The stopping smoking thread

[SizeZero]

Best advice is what a colleague told me.

Tell yourself, 'I won't have this one, I'll have the next one'. It kills the current craving as your brain is happy you'll have one in 2 and a half mins (or whatever the gap is between cravings), but like tomorrow the next one never comes.

Also, as a smoking cessation lady told me,

'There is no such thing as a nicotine level so it cannot drop after food'. It's just your brain demanding a fix; remember this is really a battle of wills and you need to treat it as a war. This is also the reason so many ex-smokers become so obnoxiously anti-smoker - they are still fighting a battle.

I quit 3 and a half years ago, and like Brillo and some others tell you, it's a war that never really goes away - there are times you really really want that cigarette

[Solent]

I totally agree that's it's a mindset, a battle of wills, having been an 18 stone, beer drinking smoker, to a 12.5 stone fitness fanatic the craving never goes away; when I have a drink, Wine or expecially a Real Ale its there, niggling away but you have to fight it. We're all better than this weed !!

[Shimano105]

Sas - you are even more narrow-minded than I gave you credit for.

Smoking is a loser's game in that you can't possibly win it. Totally get that, but FFS understand that some people are genuinely hooked on the tulip.

Don't start is obviously the best advice, but if you're hooked then stopping must be hell. I've got total respect for everyone that genuinely wants to quit and they should be encouraged not sneered at.

[vhync]

After smoking for 37 years I've stopped for 9 months using an electronic cigarette. Hooked on that now, but glad to not be smoking anymore. Had only managed a few days when I tried using patches, gum, inhalor etc.

[Bagpuss]

Smokers are weak losers.
Why would a grown adult continue to waste oodles of cash on a smelly, foul and unhealthy habit unless you were a bit weak in the head?

Says the ex-smoker trying to convince himself he doesn't want one


Remember kids:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_CPT...eature=related

[Platypus]

After smoking for 37 years I've stopped for 9 months using an electronic cigarette. Hooked on that now, but glad to not be smoking anymore. Had only managed a few days when I tried using patches, gum, inhalor etc.

Good tip, thanks.

[Pogle]

I smoke for 2 weeks every year - when I'm on holiday.

It drives Mr P insane that I can take it or leave it - I believe my vices lie elsewhere

[OrangeHopper]

Whenever you think of having a cigarette, take a very deep breath as though you were having your first drag.

It does take a very long time until the "cigarette moments" as I call them finally disappear but they do.

"Oh, not thought of having a cigarette for a couple of hours."

"Oh, not thought of having a cigarette for a couple of days."

"Oh, not thought of having a cigarette for a couple of weeks."

One of my finest achievements in life was to finally give up. My only wish now is that I know when I'm just about to die so I can choke one last marlboro.

Good luck to all those that try to give up this new year.

[TykeMerc]

Good luck to all those that try to give up this new year.

Thanks, going to need it.

[RichardCranium]

Something I found necessary: tell all friends, family and colleagues to NEVER ask how I was getting on. It did not feel like "showing a caring interest", it felt more like shoving a serrated blade under a scab and wiggling it about to see if the bleeding has stopped.

Only far more annoying.

My parents (who had both smoked cigarettes before I was born and my father smoked a pipe until I was about 8 or 10) never got the message. "Still not smoking? Quite right too. Too expensive and you should never have started and you ought to know better and you never saw us smoking (yes I did) and nag, nag, nag, nag, nag."

Allen Carr's book was a huge help for ideas and tips, but it was not enough on its own for me. I also got every other book I could find; the others were of no use to me although I could see they would be for some people: you have to stop for your own reasons, not someone else's.

Hypnosis had no effect upon me at all.

The GP was no help ("It's easy. Stop lighting them." Twat.), but I think this must have been just before the NHS decided they would help smokers to quit.

I spent a fortune on Nicorette patches when I could least afford it - and they didn't work for me. It was just feeding the addiction.

I did it cold turkey in the end. I don't think I can ever repay my wife for the amount of tulip I gave her during those first three months. Angry all the time, no patience, smashing things, uncontrollable rages. Not nice to live with. It is the thought of the pain of stopping that has prevented me ever having another cigarette: I am resolved to never have to go through giving up ever again.

(Which is why I get cross when someone says "No, really, you still have one now and again, don't you?". No I stopped and I've stayed stopped. I do miss having the occasional expensive cigar, but that is too big a risk to take so I have gone without them too.)

As for those who criticise people who struggle to give up: you are being unfair. It is not the smoker who does the smoking, it is the nicotine addiction. To use the old cliché, the smoker is just the sucker on the end. Before long, each cigarette is merely topping up the nicotine levels and providing no pleasure or satisfaction; it is instead preventing the onset of the unpleasant withdrawal symptoms. Perhaps only one in a hundred cigarettes actually provides any pleasure and that is brief. That nasty little goblin inside the smoker - the nicotine addiction - takes control of the appetite, the nervous system, pain management, reason, emotion and numerous other bodily systems and uses them to ensure it gets continuously fed. The smoker is just the host to this insidious parasite. The smoker who has to smoke during a heavy cold, the smoker who will spend their last fiver on fags instead of food, who goes out at 3 a.m. trying to find an open petrol station because they cannot find any fags in the house, who will - when told by the doctor to give up smoking or lose their legs / eyesight - light up to think about it. So, provided the smoker is a considerate smoker, take pity on him or her and their nicotine disease. Believe it or not, they really do know far better than non-smokers what the costs, hazards and inconveniences of smoking are: they live with them every day.

(Mind you, any inconsiderate smokers you come across can be kicked in the gonads for giving the considerate ones a bad name.)

So if you know someone who is giving up, do not ask them how it is going. If you must say something, ask if their sense of smell is coming back (takes a week or so), if their sense of taste is coming back (takes a few weeks), if they have coughed up much muck yet (seems to happen somewhere between 2 weeks and 6 months but was 2 years before I did). Suggest they accompany you to the kitchen to make the tea "You normally go and have a break right now, so stop what you're doing and have a screen break. I've noticed you are at risk of working without a break and you are not used to that. So come and carry some mugs for me." Offer to go for a walk at lunch time (or the gym or cycling if they are interested) - basically provide some distraction to get them through lunch times.

But never mention "tobacco", "cigarettes", "withdrawal", "addiction" or say stupid things like "I think you're doing so well" or "It must be so hard" or "Is it very difficult?" unless you want them to smack you in the mouth and go out and buy some fags.