Is Chewin Cheatin
on 07/26/2012 at 02:06 PM
Actually Drew, You CAN!
I started when I was 13 and it was unfiltered Lucky Strikes. Loved them. But things caught up to me when I was 49. Finally quit. Took some months but I was really determined. I was also angry and that helped some.
I’d buy a pack and smoke one and then throw the pack away before I could chain smoke any more.
I recall a time I’d go out in the middle of the night to an all night market if needs be.
But once I was determined I wasn’t gonna let it beat me, things began to fall into place.
I guess different ppl react differently.
The urge doesn’t leave and even now, when outside if I pass someone smoking, the cigarette smoke kinda smells nice if it’s just a quick whiff. But there isn’t any desire to start again. Of course, as I once mentioned to you, I have a very mild form of Emphysema. It won’t get worse unless I start again, and dying by suffocation is not exactly my idea of a great exit. Neither is a bladder tumor and I do worry from time to time about it’s return.Anyway .... keep at it. And if you can manage cold turkey, that might be quicker but you could check with a doctor first.
I think I’m doing cold turkey now ... just wondering if cold turkey with a slice of bacon and some mayo on the side still counts…
GeekWithA.45 had to go through this. He swore by Champix. After experiencing how it worked, he declared it a modern pharmaceutical miracle. Unlike most of the other products which provide a dose of nicotine via an alternate method; perpetuating the craving, Champix blocks the craving at the neuro-receptor level in the brain.
He said it was bizarre once the stuff had built up to full strength in his system. He wasn’t craving the cigarettes anymore. He also tried an experiment a few weeks in: He tried a cigarette even though he wasn’t craving it; said it tasted awful, and he had no desire to continue smoking it, so he didn’t.
Might be worth having a conversation with the MD about this stuff. If it works for you, well, good.
Since you want to quit, I wish you huge success in doing so, however you get there.
Tiger [ Who still occasionally smokes cigars, but that’s all, and only rarely. ]
occasionally smoke but only rarely.
Tiger,
Reminds me of an old family joke that wasn’t meant to be a joke at the start.Going back to my ancient boyhood, I recall my granddad was having chest pains and mom insisted he see a doctor. So he did.
When my mother asked him what the doc had to say, my grandfather said that the doc told him he should stop smoking but that if he really had to have a cigarette, to only smoke Raleighs.
A brand my mom used to smoke herself.
Well, she was surprised and disconcerted and called our doctor and wanted to know how he could recommend smoking to an older man with chest pains. How could go so far as to recommend a brand. Doctor denied doing that and told her he said that grandfather should only smoke rarely if he wanted to.
My grandfather didn’t usually have too much trouble with English but being an immigrant whose first language was Romanian, followed by two other languages, I can see how rarely became Raleighs. It became a family joke after that.Peiper: *laughs* Good story, thank you!
It occurs to me that the story, all true, took place in the 1950s and long before all the stories about cancer and cigs.
I started at 16 and smoked about 15 a day till I got into a high pressure marketing job in the 1980’s. My consumption jumped to almost 20 and my company then allowed smoking at you desk. The office often resembled the “tear-gas chamber” I went through at boot camp. That’s when a carton of 200 was $2 (2 bucks)
I retired early and as luck would have it I became a daddy at 53. I immediately stopped smoking in the house because of the baby. Then when my daughter was about 6-months I thought to myself: Don’t matter if I smoke out doors, when she gets old enough shell associate me and the cigs. BANG, through the pack away and never looked back. That was almost 18 years ago. Today if I enter a house where someone is smoking I have to leave or I can’t breathe.
I do have a collection of about 40 fine pipes. About half were never smoked. Most are Dublin made Kapp & Peterson briars and Meerschaums (about 20 or 25) but I have some English Dunhills, 2 JHW (Jack H. Weinberger, West Caldwell, NJ), an Italian Savinelli and numerous others.
They’re packed away in the back of a closet, each in its individual silk or cloth “sock”.
Some day, when my ashes are in an urn on the mantel my daughter will discover them and put ‘em up on Ebay.
I just quit when the smoke itself started bothering me - but I was never a big smoker and had quit while pregnant (5 times) and for about 6 years once, so it was coming. I wish the hubby would quit (he’s smoking a pipe) but we have an agreement - I only nag one day a year. Last cheap cigs I smoked were Grown Peoples Cigarettes (GPCs)it’s what my son called them.
I remember returning home to the States from Germany (1983) - and being shocked at the price of cigs - it was the beginning of the end for me (I’m cheap).
I also walked away cold turkey from the alcohol (1985) - but discovered I had an addiction problem finally broke it when I walked away from sodas (2010) now I rarely even eat sugared items.
But it is hard to break away from these things - as stress is now taking it’s toll on me - and I have nothing to ease it away or just plain kill it outright.
One of our other readers, a friend of Bill W., once wrote me privately about beating addiction. I seem to recall he said it wasn’t always just one day at a time; sometimes it was an hour at a time, or even every minute.
So far today it’s going Ok, though I was awake for a bit in the middle of the night and had to mouth my stoogie for a short while.
I got most of my addictions under control,
cept for one,
I still can’t kick my daily colonic irrigation using warm Bourbon.
Just quit Drew. I did it that way ,no pills,patches or ice cream and Im a weak SOB if there ever was one.Over 2 years now.And I never went to college either.Or church come to think of it.Hmm, according to all the info out there I should be smoking and drinking myself to death with verve and vigor. Oh well, Fuck them.
Oh, one more thing. I still have that last NEW pack in the fridge but that was just motivation too.If you want it I can send it to you,kinda like a good luck,fuck you tobacco charm.
Well, so far so good. I’m on the 4th day of mouthing my 14 yr old Arturo Fuente 8-5-8 Flor Fina cigar “binky”. At about 3/4” per day, I’ve probably got a whole week left on this one. It might be cheating, but this is the first time I’ve ever even tried to quit, and I’ve smoked for nearly 40 years. So I’ll inhale the tobacco flavor through it, and get a little nettle sensation under the end of my tongue, then I’ll put the 858 down for a few hours until the next craving comes that I can’t beat. Sometimes just smelling it is enough.
I made up a big batch of dark chocolate chip cookies, made with high end vanilla, real butter, extra fine chopped walnuts, and half demerara sugar subbed for half the white sugar ... in other words they’re outstanding. I was going to eat them, but I put them aside. Then I was going to wrap up small plates full, and trade them to the neighbor ladies for cigs. Just half of one, or a whole one. And then I beat that plan too. My evil fiendish sneaky brain.
When do the cravings lessen? They seem to be getting worse every day.
And I’m out of gin too. Grrr.
NJY - doesn’t that really sting? And I hope you’re using the cheap stuff.
Drew, try this and see. Everyone is different and so perhaps it isn’t for you.
Generally, a cigarette craving will only last three minutes altho it seems 3 hours at times.
Time it and see if that’s your case. In my case, when the craving came on, I stopped whatever I was doing and walked around the house or made a tea or milkshake or whatever took up time. The next craving came a half hour later but after time the time between cravings grew longer.
Something the wife read that she had me do that helped as well. Has to do with habits.
Like moving the chair you might usually use when smoking. I used to come home and after dinner the usual habit was to kick off the shoes and stretch out on the sofa and turn on the TV, and light up. Like clockwork, every evening. So we followed the article she found in a magazine and moved the sofa. Didn’t look as nice in new position but we were trying to break the habit. Eventually moved off the sofa to another chair. Took phone calls from another phone in the house instead of the habit I had of always using the same chair and phone table and cigarette. We tried to break up the routines that always had a smoke attached to it.
I managed to break a 48 year old habit and addiction.
07/26/2012 at 02:53 PM
07/26/2012 at 06:29 PM
07/27/2012 at 08:39 AM
