I Quit Smoking

I smoked from about the age of 13 till I was 35. Then I quit, cold turkey, and never touched one again; not once.

I did love smoking. I can remember life as a teenager, smoking while fishing, smoking while playing Asteroids. A Marlboro hanging on the end of the foosball table, Toto on the radio. Such a great feeling. I miss it a lot.

I dream about smoking, even now, many years later. I know it's bad, really bad, and I'm grateful that I did stop it. When I wake up from the dreams, I'm regretful that I started up again; then I realize, when the fog of sleep dissipates, that it was a dream.

I think when I get old, I'll start again. Regardless of the nastiness of the thing, and the deleterious effect on health, it's part of my psyche. I'm happy that my kids, all college students at this moment, don't do it.

If you're a smoker, or if you quit, feel free to comment here. I'd like to hear your thoughts.

I quit last July. I'll be 56 this year. I started smoking at 16.

It doesn't bother me too much any more, but I know that one slip and I'll be back to a pack and a half a day over night...

Quitting this time was not that hard. I must have been ready...

Thanks for the opportunity, passed...

Fellow ex smoker...

I started at 7 (yeah, ghetto as hell) and quit many times in my 20s and early 30s only to start up again.

I started vaping three years ago and now, I don't even want a real smoke anymore. I'd rather have my e-liquid.

I guess at some point I will start working on putting the vaporizer down too.

I quit when it got too expensive. The price raise from $.35 to $.45 per pack. Fall of 1969. Never regretted giving it up. And in the long run - glad I never really started!!!

kh54s10 said:

I quit when it got too expensive. The price raise from $.35 to $.45 per pack. Fall of 1969. Never regretted giving it up. And in the long run - glad I never really started!!!

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I remember watching the prices of a pack rise. I told my brother that if the price ever got to $1 pr pack I'd stop. Yea, right. We used to roll our own with a rolling machine and a can of Bugler. Now that was cheap.

I decided to quit when Michigan went no smoking in workplaces and in public. I started smoking at 16 and quit cold turkey I think I was 24. It was 3 or 4 years ago. I figured if I can't smoke at work or at he bar...why bother?

I quit about 6 months or so again. I finally wanted it enough to quit. It feels good. Here in WA a pack cost about 8 bucks. I remember when it cost me 1.50 for a pack.

I grew up in the 60's...... People all around me smoked. I never did. In those days they presumed the "right to smoke", and took offense if you asked them NOT to smoke in your car or your home. I literally lost "friends" over smoking, as it was one thing I would not tolerate in my personal space. I remember letting my girlfriend hold an "encounter group" with a bunch of women in my apartment once.......... One or more of them smoked, and I although I lived there for a couple of years afterward, I could smell it every time I walked in the door. I never made that mistake again! I've met many women I was strongly attracted to who smoked....... That first cigarette is the END.... period.
Times have changed....... No longer is it OK to sit down next to someone and light up, stick your cigarette in an ash tray and allow the smoke to drift into their face. I can't begin to count the number of times that has been done to me in the bar or elsewhere........ It was MY problem. If I didn't like it, I could go somewhere else!! As a result, my sympathy for smokers is virtually nil. I'm sorry for their habit..... for their addiction, so long as they don't make it MY problem! The BIG X is still there, and always will be........ My friends and girlfriends don't smoke...........any of them. That's not to say that I don't have friends who smoke, but none of them are close friends I spend time with. I'm shocked at how many younger adults do smoke.

H.W.

I am three weeks clean. I found e cigs the best for cravings. You don't get the craving for a e cig but they help when u want the real deal


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Started at 13, quit 9 months ago at 60. Sucking lozenges. It helps, but I really want a cigarette. I don't particularly feel better. Have gained weight. Not sure how long I can keep it up. Unexpectedly, I drink less beer now. Seems smoking and drinking feed on each other.
I miss it.

I "stopped" about 2 and a half years ago, cold turkey. I still won't say quit since I have intentions on starting back up again, like you, when I am older. I tell myself if I make it to 80 then why not. I feel like my views might change by then though. I miss the aspects of giving or bumming cig from a friend or stranger at the bar or on the street. I still enjoy the smell of tobacco from cigarettes, pipes, and cigars but know that at this point in my life it is not for me, maybe some day if I make it that far into the future.

I started smoking at 16 and by the early 1990's had been smoking 2 packs of Marlboros a day (or a pipe, or a cigar or dipping snuff) for over 25 years. I decided to try riding a bike to get back into shape and found myself lighting up while riding the bike! (How absurd is that?)

I quit in 1991 thanks to the patches after quitting way more times than I started. Haven't smoked since but have had the cravings off and on forever. I've come to the conclusion that I am a smoker and will always be a smoker. I have just decided not to smoke. I have 4 beautiful grandbabies now and want to see as much of their lives as I can. Smoking cigarettes isn't worth loosing that.

And the pic at the left? That's Sam and his grandpa. Both of them love tractors and trains. How can you replace that?

I smoked at least a pack a day from my early teens until just before my 55th birthday. I smoked my final cigarette on 29 September 2001...and that was the LAST time I quit smoking. I used the Nicorette patches and changed my daily routine as much as I could to avoid those times when I wanted a smoke.

Now, when I'm out riding my motorcycle, I can smell cigarette smoke coming out of car windows! And the aroma of a person entering a building after just finishing a smoke is amazing!

I don't see myself becoming a smoker again, because I really don't want the hassle of quitting again. Of course, death is Mother Nature's way to tell you to slow down!

glenn514

glenn514 said:

Now, when I'm out riding my motorcycle, I can smell cigarette smoke coming out of car windows! And the aroma of a person entering a building after just finishing a smoke is amazing!


glenn514

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Really?? I find cigarette smoke smells disgusting, especially on someone's breath. Pipe or cigar is a little better. Dippers are pigs.. spit wherever!!

I started in 1993 at 17 and smoked until December 2008. In the five years and 4 odd months since I quit, I've not smoked ANYTHING (cigarettes, cigars, weed, etc.) and I don't miss it for one single minute. In fact, the farther away from smoking I get, the more I'm repulsed by it. I hate the price. I hate the smell. I hate the fact every time I go to my in-laws (both smokers) that I come out smelling like an ashtray and have a sore throat. I hate exposing my kids to second hand smoke. The list goes on and on. I used to get sinus infections all the time when I was younger....I haven't had a sinus infection in 4 years.

Now, having said all that, I'm not a torch burner trying to change the world and force my ideas on people. I would never look down on somebody for smoking...I know where they're coming from. One thing to keep in mind: If you quit smoking today, imagine how much more money you will have for malt, hops, yeast, and shiny Blichmann pots.....especially with the price of cigarettes today. Plus, trust me, you'll feel better.

I started smoking at 17, I smoked for 23 years, averaging a pack a day. I also enjoyed cigars & pipes quite a bit. I smoked my last cigarette Dec. 24th 2004. I quit cold turkey, but had an odd break: I had whooping cough & simply could not smoke. I wanted to smoke, I tried to smoke, but every time I took a drag, I'd cough so hard & couldn't breathe, I had to put it down.

Oddly enough, I consider myself lucky to have been so ill. I was not only able to stop smoking initially, I was also able to sleep through the 1st week of withdrawal. Without being so ill, I don't think I could have quit. I did jones pretty hard for a few months, at times I was quite the a$$hole, but I eventually got through it. The main thing that got me through was the knowledge that if I took just 1 drag, I'd be hopelessly hooked again & I would NEVER get a better chance to quit again. Grapefruit & candy also helped a bit. I used to dream that I was smoking & would wake up afraid that I really had been smoking.

I still enjoy the smell of tobacco, I've always loved the smell of tobacco in the walk-in humidors at the tobacconist's. I enjoy the occasional wiff of tobacco smoke when somebody else is smoking near me, but I hate the way the scent of stale ashtray permeates a smoker's clothes & hair. It also permeates a room & it stays. It STINKS!

I've dated women who smoked since I quit & that old line about a kissing a smoker being like licking an ashtray isn't far off the mark. I don't date smokers anymore, nor will I allow anyone to smoke in my house. I'm not an anti-smoking nazi, I just don't want to smell/taste the nasty ashtray-like odor; but I do enjoy the secondhand tobacco smoke while it's burning; weird huh?
Regards, GF.

I stopped about 10 years ago. I used to smoke hand rolls and sometimes make my own with a cig rolling machine, I actually still have the roller and a few filter tubes kicking around somewhere! I quit because I moved from rural Newfoundland to Toronto with about 100 bucks in my pocket and no job waiting. I was living on my cousins couch and we both loved the mcbong! When my money was mostly gone and I had to start to make the choice between smokes and smoke, the choice was easy. I figured that smokes made me feel normal and with out them not normal and smoke made me feel great and without it, I felt normal. After that realization, I quit cold turkey. Some months later, while at a bar, I bummed a cig from a friend and it was the worst thing I've ever put in my mouth! Haven't even thought about having a cig since, still a little disgusted by them actually.

I smoke only cigars...and only a few a week...and only from April through September/October. Hoping the months of being off the cigars clears up most of the damage I do during the summer months.

CSB: I smoked in high school and college. Quit in 1981, with some help from my coworkers. I was at the company Halloween party, and I had the usual smoker's cough. One of my coworkers said, "why don't you quit those things?" I said, "OK, I have 2 left in the pack, then I'm done." Coworker got the attention of EVERYONE in the room and said I was quitting as of midnight. A little round of applause from my coworkers (about half of whom were smokers!), and peer pressure did the rest. Knowing that I would catch a lot of ribbing if I fell off the wagon, I managed to quit cold turkey that night.

Nearly every day at work after that, someone would ask, "how many days/weeks/months has it been?" Usually followed by, "wish I could give 'em up too."

*Rant Alert*

There are none so ferverent as the converted, and Im no exception.

I started with cheap cigars and pipes when I was 15 or 16. My father didnt have a leg to stand on to tell me to stop, as he was up to 3 packs a day at that point, and my grandmother wasnt doing much better. I dont think I was at my 18th birthday yet before I started smoking cigarettes in their company (can you believe people used to, and some still do, smoke at the dinner table?)

What was super cool was rolling my own in college. Hippy girls knew you had cred when they saw you a pouch of Drum, and one of my better lines was "can I roll you a cigarette?"

Things really came to a head though when I started smoking shisha in the Egyptian part of town once I got to Astoria. 3 or 4 bowls a day for about 2 years. Since hookahs dont travel well (not even my little travel hookah in the briefcase) I would come home from work a crazy person, nic-fitting like no one's business. My now wife used to let me come in and light up and not even try to hug me or say hello, knowing I would be ready to snap.

To shorten the story somewhat, I quit by taking the lozenges, and had to ween myself off those after several YEARS of continuing to take them. Its been about 6 years smoke free and about 3 years nicotene free. I'll still have a cigar once or twice a year. There is an entire STREET in the neighborhood I cant walk down without smelling shisha wafting, and it smells like GOD. I dont linger on Steinway.

My father, in his brilliance, still sees a massive leftwing conspiracy trying to take away his godgiven right to smoke. He has no personal income as he has quit working to take care of my ailing grandfather, but still finds money for up to 2 packs a day. The house he shares with grandpa is fetid with brown tobacco stains and has a haze of smoke at all times. He DOES wait until grandpa's oxygen tube is in his nose before he lights another one, so what's the problem? Over Christmas, my wife and I were over and I asked if perhaps he could smoke in another room than his pregnant daughter-in-law and he threw a fit. I argued until he started yelling at her, upon which time I told him he should put his fists up because I was about to knock him out. While I didnt knock his teeth in, which I planned to do, my relationship with him will likely never be the same. That was in December, and he finally reached out in April... but I dont see my rage depleting any time soon. If nothing changes, and I have no reason to believe it will, lung cancer will likely be his "retirement plan."

My point behind all this TMI is that to maintain a tobacco addiction (and Im not talking the occassional cigar or cigarette) in the year 2014 is not only unwise but its a character flaw. With the exception of the fact that cigarette smoke can repel the mosquito in areas with a high rate of malaria, tobacco takes health and lives while giving absolutely nothing back... not even a temporary feeling of euthoria... so in that way its even dumber than recreational heroin use. Next ******* who exercises his godgiven right to smoke indoors in my immediate vacinity is going to get it put out in his eye.

Good on you all for quitting.

/rant.

I tried smoking as a teenager. I never got hooked, thankfully. My dad smoked probably since before I was born. Back then it was socially accepted and in some place, expected. He very likely had a hard time coming to grips with a young family, and working at a factory where his coworkers all smoked probably helped to lead him into the smoking life.

I remember one time dad and his friend were up to the High School one night for some Adult League Drop-In Basketball (dad was always athletic) and I remember the two of them getting in the car after playing basketball and just enjoying the hell out of lighting up a cigarette. His friend even made comment that nothing is better than lighting up after a good workout...

Dad tried various times to quit and finally did so on Sunday, August 7th, 2005, when he died suddenly from a heart attack at the age of 58.

I quit a few years back, am 56 now, smoked maybe half a pack a day for 20 years-ish...got to where the only cig I enjoyed was the first of the day, the rest was just "habit" ....I finally quit when my workplace decided to ban all tobacco procucts on campus (can't even smoke in your own car parked there).....we can also be written up for coming to work smelling of smoke (am a nurse at the local hospital)....used to miss it, but, am past that stage, I guess..SWMBO is happy, she's never smoked, bless her heart

Well I never smokes but I quit chewing snuff almost a year ago. I was 2 cans a day of Copenhagen for 18 years. Gotta say it was probably the single most hardest thing I ever done so far in my life. Even at almost a year without it i still get bad cravings at least twice a week.

quit cigarettes 8 years and 80 lbs ago, cold turkey after smoking 30 years, up to 3 packs a day

will have an occasional one when I'm at rehearsal, the other guys in the band all smoke, so I'll bum one from them while we're taking a break

the BigHair is a militant ex-smoker and is always complaining about smokers

on smoking other than cigarettes - no comment

I smoked all through college, and quit about a year after graduating due to health concerns, and the fact that I felt like a pariah around non-smoking circles.

I'm glad I quit, but I absolutely miss it. I'll still have one or two on special occasions; bachelor parties, weddings, hunting trips, etc. I think I've bought 3 packs in the last year, plus a handful of cigars and an ounce of pipe tobacco.

I started stealing smokes from my old man when I was 16. Started dipping as well. Quit once when I was 22, cold turkey. Made it 8 months and had way too much to drink one night and said one won't hurt me... clean for about 2 1/2 years now (I am only 30). I did the quit smoking hotline since my work supplemented patches for free when you go through them. I ended up with a free 8 week patch system. Like I said, I am at about 2 1/2 years now and every time I smell a cigarette I want to start again, but I feel that I have the power to tell myself no.

Oh, also move to Massachusetts and spend around $9.00 a pack, can't smoke 2 packs a day like I did at those prices. That makes me want to update the stop smoking app that I had tracking my progress to see what I have "saved" in the 2 1/2 years.

It's easy to quit smoking; I've done it dozens off times. Hardest thing is to stay quit.

I smoked for the better part of 45 years. Quit cold turkey 3+ years ago. I'm 59 now and I don't miss it a bit.
Both parents smoked as did most of the relatives.

Remember kids are going to emulate their parents.

Congratulations to all who stand up for their rights as non-smokers.

What a bunch quitters!







...
I'm a quitter too.

M4car223 said:

Like I said, I am at about 2 1/2 years now and every time I smell a cigarette I want to start again, but I feel that I have the power to tell myself no.

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You are right on the mark with that. The thing that carried me through the nicotine withdrawals was the idea that having a smoke wouldn't fix the problems I was feeling...cigarettes were why I was feeling that way. That mindset made cigarettes the reason for the problem rather than the cure.

I quit last September with a vape. Cigs were getting two expensive. Having a job outside with no desk job "cig breaks" was costing $20 a day. Now with my vape I'm around $10 or less a week.

I smoked cigarettes from the age of about 12 to the age of 20.
I quit cold turkey from 2-1/2 packs a day. Never smoked a cigarette again.

In the past 10 years I’ve smoked maybe 8 cigars a year on the average; and generally only at social events where other guys were smoking cigars. However in the past year I’ve been feeling my mortality and so have stopped smoking pretty much entirely . Had two cigars in the past 8 months (at the holidays).

Nevermind the tars ... it was the nicotine that got me thinking .
Nicotine is a “Toxicity Class 1” poison ... the most dangerous classification (Classes are I, II, III & IV).

As a pesticide (which is what nicotine is), Class 1 poisons are required to be packaged with the Signal Word: "Danger-Poison", with skull and crossbones symbol, generally followed by: "Fatal if swallowed", "Poisonous if inhaled", "Extremely hazardous by skin contact--rapidly absorbed through skin", or "Corrosive--causes eye damage and severe skin burns"

For a bit of perspective, DDT is a Class 2 poison.
Malathion is a Class 3 poison.

As a group, “Toxicity Class 1” poisons are extremely bad actors. You might think of these as in the “Ridiculously Dangerous” category.

Just to name a few ... besides Nicotine, Class 1 includes things like Strychnine, Endosulfan, Aldicarb, Arsenic/arsenates, Mercuric Oxide, ... and Sodium Cyanide (for what it’s worth; the parent chemical of which is another pesticide, “ HCN”, also known as “Zyklon B”... the cyanide based pesticide invented in the 1920’s and made notorious by the nazis in World War II.)

Nicotine is in some very, very bad company.

The EPA registration for the last nicotine pesticide in the United States was terminated in 2008.
Since January of this year (2014) Nicotine has been banned for sale as a pesticide. Now you can only get nicotine liquid in the open market if you want to smoke it in your Electronic Cigarette.



<oh snap!>

I quit smoking and chaw 12/27/95. I never looked back. I kept a couple of items around just in case but every time I looked at them I gagged. I smoked cigars and mostly Camel straights for a long time. I started working out and in a year or so I was in the best shape I had ever been in at age 40. I would move 9 ton of iron weights every other day before work, free weight and nautilus. I can still hold my own pretty well at nearly 57, less than 2 weeks. Had I kept smoking, forget it.

You can do it. It takes will power and set up emergency diversions to keep your hands busy for those urges. They do go away after time. Just don't smoke anymore.

Pinebarrensbrew said:

I quit last September with a vape. Cigs were getting two expensive. Having a job outside with no desk job "cig breaks" was costing $20 a day. Now with my vape I'm around $10 or less a week.

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I almost bought an MVP, but went with the eVic instead. Are you happy with the MVP?

krackin said:

I quit smoking and chaw 12/27/95. I never looked back. I kept a couple of items around just in case but every time I looked at them I gagged. I smoked cigars and mostly Camel straights for a long time. I started working out and in a year or so I was in the best shape I had ever been in at age 40. I would move 9 ton of iron weights every other day before work, free weight and nautilus. I can still hold my own pretty well at nearly 57, less than 2 weeks. Had I kept smoking, forget it.

You can do it. It takes will power and set up emergency diversions to keep your hands busy for those urges. They do go away after time. Just don't smoke anymore.

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Sounds familiar. I replaced smoking with running. When I'd get the urge, I'd lace up and run. I was running 10-15 miles every day. I got down to about 155# at one point and had to quit running so much!

Replacing smoking with exercise is the way. You just can't do both.

passedpawn said:

Replacing smoking with exercise is the way. You just can't do both.

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When I was young I rode my bike a lot. Then I started smoking but still did an occasional 100 mile ride with my dad for a couple years. Those first ten miles or so, it was just non-stop nasty crud coming out of my lungs. I also remember being the only rider wearing jean shorts and army boots, surrounded by people in spandex with those cycling shoes. Good times.

I quit smoking a few years ago, and since then a couple times I've tried smoking one of my wife's cigarettes and they're so freaking nasty. I don't understand how I ever got hooked on them in the first place. When I was addicted I loved smoking. But without the addiction it does nothing for me, except taste terrible.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss cigarettes. I smoked for 18 years. one day our oldest (4 y/o at the time) asked why I smoked. I answered, "I don't know." I finished that pack & quit.

I quit while in the army after a sniper almost took my head off when I was having a smoke around dusk. Many years after that I started smoking a pipe on occasion but it's not a frequent thing.

Don't ever go back Billy. You get enough smoke burnin' rods. I know that I did at least. I was doing steel fab when I was your age. I loved it and had a good business. I gave it up due to what I saw man. Brian tumors and leukemia. If you do mig or tig you are better off. I did AC AP stick mostly, it was the era. What is odd is that I have a nephew hotshot that got union wage not too long ago. Newbies don't even know AC 6011 poor fit unclean metal.

krackin said:

Don't ever go back Billy. You get enough smoke burnin' rods. I know that I did at least. I was doing steel fab when I was your age. I loved it and had a good business. I gave it up due to what I saw man. Brian tumors and leukemia. If you do mig or tig you are better off. I did AC AP stick mostly, it was the era. What is odd is that I have a nephew hotshot that got union wage not too long ago. Newbies don't even know AC 6011 poor fit unclean metal.

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I quit burning rods a few years ago. I ain't welded pipe in almost 3 years. funny thing is all the guys in the shop I'm in now whining about "all the smoke". we have pretty good ventilation & it's all MIG (mostly pulse). and if something has a slight gap, they're off cutting filler rods instead of using a lower heat setting. 3/4 of the guys I work with now would quit & run home from my old shop in Wyoming.