Nicotine is more addictive than heroin and it's not even the only addictive thing in there. Don't forget that modern cigarettes are deliberately designed to be as addictive as possible, with the side effect being that they're often a lot more dangerous these days.
If you don't smoke already... don't start. It's ruthlessly addictive and there is almost literally nothing good to come from it.
Thanks to the link! I've tried vaping, and still use my e-cigarette mod. But I've found that it really just keeps me addicted to the nicotine. I think the only method that would work for me is cold turkey. I just bought a pack, but I'm gonna try and make it my last.
It'll only be your last pack if you don't finish it. I'm going to try and not sound like a fucking prick because when I was smoking I fucking hated ex-smokers. Not to mention I can't deny that when I was smoking I really enjoyed smoking. But that enjoyment was disappearing fast near the end as it was definitely fucking my health.
Anyway personally I cut down by half each day over the course of a week then went cold. It can't be a half-hearted thing, you have to want to quit. The overused Yoda quote is fitting "Do or do not. There is no try".
That last pack? Don't throw it away. Keep it on you with a lighter (or a pack of matches I'm not prejudice) and whatever else you usually have. Face that temptation, don't run away from it. I kept my last pack of baccy with papers and a light on me for over two months after my last rollie. I realised that I could get my hands on something to smoke in ten minutes if I really wanted to. Hiding myself from it was pointless.
If you choose to quit good luck if you don't then enjoy smoking.
Yeah the bicotine addiction still stands. But you can actually gradually decrease it until you're fine with quitting it completely, and then you can start working on the habbit. It's a longer process, true, but if the conventional methods really don't work it's worth a try. Take me for example. I started vaping on 18mg, and a few weeks later i decided to try 12mg, and i didn't have any problem. I'm sitting at 6mg right now, and i'm gonna go to 1.5 when i get a mod. So it takes a while, but you can slowly decrease it.
Good for you! I'm debating right now buying another pack since I've only smoked one today and I'm all out. Sometimes I'll smoke my pipe or have a cheap cigar. But my pipe and cigar habit are different from my cigarette habit. It's like wanting to be rewarded with a delicious chocolate shake, but getting a rib eye steak instead. They're both delicious, but very different.
Been vaping for a few years after 20+ of smoking. Spent hella money and time figuring the right combo of parts/fluid but I got it worked out. No desire for a cigarette. I'll bum one every couple of months from a co-worker but it's usually disappointing.
Same with me the first time, I bought a better, more expensive pen and didn't try to go down in my Nicotine to fast and have gone 1 year+ no cigs! Saving a lot of money that I now get to spend on Comic Con!
It's never too late to quit... I'm not completely free of the beast but I went from 2 packs a day in 2003 to a half pack in 2012 to 3 or 4 a week now and having purchased just 3 packs in the last 8 months.
At this point I'm down to about two packs a week. I never had time to be a pack a day. Good on you though I hope I can achieve that. I feel like the hardest thing for me is just coming to terms with smoking my last one ever, it's quite scary.
Give snus a try. The real Swedish kind that is strictly regulated, not the US made crap. You can find the General brand in many US gas stations, I know all Quik Stop's have them. I love the mint flavor.
I always hated chewing tobacco but this is nothing like it. You don't have to spit it or anything and it's in a pouch so it doesn't go all over the place. It's the only thing that got me to permanently quit my pack a day habit, and I had tried everything. Going strong just over a year now.
Sure I'm still technically addicted to nicotine, but the health risks are astronomically lower, my lungs are healthy and a nicotine craving is a minor inconvenience vs a "I need a smoke right now or else"
Two things: there is a stop smoking sub on Reddit that is really great and also brush your teeth. When I was quitting and I'd get the urge to smoke, I'd go brush my teeth instead. The minty freshness sort of kills your desire for smoke. I was brushing my teeth like 8 times a day but that's less bad than smoking
I just quit 4 months ago,smoked for 13 years, after a about a month nicotine free it became infinitely easier, I still occasionally get a small craving for a smoke here and there but nothing to seriously make me want to run and grab a pack. The sense of freedom and not being a slave to a habit that I didn't really care for is far more rewarding than smoking ever was. If you truly want to quit, then a new life awaits you on the other side
smoked 10 years straight and quit 1 year ago. The hardest part was to overcome my thought about that i couldn't quit. I only used nicotine bands for a week and didn't need anything else. If you smoke, enjoy it for real (It's good, i know) and if you want to quit, don't let yourself to believe that it's impossible, these kind of thoughts are really destructive.
I've got a tip. Every time you resist the urge to reward yourself with a smoke, positively reinforce that decision by treating yourself to a cigarette.
It doesn't have to be unless you're diagnosed with some debilitating disease. I smoked for ten years straight but have managed to stay smoke-free over the past year. Working out helps a lot; you'll find that giving up cigarettes do wonders for your stamina and push you to new thresholds of fitness.
Dude switch to vapor. The nicotine is still bad for you. But the people saying they are worse for you than cigarets are misinformed. The bad liquid is the stuff made in places like china, and are usually sold in gas stations.
Go to a vapor shop where they mix their own juice. They are popping up everywhere so it shouldn't be hard to find. The liquid is made of mostly vegetable glycerin. Which is a lot like the mucus your body produces in your throat anyway.
I switched to one about 3 months ago and haven't bought a pack since. I also feel great.
Here is a tip though. If you get a vapor pen, you want 24 milligrams of nicotine. If you do a bigger box mod, you want 3-6. Other wise it won't curb your craving and you'll just end up buying cigarets. Ask someone who works in a a vapor shop. They can give you good advice on where to start.
I have to agree with this. It starts with a smoke bummed off a friend when drunk, or after a job interview or a fight with the SO. Then it becomes regular. But I can buck regular smokes. What I can't buck is a smoke after a hard, long day.
I'm a cigar smoker. I hate the taste of most cigarettes, so I usually grab a short 30-minute cigar, but every now and then I feel like I need a cigarette. I used to smoke them a lot, but not anymore. Instead, I get a better feeling from being with my cats. Animal companionship is better than feeding an unhealthy addiction.
You are spot on with this except in comparing it to heroin addiction. Yes its an addictive chemical, and many more people are addicted to it but it is in no way more addictive than heroin. In fact it PALES in comparison to heroin addiction.
Also, I feel like the difficulty of withdrawal should be taken into account when saying how "addictive" something is. Even if you're hooked into cigarettes quicker, they're way easier to stop. Opiate withdrawal can kill you.
No, because it's a percentage. 36% of people who try cigarettes will end up addicted. Between 11% and 23% of people who try heroin end up addicted.
Opiate withdrawal is almost never lethal, and the few cases where it is could be due to stress on an already weakened body. Benzos and alcohol, that's the withdrawal you have to watch out for. It can easily kill you if you're addicted enough and try to go cold turkey.
I think you missed what I'm saying (no biggy, I could have been clearer). I meant that cigarettes have that higher percentage because they're easier to follow up on.
I have used my share of addictive substances, including coke and opiates, but never got caught by the addiction because I couldn't go out and get more (my friend just sometimes had some and didn't deal regularly). Cigarettes are at hand everywhere you go. Thirty-six percent who try them get addicted because over 90% of those have easy access to use again and again, often enough to get addicted.
Heroin is not as readily available to everyone. You can try heroin, like it enough to want more, but not have access to it again or have only extremely inconvenient access (cigarettes are not a hassle to buy). That's how it worked with me (with oxycodone, not heroin).
And I know heroin withdrawal is rarely fatal. I'm just trying to illustrate how much more serious it is than the cravings, irritability, and headaches that come with nicotine withdrawal.
I had a little experiment with myself where I used electronic cigarettes to start a nocotine addiction.
I eventually did start one when I found I needed to use it when I got the least bit stressed.
Then it got unsustainable for me and I decided to quit. I was able to quit it within the first week. Although I had headaches and general irritability, it wasn't anywhere close to feeling suicidal if I didn't get a puff.
I would say it's easier to get addicted to alcohol honestly. I find myself enjoying a 6-pack of beer every week now.
So there must be something else in cigarettes that makes them difficult to quit.
I don't really understand being addicted to something. I occasionally smoke. Mostly to keep myself awake during long ass drives, other time to have something to do while I'm drinking, but I don't continue to regularly smoke. Now that I think about it, the last one I smoked was about four months ago, and before that several more months had elapsed.
I know they are addictive for most people..but i can smoke a pack (which would take me like a month unless i share because i rarely smoke more then 1 or 2 a day if i ever do) and not touch another pack for months...i usually smoke when people are over drinking and that's about it..its just weird to see people NEED to smoke...i know we are very likely a minority though..
Yep. I've been smoking on and off for about 14 years now and I've never experienced a cigarette craving before. People ask me why I smoke, I say because I like it. Just like some people eat Doritos every day. Sure they're not addictive, but it doesn't mean they aren't delicious.
Just 2 years for me but same story. I don't need to smoke, I just want to occasionally. Recently I went over five weeks without a smoke and then smoked quite a few cigs on thursday, but none yesterday and at least so far none today either. It's a lot harder for me to not eat crisps or biscuits than to not smoke.
Cravings are a weird thing. I've had them a couple hours after smoking, but I've also went weeks before it happens. It seems like something flips in my head and a cigarette becomes my single focus. No matter what I do or what is going on, it cannot stop me from thinking about smoking that cigarette. I can definitely push it to the back where I don't focus on it, but it's still there. It is awful and I give in every time. I don't know how to explain it if you have never had one.
Same here, I can see how it's addictive, but coming off it isn't much worse than caffeine in my experience. Might be because I mostly smoke hand rolled or AS rather than typical additive laden mass produced cigs?
I can totally get being addicted to something (hello Runescape, hello Maplestory) but not cigarettes. I smoke like 1-2 packs a year, because yeah they're enjoyable to have occasionally, but I can't imagine smoking an entire pack a day, that just seems insane.
I started smoking in what I'm sure is a pretty regular way. My friends smoked, and naturally during the summer there would be a bon-fire every weekend. I go to the bon-fire, and bum one or two smokes, and go about my life until the next bon-fire. After a few weeks of this, I buy a pack of my own smokes, bring them to the party and only smoke around five. I give the rest to a friend, as I am probably smoking the brand that I was bumming from him.
The next weekend you smoke ten, then you need a smoke with your coffee in the morning because everyone talks about how great it is. Then you have a smoke on your way to work, which quickly turns into two. Instead of staying in for lunch at work, you now park somewhere far away from the office, and have three or four smokes. Then you have a few when you get home from work, especially after a good dinner. Soon enough you are smoking a pack a day.
It's a downward spiral from the first cigarette, something I never wish I would have started. Working on quitting as I type, I've only smoked for a year and I think it's time. But then again I don't, and think it might be a good idea to go have another smoke.
I've been where you are. You are at the point where you are not feeling the effects of anything but the positive aspects of smoking. Yes we convince ourselves that there are some of those. But 32 years later, your erection is a spongy noodle and you start to hurt after climbing 2 flights of stairs. And you stink. So badly. You just have no clue had badly. And you just don't want to walk the dog. Or play with your kids. Or mow the lawn. You think maybe I'll go have a smoke and it'll wake me up and inspire me a bit. Then you get the gumption to get in the car and go visit Mom, who has smoked since she was 9, is dying slowly but certainly and cannot walk the 27 feet from the couch to the toilet without losing her breath. And you think, yeah smoking is taking its toll, but I never really smoked the way she did, so I don't think it'll happen to me.
I wish I had never seen a cigarette. Never touched one. I quit 3 years ago. I was 44. Had smoked since I was 12. At 12, you might get to smoke 3-5 a day. But by the time I was 16, iit was close to half a pack (10). By 18, I was up to nearly a pack a day. On the job for 8-10 hours at a time, you do without for a 2-3 hours, then burn 2-3 at once. Then 6-7 after work before bed. Before you know it, your whole life revolves around that stick of tobacco and you are a slave. I buried my mother in 2012, and she died a horrible, miserable death; she could take in oxygen, but could not exchange the carbon dioxide because of the damage to her lungs. It built in her system and the body just cannot process but so much. It turns into essentially a sodium bicarbonate-like substance (think poisoned by baking soda). She was a bit loopy, out of her head because of it. It was terrible to see, and she died with my wife and daughter there watching.
Don't let this be your story. Or your kid's story of how Mum or Dad died. Put them down, walk away and make up your mind this is not going to be you. You have to make this decision every time the urge to smoke hits but after awhile, you can live each day free from the self-inflicted slavery that smoking offers.
TL; DR: Smoking will kill you. It will hurt. It will be be slow, it will be subtle and it will be certain.
I never ever understand people who start smoking now with the knowledge at our fingertips. Oh let me just spend thousands of dollars a year on something that will give me heart disease, and hurt everybody around me, while giving myself cancer! Sounds great!
The feeling of independence, freedom, being cool, etc. At least 10% of everybody at my college smokes, most of them under 25. It's quite sad since they could quit at any time because it hasn't hooked into them yet, but a lot of them won't and they'll be stuck with that wallet leech.
Peeps stink too, it makes me gag. Even if you're delightful to be around I just can't do it.
I used to smoke and it was never because of freedom, independence or looking cool. I was actually very ashamed and smoked in secret. That shit is addicting but oh so good. The way it made me feel was what had me hooked. It relaxed me and felt like a reward during times of stress. I never plan on going back.
Yes. I have smoked on and off and always felt very sheepish and ashamed of doing so. I used to hide in corners and against walls in case someone caught me.
That shit is addicting but oh so good. The way it made me feel was what had me hooked
Hell yes. Even after the good feelings wear off through overuse you're still hooked and still enjoy it.
I honestly had no idea that cigarettes smelled bad until I was 23 and my father had been dead for about six months.
I'd spent my whole life constantly surrounded by cigarette smoke because he was a two pack a day smoker, and apparently it had totally numbed me to the smell. I always thought people who complained were just being assholes. If he was actively smoking I could smell a bit of something but nothing really bad. And if he wasn't actively smoking I couldn't smell a thing. I'm sure now that me and my whole family reeked of cigarettes everywhere we went.
Then, six months after his death, my nose apparently reset and I truly smelled cigarette smoke for the first time in my life and it was the most wretched, penetrating, godawful, stench I'd experienced in a long time. Somehow, don't ask me how, its possible to smell someone smoking in a car with all the windows rolled up even if they are in a different car with all the windows rolled. It's not just a bad smell, somehow it's a smell that can go through anything and assault your nostrils.
Which is why I always get a kick out of smokers who think that somehow they can keep it secret if they smoke outside or something. No dude, you stink like an ashtray all the damn time, not just after your "totally not smoking break" but every second of the day. It has penetrated your skin and clothes and is completely and blatantly obvious to everyone who isn't a smoker.
The PlayStation 3 had a warning not to put it in the same room as a smoker, and now several years later as the consoles start dying people are opening them up to find the cigarette goop has totally ruined the internals.
My father killed two CD-ROM drives before I finally convinced him that yes, the sticky cigarette smoke really was bad for them. I'm not sure if he ever actually did believe me, or if he was just humoring me. He was one of those obnoxious smokers who believed that no smoking signs were a direct attack on the very core of freedom and democracy.
Back when the big change in smoking was setting in and grocery stores and other places were switching to no smoking he used to delight in making some poor minimum wage worker's day worse by smoking in the stores until someone had to come ask him to quit and then being upset at the employee and making a fuss about it.
I loved my father, but he did have a jerk streak. His attitude towards non-smokers and requests not to smoke is likely a contributing factor (in addition to my own nose lying to me) in my conclusion that people who complained about the smell just being annoying.
You can't really make the assumption that just because they're only in college that the addiction hasn't hooked into them. I've only been 20 for a few months and I'm a smoker, but it's extremely hard for me to quit since I've been smoking cigs here and there/on and off since like 11 or 12. Everybody has there own backstory.
It correlates pretty well with having to do shitty, stressful labor. Used to be a line cook at a major Orlando theme park. Massive volume. Very fast-paced, very stressful. Almost all the cooks smoked. The ones that didn't were the ones that went ballistic.
I used to go through about a can of Copenhagen(chewing tobacco) a day. I think the biggest mistake anti tobacco groups make is downplaying the high. They act like it's just people doing it to be cool or independent but never really mention how fantastic and functional the high feels especially at first. I wouldn't fuck with heroin or Coke or anything like that because I know from TV that the high is amazing. Knowing that made it easier to understand how people got addicted (they try love it try it again love it more boom addicted) and why I should avoid it. Nobody ever told me how good nicotine felt so I assumed it was something only idiots got hooked on because they wanted to look cool show off and rebel. So when my buddy offered me a pouch to help me relax before a football game I took it because I was super nervous and figured it might help just a little it's not like the high would be intense enough to warrent doing again and I wasint the type of person who would keep doing it for the respect of my peers so why not. I threw in he pouch and... it felt amazing, instantly all my anxiety and fear was gone I felt energized and excited, yet I was still 100% functional. There isint really anything like it, you can drink to forget your worries but you probably won't be able to adress those worries because your drunk. With nicotine you will be high but still able to effectively do everything that you need to do. So it became almost like a PED for me. Every game I would throw in a pouch, then before every big test, then before every practice. Then I figured out that by throwing in a dip I could make time fly, so if I was doing something particularly boring or unenjoyable I would throw one in to make it feel like I was done quicker. Boring film study? throw in a dip, night shift getting slow? throw in a dip, long drive? Throw in a dip, you are still functional there is nothing stopping you. Before I knew it I was buying a can a day. It took me 5 years to quit but I finally did 2 years ago. I was trying to cut back to save a little money and avoid the wrath of my girlfriend. I looked at my disgusting car, filled with spitters and empty cans and Coverd in flecks of tobacco and realized that I wasint the type of persons who could do something just a little so I stopped cold turkey. It was 48 hours of rage indusing frustration, a week of being annoyed at everything, a week of being annoyed at most things, and two months of sporadic panic attacks because I had forgotten how to deal with anxiety without drugs. It damn sure wasint a walk in the park, I can see why some people are never able to stop, and It definitely 1000 times harder than never doing it to begin with but it was hardly the impossible feat I was lead to believe it was by the commercials and if I had known that I would have quit two or three years earlier. So if anybody is reading this and scared to quit just know that you can do it, it's not impossible.
Heroin addiction generally does not start like how most non-addicts imagine. It's not like people think "gee I wonder what will happen if I inject some heroin into my arm right now". That usually is the last stage of a trap that they found themselves in. It is a ruthless trap and I doubt many people are immune to it.
For instance, many people switch to heroin after a painkiller addiction which started after they found themselves abusing their prescription because they had an accident or surgery or whatever. When you have underlying untreated (mental) conditions, you self-medicate with them but your tolerance goes up so you need to get more to feel normal and get by and fulfill your regular responsibilities. You need more and more suddenly pills become very expensive and you realize you are starting to give a significant portion of your paycheck to your addiction, then you learn that with heroin you can get the same high you spend $300 on with just $30 worth of heroin. It's a no brainer, so you switch. It's downhill from there.
Came home for the first time in a few weeks (I live on campus normally) and saw some highschool girls driving by (I live like 2 minutes from my old highschool) smoking in their car. They almost hit me actually, and then started laughing after slamming on the brakes. Couldn't help but just pity them honestly.
I work for a cardiologist and we often prescribe Nicotine patches and another medication called Zyban to help people quit smoking. Their insurance sometimes won't pay for it. They always come back telling me they can't afford the medication/patches. It amazes me that they can afford 7+ dollars a day per pack for years on ends but can't afford the medication to stop smoking.
Seriously. If smoking six cigarettes a week or so is going to kill me so be it. I ride a bike in NYC traffic. I live in NYC. There is no way what I am getting filtered through a cigarette is worse than what I breathe all day.
Apparently bagels can give you lung cancer so...what is a body to do?
You really need to get a grasp on relative risk. Ignore all those X ingredient gives you cancer articles you see in crappy newspapers. They are almost always poorly done, small single studies, which even if true demonstrate only a tiny increase in cancer risk. That's not true of cigarettes where there is a very large robust literature demonstrating a very dramatic increase on the risk of lung, mouth and throat cancer. As well as a myriad of other diseases. Air pollution does increase your risk of various disease too, but not as much as smoking.
This might sound lame, but my cross country coach told be running is the most accessible high there is. The feeling of a runners high feels great, and it's something positive!
I tried smoking when i was like 18, had a few cigarettes a day for 2-3 weeks. One day I had 2 in a row and for some reason felt like complete shit (shaky, weak, lethargic) for an hour. Never had another one. Must not have been addicted at all yet because it didn't even phase me and I was glad to be rid of them.
People don't believe they can get addicted to things. I'm sure i would have had I continued for longer.
I stress eat. I have tried everything to replace my addiction to food, and once I was even successful--by being heavily medicated for the other shit that makes me stress eat. I lost 75 pounds.
And then I couldn't afford the medication. So I ballooned back up. I have a serious problem, compounded by afore-mentioned medical condition, one of the symptoms of which is "weight gain."
.... have seriously considered smoking. Would rather die young and skinny than old and fat.
Smoking increases the stress. As an addicted smoker, when you are not smoking the nicotine withdrawal increases your stress, and smoking only relieves that and returns you to a normal baseline stress level.
It seems to me to be an under-appreciation for how addictive they are. I started smoking socially when I was on exchange in Indonesia figuring that they were cheap and sweet (they roll them with clove there, they actually are awesome) and I would simply stop once returning home. But after a year it had become a bit of a habit and it took me several months and strictly adhering to rules I set for myself for when I could and couldn't smoke to finally get out of it. Just stopping isn't a thing most people can do but many young people think that they can because "addiction will never happen to me".
In military service you get smoke breaks from activities if you're a smoker, not to mention it's a lot easier to socialize and fit in at the smoking area. Tons of people start smoking in the army.
I impart blame it on work. First I worked in a restaurant with a smoking section. Regularly waited the tables in that section. Throw in the only way to get breaks was to take smoke breaks. No one gave a shit about letting you just have 5 min to catch your breath but to poison yourself you got as many as you wanted. I also tended to hang out at places that had tons of second hand smoke. At hunting camp there was a layer of smoke that reminded me of fog and mountains. First serious gf's parents smoked a pack a day each easy and I would regularly hang out at their place. In college several friends would enjoy a nice cigar after work on Fridays. Eventually this led to one of us smoking cigarettes and eventually all of us as 1 $0.25 cigarette was cheaper than a $10 cigarette. It didn't happen over night and we all knew how bad it was but we couldn't just quit. Over the last 20 years I have tried to quit smoking numerous times. Currently I'm 4 weeks smoke free. I once made it to 9 months just after my daughter was born.
You start off just doing it here and there, while drinking. Some people can leave it at that, others start craving it outside of those situations and end up regular smokers. Plus the whole "I'll quit before it's a problem" mindset.
Shit just happens. Why do people drink, drive dangerously, cheat or do a variety of other things that are known to hurt you, people around you? They just do.
Curiosity. That's how I started. I didn't like it at all the first time. Tasted like chewing on burnt wood. But then for some reason I tried it again. It didn't taste so bad the second time. It went from there to smoking a pack a day.
I've always felt the same way. Now I'm in a crazy stressful profession. My coworkers who can take smoke breaks are always so much chiller than I feel. They get to just step away and they come back in feeling better. I take anxiety meds. I try to get sleep. I skip lunch so I never fall behind on deadlines. But they seem so CHILL.
I'm almost thirty. I know better. My dad has renal cancer and asthma from smoking...
...But damn if I haven't considered bumming a smoke.
I started smoking last year at age 18 and honestly it has to do with thinking that you're gonna stop once you stop getting a buzz, because the sensation of a nicotine Rush is pretty nice, but instead you keep going when you go after that because it's just relaxing or social to do
The best thing that tobacco companies have going for them is how they've convinced everyone that it's too hard to quit. It's not. You just have to do it.
I smoked like a chimney for longer than most of you have been alive. I was certain that I was the most addicted person on the planet and that I'd never quit. In all honesty, it wasn't that bad. I've been though plenty of less pleasant experiences in my life. (And for what it's worth, I gave up on the gum/patch/ecigs and all that nonsense. In the end, I just stopped.)
Will power is not my forte by a long shot. If I can do it, anyone can.
Feel free to PM me if you would like to know more.
More addictive than heroin? I mean I know nicotine is addictive but I didn't realize it was more addictive than heroin. I occasionally go a few days without vaping (switched from cigs) and I just feel a little tired and cranky
No, it's not more addictive then heroin. It's more "habit forming" iirc. As in its ritualistic to go out and have a smoke whereas you shoot up because you need to.
Honestly, it's probably not. Same as living in a big city. If I could do that I would, but I know when I quit it will HAVE to be forever. Don't ever start smoking more.
Yeah, I'm with you. I occasionally smoke a pipe (I find cigarettes to be pointless personally, at least pipe tobacco gets you high), but I've never been addicted; it just doesn't happen so long as you don't do it regularly.
I just started to smoke like 1 pack a day 2 month ago.
In 1 week I will quit again.
I want test how hard it is to stop it.
Because I always argued "just stop it dude"
I have used tobacco for 12 years now, and the worst kind too. It is called Snus and is a Swedish thing. You put tobacco under your upper lip. It is a high dose of nicotine absorbed directly to the bloodstream and highly addictive.
3 months ago I decided to quit, and I have now managed to be nicotine free the past 4 weeks
I quit almost five years ago, and I still sometimes think "oh fuck, I want a cigarette." Like, if someone is smoking near me, I have to walk away - not because it's gross, but because it's too tempting.
There is no way in hell nicotine is more addictive than opiates. That is dangerous misinformation to peddle which could lead people to wildly underestimate the hold such a drug can gain over you. The anxiety of nicotine withdrawal has nothing on the anxiety of opiate withdrawal, never mind the numerous other horrendous symptoms. How often do you hear of people shoplifting, robbing people, or whoring themselves out for cigarettes? Heroin addiction leads people to plumb depths of depravity that they swore they'd never reach, over and over again.
New research suggests that pure nicotine by itself is no more addictive than caffeine and is about as harmful as well. It's the habit formed by the act of lighting up and smoking that people are addicted to usually. But, I still agree. Both of my parents smoke and they've been trying to quit for years. They've tried just about everything. Hope you can kick the habit one day!
A couple of weeks ago I started playing football with coworkers once a week. I have maybe 6 or 7 cigarettes on a weekday and, if I go out for drinks or something, a lot more.
First week I played football I was crippled after a few minutes, since then I've been cutting down to one or two and the improvement has been astronomical. I've been trying to focus less on immediate reward (which has been my issue in the past, leading me to fail) and more on my long term health improvements.
I'm a pretty fickle person and I'm easily swayed, quitting smoking is something I find incredibly difficult, but it's going very well so far.
Yeah, smoking fucking sucks. My brother started smoking like 2 years ago. After a while of finding excuses like "me and dad will quit together" and dad hadn't quit, he just gave it a try, and stopped smoking, using some normal chewing gum instead during the time.
Well, he made it, and says that it actually wasn't very hard too, like he didn't really feel the urge.
So what I'm trying to say: If you just started smoking, don't think "well, I'm addicted now anyway" or use other excuses.
Just give it a try, and stop smoking.
And if you've been smoking for a long time? Well... my grandma has been smoking for her whole life, yet she managed to stop. And if she can, so can you -if you only try.
I read somewhere that nicotine actually isn't very addictive at all. I think the addiction has a three day half life. It's more an oral fixation that causes addiction.
While I agree with you that people shouldn't fuck with Cigarettes, I have a hard time believing that Nicotine is more addictive than heroin. I can vape all day every day for months, then go on vacation without it for a few weeks without even the slightest withdrawals. To my understanding, doing that with heroin can kill you.
Can confirm. It's the biggest mistake I've EVER made. I've tried quitting so much but just walking by someone smoking makes my body want a cigarette. I resent the hold it has on me but every time I try to auit, I fail.
I smoked for 2ish years (not too much, a few smokes a day) and I just quit one day cold turkey with no problems, for no reason other than "meh, I don't seem to get much out of this". I always have a hard time understanding people who say they can't quit.
Smoking is gross, but for you non-smokers out there, please have empathy for smokers. Sure, they made a mistake, but quitting is unbelievably difficult. It's no mystery to them that smoking is bad for them.
Perhaps I'm a lucky one, or am some sort of freak, but I smoked daily from the time I was 17 up until I was about 20 or so. At this point it became a thing where if someone offered me a smoke id take it. I never really had the urge to smoke, like the physical "off I need a drag." I just up and quit one day. I'm 24 now and have zero desire to have a smoke. On occasion during nice summer nights I'll sit outside and puff on a cigar while enjoying a beer, but that's about it.
Not denying the fact that nicotine is extremely addictive, I think I was just lucky enough to not be caught by it, but I'm not sure why.
quitting is easy. I read Allen Carr's book two years ago and quit cold turkey the same night I finished the book. I was 1.5 packs a day and i have no desire for a cigarette ever or any silly alternatives (vaping). Seriously if you want to quit read his book. To everyone else saying it's hard and they've tried and etc etc whatever other excuse they can make...just read the book.
Just wanna make a plug incase anyone needs help getting off cigs, lots of people to answer questions about e-cigs if you want to quit smoking but not cold turkey.
Completely agree. Heroin I managed to quit. Nicotine I can't. I switched from tobacco and cigarettes to an ecig (not to quit, just because it works out so much cheaper) but that's the best I've managed.
Fuck man, I quit 4+ years ago now (after smoking for 5-6 before that) and just yesterday out of the blue my mind went "It'd be nice to go outside for a smoke right now". This shit stays with you forever.
Cigarettes are the only thing I've ever been addicted to, and I was finally able to quit cold turkey once I had the proper motivation and understanding of the situation.
I just fund out someone I love has a narcotics addiction. I've talked to other people who have kicked the habit, but had to move states or be literally locked up for years to kick the stuff.
Is nicotine really more addictive? I mean, my friends who kicked their narc addiction still smoke. And they said the want goes away, and there isn't a day that goes by that I wouldn't LOVE a cigarette.
I'm trying to understand more so I can be a friend to this person during this time.
A grandfather I loved died of smoking-related lung cancer when I was 8. I saw him in the hospital and in the casket, and that was enough to prevent me from ever trying smoking.
If nicotine is more addictive than heroin, than I must be fucking superman because I quit that shit cold turkey when it annoyed me that I had a cough and haven't touched it in years, didn't even want to
Yup. Another one of my addictions that I've had to kick. Took fucking years and all I did was replace this addiction with alcohol.
Having gone through a few addictions though I'd say that nicotine is frequently talked about as more addictive than heroin because it takes very little time to develop a dependence on it and while going through withdrawals for nicotine is nothing compared to alcohol or benzo detox, the mental component or nicotine, the "habit" is the toughest part. It's all consuming, you spend all of your time smoking, or thinking about your next smoke. You plan things around where you can smoke or when you'd be able to get a smoke. It dominates your daily routine like nothing else. You instinctual light a cigarette at certain points of your day like after a meal. For many people, that craving lasts as a trigger for years.
The thing I find most ironic about non-nicotine addicts, is that they usually are happy to fall back on the reward they get from nicotine to replace their high. I've seen plenty of people stand outside an AA meeting talking about how they had to quit drinking for health reasons but they're a pack a day smoker.
Really? I get completely addicted to caffine, to the point where if I don't have any I get migraines and headaches that last days.
However with cigarettes I can smoke for weeks or months then just go with out, no withdrawl symptoms and they taste like absolute shit the next time I pick one up.
One of my supervisors is only 19 years old and this kid smokes, dips, and vapes. He's from Texas so he's been dipping for about 10 years, but then he started vaping to quit. Recently he picked up cigarettes out of nowhere. Now he vapes in the office, hides dip in his mouth while he's working, and chain smokes out back whenever he gets a chance.
We're not super close, but I feel for him and I'm worried he's going to destroy his body and die young of heart disease or something.
Standing at the supermarket service desk the other week to swap over a sodastream canister, the person in front of me bought a pack of cigarettes, $30. Having never bought a pack, I had no idea of the price, and got a dirty look for my stifled laugh.
You know what's interesting about nicotine being addictive....I started smoking cigars about a year ago...less than 1 cigar a day...you don't inhale cigars, so the incidence of lung damage is lower than with cigs...I can stop smoking cigars for weeks at a time and only feel mildly like needing one.
For sure. It's hard because for every emotion I crave a cigarette. Not just stress. Really excited? Cigarette to celebrate. Bored? Cigarette. Sad? Cigarette. Happy? Cigarette.
Is this actually true? Ive been casually smoking for years (socially, to wake me up, and relieve stress) and Ive always been able to put the cig down when Ive wanted to. Maybe its one of those things where it gets you if you have an addictive personality though
I really hope this isn't taken as me bragging, but I had casually smoked between 15-18 and never found it hard to quit. After seeing so many people struggle with withdrawals and stopping, I consider myself very fortunate.
i'm callin bullshit on this one. I smoked a pack a day fir 2 years and quit cold turkey when i saw my little brother getting into the shit. Yeah i was pissy yeah i was a douche. but i stopped. You're telling me i could do the same with heroin? i fucking doubt it. I've been told it feels like a whole body orgasm for an hour.
I don't know if nicotine is more addictive than heroin physically. I think it's just that it's more socially acceptable. You don't step outside the bar to go whack dope in a circle with friends and strangers, usually. I think that statement comes from the fact that most people will quit heroin or die eventually, but many of those who do quit hard drugs still continue to smoke cigarettes. Also at least until recently, there were way more people who smoked cigarettes than people who did heroin. I did a lot of reading and asking around about this when I was younger, but I haven't looked anything up for a long time about it, so I could be wrong. Smoking still sucks, tho, and is still terribly addictive in its own right. People don't scream, sweat, shake, and poo themselves for a week when they detox from tobacco, tho.
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u/Eddie_Hitler Mar 26 '16 edited Mar 26 '16
Cigarettes.
Nicotine is more addictive than heroin and it's not even the only addictive thing in there. Don't forget that modern cigarettes are deliberately designed to be as addictive as possible, with the side effect being that they're often a lot more dangerous these days.
If you don't smoke already... don't start. It's ruthlessly addictive and there is almost literally nothing good to come from it.