Posted on 10/01/2015 5:50:17 AM PDT by Kaslin
I smoked for 50 years. My parents smoked, hell...the whole world smoked then. Sunday drives to gramma’s house, me and my sisters in the back seat while mom and dad flicked ashes out the vent windows of daddy’s Galaxy. Fast forward to 2014, I go to Sheetz every week and plunk down $35 (Virginia prices) for another carton of Pall Mall Light (Lights..yea right). Last December 18th, I was fighting a bad cold. I had gone to the menthols, the usual method of smoking while you have a chest cold. I started coughing, and then had that moment that must be what it feels like to drown. I couldn’t breathe, the docs said my lungs started to spasm. I was able to get to the phone and dial 911 and croak out the words, “trouble breathing....” After four days in ICU I finally got the hint. Have quit 9 months and counting...and yes I still have a crave now and then. Probably always will. But of all the ways I may die, flopping around on the kitchen floor like a fish out of water is one of the least attractive. Trust me on that one. Plus there is the added bonus of flipping off the tax man.
Vaping got me off cigarettes easily and I can do it in hotel rooms and airports and any other place where smoking is verboten - it’s not smoking!
The people who want ban or restrict these e-cigs are murderers, period. Their motive, less tobacco tax revenue or rank stupidly.
I seriously want to punch them all in the balls/ovaries. E-cigs don’t kill and they don’t stink up my air like noxious cigarettes do, great invention. I’m happy to say my stupid little brother got off the death sticks thanks to them.
Tried the gum in the early 80s. Didn’t work — for me.
Tried the patch in the mid 90s. Didn’t work — for me.
Finally puffed my last in January 2003, finished off the half pack, and never bought another.
One big factor was the constant increases in taxes/price.
I quit for one whole day in 1979,
I quit for another whole day in 1985.
I quit for good in early 2003. I found my hard cravings happened 3 times per day. The actual craving lasted less than 20 seconds. If I would outlast that (which I did), I could get through.
A whole day. Then, a week. A whole month. The cravings subsided to almost non-existant. Then, about about 6 months later, I started having hard cravings again. They did follow the same pattern — 3x per day for about 20 seconds. I lasted through them. After about a month, I didn’t have the cravings anymore.
I sometimes reminisce when I see a smoker on TV, but I have a philosophy:
A puff leads to a cig which leads to two cigs which lead to a pack which leads to a carton which leads to a habit.
I will start my 13th year in January. Whenever I want to upgrade computers or get a splurge item, I say I can afford it out of the money I have saved from cigs. At current prices, that is around $3,000 per year that would have otherwise gone up in smoke.
It can be done!
After smoking for 25 years, I quit cold turkey 20 years ago. IMHO it is the only way to do it. Replacing one habit with another is just a waste of time.
I also quit drinking 19 years ago but that took 2 months in intensive care. lol
Bravo for your bro!
Yep. Like always, follow the dollar$...
The State harassing and punishing people who have quit using tobacco is sick. We know liberals are not in this sin tax nonsense because they stand on some high moral ground or love human life and want to protect it. That is not their thing. Taxing, bullying and shaming people - that is their thing.
Oops - thought it said, “On being a QUILTER” “;^<
It is amazing. I LOVED smoking Marlboros. Never realized how much they were limiting my life.
I am not saying that I never smoked. I did try it and after a while I noticed that I did not enjoy it. So I smoked less and less. The thing that helped me was that I never learned to inhale. One time though I tried to and after I took the first inhale it went like cough, cough. I took the cigarette out of my mouth saying to my self 'I don't need this'. I tore the cigarette up and threw the the pack away and that was in the mid seventies when we were stationed at Fort Riley, KS
Good on you. Just don’t fall back. One thing that could help you is to think abut the ugly smell of your clothes because of the stinking cigarette smoke.
I didn’t know Derek Hunter is a Freeper. LOL
It looks to me like you are way of the subject.
Breath mints come by caliber?
Congratulations to your daughter. Just help her to stick with it.
Sorry, dear, don’t know what you mean.
Did I post to the wrong person? I meant I was afraid you would quit FR.
Pardon, but you did not use vaping to quit. You used vaping as a substitute for smoking. The liquid used in vaping contains nicotine just like cigarette smoke. And it's the nicotine that is addictive.
Speaking as an recovering-smoker (quit in 1999 and still want a cigarette every day), there is only one way to quit smoking: quit smoking.
Gum, patches, prescription medicine, etc. are just substitutes for smoking.
Of course someone has to have the will to stop smoking. Without the will nothing will help
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