God bless Doublemint gum! When I’ve had it at the end of the work day, aggressively chewing a stick of gum works wonders!
1M
2W
1D
Cigarettes not smoked: 465
Amount saved: $124.26
Life saved: 1D 14h 50m
Still moving along pretty nicely. There’ve been some very bad moments (moreso recently, for some reason), but they pass by quickly enough.
Time Smoke-Free: 45 days, 9 hours, 10 minutes and 19 seconds
Cigarettes NOT smoked: 1135
Lifetime Saved: 8 days, 16 hours
Money Saved: $309.38
Just quit, had my last one a 8:00pm yesterday. I hope I can quit for good this time. It’s odd that I would find this thread this morning. 
11:09 smoke-free, 2 cigs not smoked, $0.55 saved, 0:10 life saved
I’m still smoke-free! I came off the patches last Saturday and of course I got monkey-stomped at work that night but I didn’t kill anyone and no one killed me so I guess we can call that a success! I wasn’t expecting the cravings to come back quite so bad when I came off the patch, but by now I’ve been not smoking for so long I don’t want to ruin it. So I suck a Blo-Pop instead.
And, of course, our landlord has let some chain-smoking buddy of his crash in the office space downstairs. :smack: I never realized how much that stuff stinks.
VenusProbe, hang in there! I smoked for over 20 years - started when I was 10 - and I didn’t think I’d ever manage to quit. I think I mentioned earlier in this thread about having to dispatch an ambulance out to a COPD patient on oxygen who was still so hooked on those damn cancer sticks that he just had to have one, and he set his face and hands on fire because he forgot to turn his tank off. I decided I didn’t want that to be me in 30 years.
And oh, WOW, the things that have come back to me! I can walk up the stairs at work now without getting winded, or practice my bellydance for a whole hour without it making my breath feel like ice-cold knives jabbing down my throat. And food tastes so much better now! My new obsession is trying to brew the perfect pitcher of iced tea; I go through about 2 quarts of that stuff a day now, because it’s so yummy. It used to just taste like slightly flavored water to me. My whitening toothpaste has finally been able to make some headway. I don’t wake up every morning coughing up lung goobers, my tongue tasting like R.J. Reynolds took a dump in my mouth.
I still have that one cigarette in my dresser drawer, the one I put away when I quit. I’m trying to think of something symbolic or goofy (or symbolically goofy, or goofily symbolic, or just plain weird) to do with it.
I guess I get the joy of continuous bumping of this thread… still smoke free!
I even survived a weekend in Vilnius, Lithuania, where EVERYONE SMOKES without having one, although I really wanted one out clubbing!
1m 3w 4d 02:02 smoke-free, 1,122 cigs not smoked, £280.50 saved, 3d 21:30 life saved
The smokes are probably dirt cheap there, too. I quit over two years ago and the times I really still want to smoke are when I’m in Eastern Europe, where everyone smokes and where a carton of 200 cigarettes costs less than 40 would cost me here in Ireland.
Way to go, GomiBoy! I’m still smoke-free, too. I was worried I was going to slip up last night; I spent the night at my best friend’s house, and she and her husband both smoke like chimneys. But I didn’t want one! Oh yeah, who’s gonna be your bitch now, Brown and Williamson?
I did have to take a shower and wash my coat and my clothes as soon as I got home this morning, though. Did I really used to smell like that? Bleh.
Hey, congrats to all of you as well!
To be perfectly honest, that is one of the major things keeping me smoke free. I smell the poor junkies coming in out of the cold from their smoke breaks and it’s so bad it almost makes my eyes water…
Glad to hear everyone’s still hanging in there.
It’s been 1 month, 3 weeks and 6 days for me
699 Cigarettes not smoked
$131.06 saved
2 days and 10:06 of life saved.
I only get cravings when I’m drunk and even then I have to be falling down shitfaced drunk which doesn’t happen all that often.
I’ve gained about 7 lbs however and my husband who quit at the same time is up about 15 lbs.
So as of this week we feel like we’re ready to tackle our next lifestyle challenge and start eating less. We already exercise but we’re going to try and make that more consistent. I’m going to quit drinking for a while and see if it helps me shift some of this weight. I’ve gotten into the habit of having a little wine every day and I really don’t want to be a daily drinker.
Marlitharn and gomiboy congrats on hanging in there during a tough situation. Woohoo!
Looks like I am just one lucky bastard; I don’t think I’ve even put on any weight… of course I put on a bit every winter (I call it my winter insulation) so it’s hard to tell…
Keep up the good work, everyone!
I am bringing this thread back because I just quit two days ago and searching for threads and other’s stories about quitting keeps me from going outside and smoking. I smoked about a 15 cigs/day.
I wanted to quit (or at least I thought I wanted to quit) for a while, but it clicked when I was at a concert on Monday. I ran out of smokes right after it started and a pack at the club was too expensive, so I deceided not to buy any until the way home, then I deceided not to get any until the next day because I was tired. Then I decieded to see if I could make it the day…and I did. So I haven’t "officially"quit, nor have I told anyone, but I think I am going to make it this time. It has been almost 48 hours and I am doing pretty good. The test will be the first non-smoking gig with the band, but that’s not for about 2 weeks, so I should be OK.
I do have some flu like symptoms going on, and I had a headache this morning, but some advil took care of that. I also just bought a house that we close on in about 3 weeks, so that should keep me occupied.
Good luck to all. And this thread has helped me confirm my decision to finally quit.
slu, this seems like the most worthy thread bounce I’ve seen in a long time.
Over 8 months for me (not sure what it is to the minute ). I quit by using Nicorette when needed for the first two weeks (about 4 pieces a day). 10 cig/day habit, around 2400 cigs not smoked so far, and I’m very glad I quit. I quit mainly because I have two young daughters, and although I never smoked indoors or around them when they were outside, they’re both smart kids, and the oldest was starting to get curious about what Daddy did on the porch every couple hours. Plus, my wife doesn’t smoke, and she was tired of the constant smell, the overflowing ashtrays on the porch, and the $60/month expense.
It’s been rough at times - I’m in technology sales, and we have our share of smokers in the office, plus it’s a very stressful job. In fact, I still have dreams where I’ll light up, and wake up feeling guilty, while at the same time jonesing for a smoke.
But it’s worth it, for the knownledge that I was able to kick that monkey off my back. Every day that goes by, I feel a bit more in control of my life, and I take solace in the knowledge that I’m not signing over part of my paycheck to Big Tobacco.
To all those who are quitting, stick with it. Don’t use weight gain, or peer pressure, or old habits like smoking while drinking (or after dinner, or before bed), as an excuse to start up again. I think the only “reason” to relapse with even a hint of validity is stress, and frankly, I’ve got no recommendation to counteract that - I’ve come a hair’s breadth form lighting up again during very stressful times, and I very well may have if it weren’t for the fact that my wife would’ve thrown a coniption fit, and probably kicked me out. When the urge hits, just grit your teeth, ball your fists, and wait it out while trying not to completely alienate and insult your loved ones.
Good luck, and most importantly, good health.