Do you still smoke?

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2

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  • ElegantSlenderChic
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    My sons kept giving me lectures, hiding my lighter and getting emotional about cancer and my dying and leaving them alone (I split up with their father in March so this was a real concern for them) I woke up one morning four months ago smoked my last cigarette from my last pack and I have not looked back. I did gain 4lbs from the subsequent candy habit but I kicked that too and I am so proud of me.:smile:

    When the time is right and your mind is made up quitting will come naturally. Good luck:flowerforyou:

    ps...I am so intolerant of smokers now :laugh: and I had to change my curtains, bedding, cushions etc becasue I can't stand the smell of stale cigarette smoke....
  • vniemo2
    vniemo2 Posts: 25 Member
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    I quit using a E-Cig 4 months ago. I smoked 2 to 3 packs a day.. My next step is to wean myself off of nicotine completely.
  • Spiderkeys
    Spiderkeys Posts: 338 Member
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    My opinion is quit smoking is a lot harder than dieting, I'm a smoker, I did quit, but I felt I needed to start again, as the myth goes, that smoking speeds up your metabolism.
  • brownbeauty2013
    brownbeauty2013 Posts: 50 Member
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    I do. I would like to quit as I know it is bad for me but it is hard. I still work out hard, run on the treadmill, pump weights but long term I know I need to kick the habit. I'm working on losing the weight and I may try quitting alittle later. It is easier said than done, never really gave it try!!
  • _Resolve_
    _Resolve_ Posts: 735 Member
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    Quit 2 years ago, if you need motivation Google respiratory arrest.
  • MrJThomasEsq
    MrJThomasEsq Posts: 141 Member
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    I quit 12 years ago after having smoked for 17 years. I finally quit by buying a pack of More brand cigs. They are some really harsh brown ones that taste like a cigar that has been dipped in cat uring and left to dry our in the sun for a few years. NASTY! Then whenever i had the urge for nicotine I would only let myslelf have on of those. I think I made it half way through the pack and never more than 4 or 5 puffs per cig and I was done. I still get cravings sometimes though, but I get cravings for alot of things LOL.
  • loriq41
    loriq41 Posts: 479 Member
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    Yah unfortunately but I think it would be too hard to quit eating like I was and to give up my guilty pleasure. Plus, I feel so much better emotionally than I did a year ago and I am honestly afraid to quit as I really am scared of how I will react emotionally...that feeling and the denial of something I love seems to hard a mountain to climb at this time. I know I need to..just not quite there yet.
  • KANGOOJUMPS
    KANGOOJUMPS Posts: 6,472 Member
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    I quit, but was a smoker.
  • loriq41
    loriq41 Posts: 479 Member
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    This coming Tuesday is my two year quit date. I quit by taking Chantix. I probably would not recommend it, though it made quitting very easy.
    The side effects were hell, but I quit.
    I second not using Chantix...especially if you have ANY mental health issues..my hubby tried Chantix and when I tell you he turned into the BIGGEST a-hole on the face of the earth that is an understatement..you could walk by him wrong and he would flip out. I ended up taking it away from him and tossing them..I told him it was either that or divorce..no joke, that stuff is really bad for alot of people.
  • patrickblo13
    patrickblo13 Posts: 831 Member
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    This coming Tuesday is my two year quit date. I quit by taking Chantix. I probably would not recommend it, though it made quitting very easy.
    The side effects were hell, but I quit.

    My wife used Chantix and she said the side effects were awful. She was having crazy dreams at night and couldn't sleep
  • KateK8LoseW8
    KateK8LoseW8 Posts: 824 Member
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    I switched to an e-cig a bit over a year ago with zero effort required on my part. I'm still addicted to nicotine, but eh. No lung problems.
  • tm82001
    tm82001 Posts: 133 Member
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    I quit 23 years ago and am so thankful. I smoked for 8 years and it was FRICKIN' hard to stop. I white-knuckled it and went cold turkey, but the power of the cig is a beast and my desire for a smoke was strong for an additional 10 years (although I never cheated and had one!). Good luck to you...please quit.
  • ValerieMartini2Olives
    ValerieMartini2Olives Posts: 3,041 Member
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    I was weening myself off. Then I just quit. I hated the way I smelled, the way my mouth tasted, and how I couldn't breathe when I rode my bike. Been smoke free for a year and a half.
  • WendyTerry420
    WendyTerry420 Posts: 13,274 Member
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    I've been smoking since I was 18.
  • WendyTerry420
    WendyTerry420 Posts: 13,274 Member
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    I stopped smoking 9 years ago because I couldn't afford $70 a carton anymore. I still want to smoke and have to be dragged away from people outside on their breaks who are smoking.

    I don't feel it makes you a bad person or your should be down on yourself for smoking. :heart:

    $70 a carton? Wow! We roll our own. Bulk tobacco is only about $13 and makes about 2 1/2 to 3 cartons.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,874 Member
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    I quite on Sept 25, 2012...it was the first thing I did in my quest for a lifestyle of "good livin'. I actually used an e-cig to help me quit...I basically picked up an e-cig and told myself I would never smoke a traditional cigarette ever again. From there, I mapped out a plan that would slowly reduce my nicotine intake over time...over the course of 12 months I went from the highest dose available to zero nicotine and as of Sept 25, 2013 I no longer use the e-cig either and am completely independent of nicotine, cigarettes, the e-cig, etc. It's pretty awesome.

    For me, it was not something I could just do cold turkey...I've tried a million times. For me, I had to go through this very lengthy process...for me, it was about "harm reduction" first and then working my way towards full independence. The best part though was that with the e-cig, I kind of felt like I was still smoking...but it was just water vapor...so my lungs started to clear up right away and within just a few weeks I was feeling much better than I had in years...within a couple of months I was exercising again.

    I was a 2-3 PAD smoker for the last 5 years or so...in total I smoked at least 1 PAD for about 20 years.

    The way I look at it is that the road to health and wellness is a long one, but you have to start somewhere. Last year is was getting off the cigs and getting my diet in order and exercising and just basically fixing a bunch of bad blood work and getting my fitness back. With that accomplished, I will continue onwards...but this year I'm tackling my drinking. I'm not an alcoholic, but I am an abuser of alcohol and drink far too heavily, far too often for what I'd call "good livin". I just joined a group called Moderation Management to help me moderate my intake and help me make alcohol a healthy part of my lifestyle or not. I begin next month with what is called "the 30"...abstinence for 30 days and then there are a number of other steps which include keeping a diary, etc. Ultimately it is designed to either moderate intake or identify whether I just need to quit altogether if I am unable to moderate...should be a good program and will take me the better part of 2014.
  • richardheath
    richardheath Posts: 1,276 Member
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    I quit about 16 years ago when I got engaged, then started again 3 years ago when I got divorced. "That'll show her!" I must have been (not) thinking!

    I quit for 3 months over the summer using Chantix. I too had the bad dreams, sleeplessness, so I stopped taking it, and a month later started smoking again. I got an e-gig about 3 weeks ago and have been using that exclusively ever since. I'm on the 18 mg nicotine now (equivalent to a pack a day) and plan to try to reduce down to the 12 in the spring, then phase it out totally.
  • RunForChai
    RunForChai Posts: 238 Member
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    Watching two youngish friends die of lung cancer....that's painful. Both smokers who tried many times to quit and used every rationale in the book for not quitting.
    I don't smoke and never have, I have tremendous sympathy for those who do---but hope that you keep trying to quit.
    They say it take 5-10 serious attempts to really quit.
    Good luck.
  • emilychristinet
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    I was at a pack every two days, then I was at a pack a week (since my budget is set every week, it was an excuse for me to smoke less) and about 2 months ago, I lost the urge to smoke. That week, I didn't buy a pack and never bought one again. Don't know how it happened. Unfortunately, it made me really lazy since a didn't smoke inside and liked to go out for walks when I smoked. Now that I know I'm done smoking for good, I'm trying to get bad to old GOOD habits. Good luck to all the smokers out there who are trying to quit. It's hard, but when you feel you are ready, it's far from impossible.
  • Rosyone
    Rosyone Posts: 74 Member
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    I quit in December, 08. What I did was scatter a box of nicotine patches around all the places where I knew I'd be during the day - in my desk at work, under the keyboard of my home computer, in the car, and so on - so that I'd have the comfort of knowing that nicotine was always within easy reach if I really REALLY needed a fix. I quit cold turkey, as I never actually used any of the patches in the way they were intended. I just used them to fight off the urge to acquire more cigarettes long enough to break the addiction, sort of the way garlic is used to fight off vampires. Eventually I passed the still unopened patches along to a friend who used them the same way.

    It took me about a year to get through all of the major and minor triggering events when I would have smoked before. The last bad one was on a hot Saturday that summer when I was worn out and sweaty from a day of yard work. I came in for a cold beer and... And what? I was used to having a smoke at such times, and I wanted it SO bad it felt like someone had jammed his hand through the wall of my chest, grabbed a fist full of bronchial tubes, and given them a hard twist. The feeling soon passed, though, and never again did a nicotine craving involve any sort of real discomfort. I still think about cigs occasionally but I don't want them anymore. It's just something I used to do.