Quittin' Smoking

[Odsox]

I can't help it because I know that anyone who smokes would rather not

Not true ... not with me anyway.
I enjoyed smoking, I enjoyed the quiet moments that Julie mentioned, what I didn't enjoy and what ultimately made me stop was the stigma there now is against smokers.
To be completely honest, if I were to be diagnosed with an incurable disease ... I would start again.

[TheGoodEarth]

Odsox - let me phrase it a different way. If you could go back to the time when you didn't smoke and with the knowledge you have now, would you start?

[JulieSherris]

Smokers are desparate to quit which is why there is a multi billion pound industry for stop smoking aids.

Ummmm.... no, I'm not desperate to give up - if & when I get to a point where I want to give up again, I will.
I gave up before for 2 years - but I missed it greatly during that time & it was such a relief to climb back on the wagon.
In fact, I'd say that I didn't enjoy being a non-smoker - and I almost lost a friend at the time, because she wouldn't come & visit me - she thought that a) I was going to lecture her & try & convert her... and b) I wouldn't let her smoke in the house!!
In the meantime......

I've bought some tobacco seeds & am going to try & grow my own this year - Andy has to make me a curing box & I am also giving Camile some seeds too - if I can crack the baccy growing, I'm nearly all the way self-sufficient!

[Odsox]

Odsox - let me phrase it a different way. If you could go back to the time when you didn't smoke and with the knowledge you have now, would you start?

Well, it depends on the time frame.
If I were 16 today but with my memories, then no I wouldn't start.
If I were transported back 50 years to a time when smoking was acceptable then I'm not so sure.
When I started virtually everybody smoked, you were the "odd one out" if you didn't, and you could smoke everywhere ... trains, buses, planes, offices even in hospitals and doctors waiting rooms, and so it was just about the natural thing to do.
On the other hand 50 years ago there was no cocaine, cannabis or heroin.

[Odsox]

I've bought some tobacco seeds & am going to try & grow my own this year - Andy has to make me a curing box & I am also giving Camile some seeds too - if I can crack the baccy growing, I'm nearly all the way self-sufficient!

We used to do this years ago Julie, in fact there was a tobacco company who would take your harvested leaves and cure & shred them for a small fee.
I seem to remember it tasted pretty disgusting

[TheGoodEarth]

you could smoke everywhere ... trains, buses, planes, offices even in hospitals and doctors waiting rooms

Gosh yeah when you think about it, it seems unbelievable. You could smoke on the top of a bus but not the ground floor! You could smoke at the back of an aeroplane. I smoked on a train from London to Edinburgh only 3 years ago!

I worked in the NHS and used to sit having a fag at my desk! That was only about 20 years ago!

[Millymollymandy]

Those of you who say that the first 3 days are the worst - I found the opposite. The first few days were actually relatively easy but the cravings just started to get worse and worse as each day went by, to the point where the cravings were with me every waking moment - I was just desperate for bedtime all day every day because I knew that would be the only respite I had.

I have previously given up in the past completely successfully and very easily but I substituted my nicotine addiction for food. I ate and ate and ate and never felt full, put on loads of weight and went back to smoking in order to lose the weight. But at no time during that time (apart from day 1) did I ever feel like smoking a cigarette!

My last attempt (see para 1) I was determined not to eat any thing more than normal as I didn't want to put on weight. I still put on 3kg in 3 weeks!

Anyway as we can see from all the postings in this thread, everybody is completely different and it works (or doesn't) for everyone in completely different ways.

Anyway I have just seen my doctor today and the subject of smoking came up and he advised me NOT to try to give up at the moment because I am just starting to be premenopausal (lovely jubbly) and he says that is absolutely not the time to be trying to give up smoking! I love my doctor! (French doctors are great because they never lecture you about smoking unlike English ones).

[pumpy]

WOW!! What a response! We have both read all the posts, & it is so apparent that there is no direct solution to quittin'........ it is very much an individual thing. I,personally, quit last April,soley because i wanted to ( i first tried to quit in 1980). The fact that,so far, i have been sucessful doesn't mean that i am a stronger person. Jackie is very strong-minded, (she has dealt with Type 1 diabetes since she was a toddler, including a recent 6-month stay in a wheel-chair, & has over-come severe depression in the past.). However, last evening she bought some baccy, as she was climbing the walls, ( & i was having to think twice before i even said nothing!). I guess, at the moment, that this is one hurdle too far to climb, but who knows, in the future. It just goes to prove the theory that nicotine is the most addictive drug known to man............. & it's legal!!

[pumpy]

P.s. ......... Julie Sherris, self sufficient, "grow yer own",......... brilliant!!!

[oldfella]

Smoked for 20 years, 60 a Day in the end, was working in the basement of house ripping up the old floor, lit up a fag, and what with dust and smoke nearly died coughing; Puts out fag and carry on working, ten minutes later, same thing.

Stop working , "THINKS" what the ----- am I doing??

Start work, Thinks about ~~~~~~ FAG ~~~~~~ Instead stand in corner close my eyes and think about coughing not just coughing BUT COUGHING and gagging and making myself sick.

This I did for about seven or eight days at which point I still wanted a fag but I did not want to stand in the corner like a Pratt in front of the blokes at work as I had finished my Holidays.

It worked for me 40 years ago so maybe it could work for you. What ever it takes I wish you all luck and the strengh to get you there

[Annpan]

I was never a serious smoker, only ever really a social smoker... but now, I wouldn't even dream of touching a cigarette.

My Dad died when I was 4 (he was only 39) because he didn't look after himself, he smoked too much, drank too much and ate too much. I don't even want to think about leaving my E through my own stupidity. I can't bare that my brothers smoked/smoke.... it makes me so sad and angry

I think when you weigh up what smoking can do.... and not to you (most smokers IME have dealt with that fact) but to those around you, those you'll either leave behind, or will be left to look after you.... well.... I think you can all guess why I won't ever smoke again.

[sheena]

The Carr book is good if you want to give up smoking, but you must take time to read through it and possibly twice before you can get the full effect, I managed with this alone however if I hadn't the death of my friend due to cancer would have done it every time!!!!
She was bubbly, mad, naughty and had more life in her than anyone should have been allowed to have, whats more she was very fit, green in every way possible and only smoked 12 per day.
This was enough to kill her in the end at 40 years old - the chemo made her so ill that she eventually refused help as weak as she became and wanted to die in natural surroundings at home with friends and family around her, this was desperately hard time for for everyone and the amount of times that I cradled her children (aged 14,11&3) without losing it myself was a miracle....I beg all of you from the bottom of my heart don't put your family and friends through this.If you want to quit smoking, do it because your life is precious!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[pumpy]

Hi Sheena, i think you've hit the nail on the head, there.

[the.fee.fairy]

I have no wish to give up.
I enjoy smoking.

if i were to go back to the time that i started...yes. I'd still smoke.

I quite enjoy being outcast with the other dregs of society into the bitterly cold outside of a pub.
I don't like the smell of cleaning products, stale beer and BO in pubs...

[pumpy]

Hi f.f. , i know what you mean, & i used to really enjoy a fag (not in a public school kinda way!), but eventually i decided that i'd had enough...... & so even tho' there is baccy available at home, i'm really not interested......... but i'm not one of these ex-smokers who drive everyone nuts..........