Prepare to Quit Smoking

For any smokers out there reading this and thinking, 'God I will never quit if I have to spend the rest of my life resisting the urge for a cigarette', like this article says, note that it doesn't have to be that way. I quit smoking six months ago and every day without cigarettes is a blessing. I _hated_ smoking, and I wanted to stop, and for years and years I couldn't stop. And then I did, and I am free, and it is wonderful. Why the hell would I want to go back to the thing that I hated and was killing me, like this person? If you see cigarettes for what they really are, as a non-smoker sees them, how could you ever want to smoke?<p>These arguments come from Allnn Carr's stop smoking methodology. You can read his book or do a seminar. And for those out there who say 'it doesn't work': I read that book the first time in 2003, and probably more than ten times since. I attended the seminar three times. It was finally the online seminar that made the ideas click for me. (The breakthrough was the realisation that the response that says 'I want a cigarette' is a broken thought process that was learned, i.e. is not natural, and can be unlearned.) Now that the ideas have clicked into place for me I am absolutely certain I will never smoke again. When I hear the 'I want a cigarette' thought, I don't have a melancholy response that I can't smoke. I hated smoking! I have a happy response that I have learned how to get back to very close to the state I was in before I ever smoked at all.<p>Anyway, I am sure this article is well-intentioned, but I would strongly strongly suggest that if you haven't tried Allan Carr's method you give it a shot, and if you have tried it, give it another try. Smoking is a nightmare from which we all can awake.

After a dozen or so years of pack-a-day smoking I quit by just switching to nicotine gum. You can get a <i>big</i> kick out of one of those whenever you need it, and I was very liberal with them and probably actually increased my nicotine intake heh. After a couple months of gum I moved over to patches and then after a month or so I started forgetting to put them on.<p>It's about a year and a half since then, I still get cravings occasionally but they can be beaten by going for a walk and sucking up some second hand smoke.

I moved onto smoking e-cigs. That was quite easy really. If you haven't had luck with other ways to quit smoking, then getting your hands on some vaping gear might be something worth doing.

I quit after 5 years of smoking regularly with an extra year in there failing to try to quit. The second time i quit was much more a mental thing than physical. Truly randomly, my friends suggested at dinner that we quit and never smoke again. I'd tried to quite before and tried to warn them how hard it is, but the idea of never touching it again seemed reasonable.<p>It worked for me, but none of my friends. Just randomly deciding to never touch i again. A book i read that reminded me of the struggle, oddly enough, is The End of Overeating. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-End-Overeating-Insatiable-American/dp/1605294578" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/The-End-Overeating-Insatiable-American...</a><p>Six years out, I'll say this. The "knowledge" of the smell never goes away, but the craving does, slowly. That is, I smell it, and I remember what it means, I know I want that sensation, but at the same time, I've had my peace with it and know it's not not for me anymore.<p>On very rare occasion, i'll end up inhaling tobacco (if it's combine with something else that i rarely smoke) without my knowledge. At this point the sensation is very very uncomfortable. While it is pleasurable, it's totally overwhelming, my heart races and everything is too intense for a couple minutes. Very odd feeling.

I've been stopped for 3 years, I smoked 20 a day for 12 years prior to stopping.<p>Stopping was difficult to do but I'd been thinking about it for a while and my mother getting diagnosed with a heart problem (she's smoked since she was 16) was a good incentive so I picked my 30th birthday and just stopped.<p>I initially used gum to manage the cravings but after a month or so I kept forgetting to pick the gum up or simply ran out so I stopped buying it.<p>For the first year or so I used to get sporadic random cravings (but I just visualized my mother on a heart machine clearly in my mind each time, talk about negative re-enforcement) but they've gone now.<p>My GF continued to smoke throughout before and after I quit which in theory should have made it harder but in reality actually worked in my favour after a month of not smoking the smell was nauseating.<p>I put quite a bit of weight on while I was stopping which took a while to lose but other than that and not getting a chest infection the last 3 winters (where I'd usually had one or two a year in the previous decade) I've not noticed much difference in my health.

I cheated and used Chantix to quit after a 20 year pack-a-day habit. After dozens of failed attempts it was super-easy to quit on this drug. I'm not sure why everyone doesn't use it, it's a miracle drug.

I found that only the first two days were hard. After that, it is easy to quit.

I smoked cigarettes for around 15 years. I had a terrible habit of 2 packs a day. I would constantly chain smoke. When I decided to quit, it was honestly pretty easy. I gave up social drinking, which I used to go out on an almost daily basis. My blood pressure is a lot better now, and I used to have a really bad temperament. For all the people who are trying to quit, good luck to you!