any piece of advice is welcome, thank you :-3
I’ve been trying to quit for 18 years now. I’ve tried gum, patches, toothpicks, welbutron (or something like that), but this time it’s going a bit better. We switched to cheap disposable vapes (Kadobar was what was near the house) which is totally not ‘quitting’ but when picking a flavor, Pick a bad one. I’ve found I don’t like it, it’s way too sweet and that keeps me from wanting to smoke it too much at a time, but when that need arises (bad meeting, car trouble, bad anxiety) it does deliver nicotine which keeps me from buying a pack.
As a side effect, I went from spending around $400-450/month on cigarettes, to around $
16080/month (my wife went with one she likes, but she’s quit before and I think she could do it anytime).Edit: I’m bad a math
I used chantix back in the day, but it also required me basically not leaving the house for a month to really get there. When and where I quit for the first time (I would later start dating a smoker and relapse, then quit again), smoking was still allowed indoors and I had a huge association with drinking and smoking. Same for certain other places and situations. I basically had to do everything I could to avoid those. It got easier with time.
While I have no personal experience with tobacco addictions, there is an interesting literature review of CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) and MBI (Mindfulness Based Interventions).
I’m going to tell you what worked for me. There’s a very good chance you’ll hate it and I will get flak.
Cold Turkey.
You physically stop yourself from purchasing cigarettes and not ask for them in social situations. You make a line in the sand and never cross that point again.
Honestly, this is it. You have to want it, and you just have to do it. You’ll feel “sick” for a while but you just have to muscle that out.
I know it’s easier said than done, but it really is that simple. Just stop.
Cold turkey worked for me. Took me 4 attempts. I wasn’t hard on myself for failure, I noted what happened (emotional trauma, stress, alcohol) and prepared myself for the next attempt.
I wanted to quit, so when I relapsed it’s not because I wanted to smoke but because those little cancer stick bastards were trying hardest to kill me. But if they were going to be tough, I could be tougher. I found it easier when I could see the cigs as my enemy.
I did the same and can confirm it worked. First two weeks will be the worst, then it’ll be easier. Just be stuborn and aware that your will is stronger then a habit and that it doesn’t have power over you. The urge to smoke will remain but at that point you need to be aware that even if you’re convinced you want a smoke, it will taste really terrible when you actually do it and you will regret you broke your streak of non-smoking days.
I do confirm that cigarettes taste awful now.
This is also the only thing that worked for me
I quit by switching to vaping and then working the nicotine level down to nothing and then quitting that. Whatever you decide to do I wish you the best of luck (and stick with it!)
Same here. Fuck the naysayers who say cold turkey or nothing. Do what works for you.
For OP: One caveat to the vape plan is you’ll likely need to get a vape that’s refillable so you can customize the nicotine level. Juul/vuse/disposables typically only come in one, or at best, 2 nicotine levels, which prevents effective tapering.
Also, don’t fall into the trap of vaping places you wouldn’t have smoked (e.g. in your house/car). That can increase your nicotine dependency.
Good luck!
If you don’t have the willpower or don’t really want to, you will fail. It’s nearly all willpower.
*Crys in depression which fuels smoking more
Nicotine pouches
I think it depends what your goal is. If you want a less painful quit wheen yourself off it. If you want to be off them ASAP then cold turkey.
I overpressure myself, as if I was constipated, each time I get cravings. I basically make my body as uncomfortable as I can so it learns that cravings=pain.
In the past, I’ve used hand rolled tobacco to ween myself off. It’s a lot harder to just grab a smoke when driving for instance. But cold turkey is best. I usually wait until I get sick before starting stopping since it tends to skip the nasty craving in the first few days. After a week or two, it gets much easier.
Remember, having a smoke every now and then will work until it doesn’t.
You have to want to stop. I smoked 13 years, stopped several times, but the final real stopping was not that hard.
What also worked quite well for me as a crutch were nicotine free cigarettes. I decided I’d smoke as many of those as I wanted. Started with 20 at the first day and it slowly reduced by itself over time, till at one point o completly stopped without even realizing it.
Say what. I feel like I’m addicted to the feeling of smoke being inhaled. Vapes reck me and I can’t stop coughing.
What are these things you speak of
Oh, apparently they are called herbal cigarettes. Consist off some non tobacco leafs. Here in Germany they are sold in pharmacies.
IRL social network is a major factor.
Not a smoker myself, but I can tell you what worked for my brother when he quit in college.
AC went out in his dorm during an August heat wave, and it took forever for them to fix it. He decided that it would be a perfect time to go cold turkey, since he’d be so miserable from the heat that the few days of nicotine withdraw wouldn’t really be comparably bad. And he said it was right, he didn’t think about it during the worst part, and by the time they fixed the AC, he was 90% of the way through the process.
So if you live in one of the parts of the world moving to summer right now, it might be worth a shot.
You already have! Congratulations! That last one, was the last one. Throw away the rest, you’re done.
I had tried multiple times previously, but when I stopped using snus (tobacco in pouches you put under your lip) for good these are things that helped me succeed:
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I actually wanted to quit (this is the most important one. If you just feel like you should quit and don’t actually want to. It’s gonna be really rough).
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I set a deadline for myself. For me, that deadline was during a family vacation so I planned for myself to get through the last box of snus before the vacation was over. I had a single box of snus that was already opened and a week long vacation (a single box used to last me maybe 2 days normally). This made me ration it out so I had a natural decrease in amounts used before I quit.
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I distracted myself from things that would normally make me want to grab a snus. Some were harder to avoid like when having morning coffee or when I had just eaten a large meal, but those could be substituted with chewing gum, breath mints, etc. I had also just recently started dating again at the time, so my daily routine was almost always different from the norm, which made ignoring the cravings a lot simpler.
And honestly, from there it was just staying true to my goal and making sure to be proud of every milestone. Even now, 5 years later, I made sure to be proud of being 5 years clean.
And you will think about it every now and then. Especially in situations where you normally go for a smoke, your brain will occasionally go back to “ahh, shit, a smoke would be nice now”. I still have those moments when I have stressful situations, have been out drinking, or just randomly from time to time.
If you really want to quit, you can do it! I believe in you!
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