# Smokers: What are tobacco cravings like?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smokers-what-are-tobacco-cravings-like/612941>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [February 15, 2012, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smokers-what-are-tobacco-cravings-like/612941 "2012-02-15T17:29:14Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![River\_Hippie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/river_hippie/32/26_2.png) [@River\_Hippie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/River_Hippie)\
**Post date:** [February 18, 2012, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smokers-what-are-tobacco-cravings-like/612941/21 "2012-02-18T01:23:45Z")

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I too experienced it like a thirst or hunger that intrudes on your thinking more and more the longer you’re deprived.

And the longer you resist, the better it is when you surrender.

Longer term, the point my quitting attempts usually failed is at the point you start to forget how much smoking sucks and only remember the good parts. At my heaviest smoking I was truly enjoying maybe 5 out of every 20 cigarettes I smoked. The rest were just to satisfy the cravings. After quitting for a while I would only remember the 5 good ones.

Been clean over two years now.

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**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\
**Post date:** [February 18, 2012, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/smokers-what-are-tobacco-cravings-like/612941/22 "2012-02-18T22:36:19Z")

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> [@SaharaTea](#):
>
> That’s exactly what cravings are like, except that regular smokers have a lot more triggers than just drinking - driving in the car, drinking your morning cup of joe, taking a break at work, etc.
> 
> I recommend having a couple stiff drinks and seeing how long you can go without a cigarette. You will most likely feel the same emptiness and distraction that a lot of regular smokers feel when they can’t have one.

I would be willing to bet that bldysabba couldn’t go a month with drinking and not smoking.

It is amazing how much difficulty my friends who were “non-addicted” smokers had trying to stop after I successively quit cold turkey.

I am not claiming this to be true in every case but a few actually drank more during the week because they “only smoke when they drink”

My own withdrawal, assuming I was trying to quit felt like anxiety. It would build to almost panic level and it felt like it would go on forever the harder I tried to not buckle.

I had someone point out that it doesn’t last forever and if you just go for a 10 min walk it will be gone. This was probably the most important factor in my ability to finally quit.

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