8 days. No tobacco

I was just doin' the math the other day on when i quit. I think it's been...12 years now? my kid is coming up on 14 and I *think* he was two.... hard to remember. Quit as randomly as I started so....

either way, success is success. good on you. 

Good job!
 

Years ago , my uncle quit cold turkey. He kept hard candy in his shirt pocket where he kept his smokes. He swore it helped to have a substitution. 

In reply to rustybugkiller :

that was the weird thing. I never needed anything. I was just...done. "ok this is over" and that was it. i've heard tell replacement is important, but it never meant much to me. 

In reply to Mndsm :

I'm pretty sure it's a mental switch. For 30 years I quit a dozen times using everything from hard candy to patches with zero success. The longest I made it was 6 months. 

Then I thought I had a heart attack. That flipped the switch instantly. When I quit, I carried a pack of smokes in my shirt pocket for a month and never had the urge to touch them. 

That was 12 years ago. While I still love the smell of tobacco, I don't have that constant urge to smoke. I enjoy a cigar a few times a week but it's like dessert, nice on occasion but not necessary. 

Keep up the good work wvumtnbkr!!

I agree on the mental switch. I tried quitting for years before we decided to have our first child. I was told not to quit while trying because it could cause issues and to wait until after conception. I chose a quit date which happened to coincide with my birthday and also paid for Chantix out of pocket. I think that's how it's spelled. Anyway, the insurance company wouldn't cover the cost so it was like $250 but I figured I spent that plenty on cigarettes over the years. This July it will have been 17 years since I quit. I tried a cigarette once a couple days into quitting but couldn't even finish it. 

I'm glad my children have been raised without a smoking household. Now I KNOW if I were to try smoking again it's basically comitting to starting back up. I can't do it. Not even a cigar after a special event. I just can't do it. Won't do it. Never again. If you can't say never again to it, you aren't ready to quit. It's that simple.

On to the drugs. Without Chantix I'm not certain I could have made it happen. The stuff isn't for everyone and I was only on it for two weeks. I started a small dosage leading up to the quit date, and one week after quitting I stopped. Pretty sure you're supposed to take it a month, but I never needed it again. This isn't to encourage you to take a substance to quit, but it worked for me and I know it's worked for others. I can't stand taking medicine so it took some effort for me to finally talk to a doctor about getting set up. I'm sure there are other options similar to it now and most I think are covered by insurance. It's worth looking into. I wish you the best of luck. Quitting changed my life, I hope you can do it.

Recently my nephew was prescribed chantix.  In short order he stopped smoking and also stopped drinking.

I have never smoked, but I am currently trying to quit sugar and believe me, it is every bit as addicting and harmful. Best of luck to you! 

In reply to pinchvalve (Forum Supporter) :

It's totally doable, but depending on how committed you are to scanning nutrition information for EVERYTHING it might be more difficult than you think. Certain foods have shocking amounts of added sugar. Bread and yogurt are big culprits. That E36 M3 is pernicious! 

I quit virtually all refined sugar about a year and a half ago: No cookies, no sugary cereals, no ice cream, etc. These days I might have a sweet treat a few times a year on special occasions but certainly not on a daily, weekly, or even monthly basis. Sometimes I still crave sweets, though. However, one of the things that takes the place? Aromatic blends of pipe tobacco. I don't smoke all that often -- maybe 2 or 3 times a week, mostly on weekends, and I never inhale -- but it kind of scratches the itch for sweets.

I quit smoking in 2003 after about 10 years of a 1-2 packs a day. My wife (fiancé at the time) also quit smoking at the same time. 

I used the patch and she used Wellbutrin. After we started quitting I still had a full pack of cigarettes. I had 1 cigarette a day in the morning before showering and putting on the patch. Once those were gone I didn't buy any more and haven't bought any since. 

The toughest times in the beginning were when having my morning coffee and driving.

I had an hour commute from Worcester to Canton,MA that required dealing with traffic on the Mass pike and 128. Even though the patch took care of the nicotine cravings, the habit of smoking while driving and sitting in traffic was present.  

Now that I've been helping my dad get through treatment for throat cancer (total laryngectomy), I don't have any desire to start smoking again (or to try vaping), although I still like the smell when I occasionally walk past someone outside on their smoke break. 
 

Edit- TL:DR Congratulations on making it this far with quitting. It's a tough habit to break, but as time goes on it will get easier. Find hobbies to fill the time when you used to smoke, and maybe take short walks to replace smoke breaks. 

Oh man, hang tough!!  I quit decades ago, smoked cigars on occasion because wifey thought you didn't inhale them.  It's hard, like an alcoholic; don't go to your usual haunts etc. 

=~ )  My brother quit, he just quit buying, bummed cigarettes mostly when keggers were involved.

Though it's been decades, medical people still ask if I smoked and when did I quit.  Riding a motorcycle at 70 mph I can tell if the guy ahead of me is smoking, too sensitive maybe.  Hang in there, it's worth it.

That's a great update, man. Im really happy for you.
 

I only smoked here and there in jr high and high school. Happily it never really took. Based on what I keep hearing and seeing from friends tho it sounds a lot like all the other addictions like alcohol, porn, food, whatever - for some ppl it's a habit, for others it's a true, ingrained emotional support system.

For one of the lucky "habit" friends, I remember one day right after he quit we went to the junk yard and he stood by the tools while I looked for the donor car. This was before cell phones. Walking back his way something seemed really off about him. The dude was standing there - bored - doing nothing at all. Most notably, there was no cigarette in his hand.

Poor guy needed a new habit for what to do when he was bored, etc.

pinchvalve (Forum Supporter) said:

I have never smoked, but I am currently trying to quit sugar and believe me, it is every bit as addicting and harmful. Best of luck to you! 

Oh man.  I have just quit sweet tea after drinking it my entire life.  It is tough.  Water is so blahhhh.  

 I never smoked. My dad was such a heavy smoker, I couldn't stand being in the same room with him. At 41, he got a chest scan after having pneumonia off and on. The doc found a dark spot in his lung and he quit on the spot. He smoked cigarettes and cigars, which he inhaled. He started when he was 11. He is now 79 and he doesn't have to use an oxygen tank because he works out several times a week. He rides his bike 50 miles during the week in the warm weather and does stationary bike, rower, and hiking in the forest preserve in the winter. He was like others have said, he could smell someone smoking and it would smell good to him but he would never go back. I know not everyone can just quit on the spot but good on you for trying to quit.