The Official Skank Quitting Smoking Thread

[Velvet]

I saw it as jokey. Fret not.

[timouse]

back by popular demand!!!

i have had another request to put The Easy Way to Quit Smoking back on the intertubes. Follow the above link for an audio and pdf copy of the book that changed my life.

Offer valid for seven days, after which time yousendit will no longer be sendingit.

[Basher]

No smoking for me since Feb. 24. No book reading required.

[PassedOutGuy]

Nice job Basher... nice job everyone quitting.

Edited July 3, 2009 by Guest
for assholes like Booche.

[Hal Johnson]

Im on Day (something or other). I've caved a few times over drinks, but that's honestly the worst I've done. I go full days at work without smoking and I don't smoke at home afterwards. Nicorette gum has helped a bit, I must say. But honestly, the hardest part about it are the breaks at work. What the crap am I supposed to do during breaks? I've smoked for almost 15 years and I gotta tell ya, non-smokers are really really boring people!

[Booche]

Edit to add:

Deal with reality or stop bullshitting us.

Edited July 3, 2009 by Guest
POG, seek professional help...enough is enough.

[rubberdinghy]

I've got the book...

Accepting trades...

I'll accept two packs of smokes.

[Gateaux]

I love you Dinghy.

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

my wife read that book about 6 years ago. she was a huge fan for a while...

she is now taking Champix and hasn't smoked in nearlt 3 weeks. not even over drinks. she has no cravings at all and realizes, now, how disgusting it is when she sees other people smoke.

[rubberdinghy]

I love smokes. and Gateaux toooooooooo

[bouche]

What the crap am I supposed to do during breaks? I've smoked for almost 15 years and I gotta tell ya, non-smokers are really really boring people!

maybe you just don't need to take a break. if you needed a break, you'd be happy to be taking one.

[Hal Johnson]

That is the least constructive piece of advice ever. Seriously.

[TheSloth]

Two and a half months in, downloaded and printed the book, haven't read it (but still may). Cravings are negligible except for drinking+patio action where there's the occasional dicey moment but nothing I can't handle.

[Booche]

Hey Hal, I totally hear you on a certain level.

I never really took smoke breaks at work but if this helps.........

On evenings with the buds, I still go outside to hang while they smoke. I found I was missing those moments but now I just do it, while staying away from the smell as much as possible because it always brings about a craving.

At first I didnt but after 3 weeks it seemed to be fine, not unlike what Sloth has to say above. I'll always miss smoking I figure but what I am going to do about that? Deal.

[Hal Johnson]

True enough, being able to sit and enjoy a few beverages without caving is prolly the hardest part and likely the biggest step in kicking the habit. Just gotta deal, is right.

And Bouche, I hear ya...

[Booche]

Quitting smoking isnt easy but I dont think its necessarily as hard as some want to believe it is. That's a self-defeating prophecy right there which one uses to trick themselves into believing it cant be beat, hence I continue to smoke.

When you get down to quitting, I dont trust the gimicks myself. Never have. They are ploys which try and get the brain to look the other way but if you dont want to quit you arent going to.

For me the tried and true method (I have quit a few times in the past but stupidly started up again anywhere from 6 months to a year later because I thought I had slayed the dragon) is weening for a number of weeks while breaking the psychological crutches. By those I mean the:

"I always smoke when I have my first coffee."

"I always smoke after supper."

"I always smoke on my drive home from work."

Getting rid of those is the first hard step because you keep a couple of them. Try smoking when you normally dont while you ween.

In the end, its down to the cold turkey and realizing you are done....never to smoke again (which I am employing this time, hadnt before).

This is where that book may come in handy to some people. Its wrought with the fallacies of smoking all the while beating you with it's common sense. I just flipped through some pages while on the shitter but if you believed reading this book would make you quit then you are trying to do it the easy way (funny enough, isnt that is what it is called? Haha).

There is no easy way. Quitting is hard. Nothing is going to magically happen and you stop smoking. If you are quitting, dont put yourself in positions where you might 'cheat'. Get over the rough patch and move onto the next one that isnt as rough as the last one.

Fuck. I could use a dart right about now and its going to be even worse later when I am drinking a pint. That's the way it goes but I am not going to smoke. If you truly want to quit you quit.

[rubberdinghy]

come on over andre...I got smokes.

[d_rawk]

Thanks for the (re-uploaded) link timouse.

The problem I have always had with that book is that I do find it very motivating, and it is doing the trick, I'm convinced -- then the chapter on the health effects of smoking comes. And then I start smoking again. This goes back to what Velvet was talking about regarding health warnings on cigarette packs probably making people smoke more.

My personal psychodrama involves being very unwell for a very long time and finding solace in the illusion (and it is that) of control over my own life extended to me via vices, instead of just being batted around by forces outside of my influence. I am quite happy to not smoke until I feel sick, or until someone reminds me that I should be sick. There's a certain amount of "I'll show you, you miserable fucking universe" to it. Of course, the better way to give the finger to the universe is to actually be well despite the odds.

Maybe I'll just skip those chapters this time.

[Im going home Donny]

I wonder if people with adult ADD would find it easier to quit if they were actually diagnosed and taking appropriate ADD medication? Would this help them stay focused on the task? The older of the quit smoking drugs is also sold under another name as an anti-depressant which is often a medication route for adults with ADD.

I wonder how many smokers have adult ADD and are self medicating with smoking...kinda the one steady, focused event...like meditation kinda.

hmmm...I'll let y'all in on my findings when I find the appropriate ADD meds for 'quitting smoking experiment #123'. :susel:

[Basher]

Champix is a wonder drug. At least, it was for me.

[d_rawk]

Whether folks with adult ADD are going to find their reprieve with medication is a whole can of worms itself, I guess. Cutting out the additives (*all* of them), getting rid of the PUFAs (poly-unsaturated fatty acids .. except maybe fish oil), getting to the bottom of food sensitives and/or allergies, dealing with mineral deficiencies, etc.. seem a better strategy with more payoff. But that said, know the messenger - it's a bit rich for me to be giving health advice

I remember sitting and listening to a seminar with a doctor who had spent his practice dealing with addiction issues. He insisted that while certainly not all, many of the 'intractable' addiction cases were yearning for God. I found this very unpalatable. I despise the warm, fuzzy, ambiguous, fluffiness of the 'higher power' bit of 12 step programs, and figured he was just on about that. It works to a degree (although the success of AA and other 12 steps are overstated, in my opinion) but it offends me. But he was talking about something a little different - about going toe to toe, about kicking God's ass and letting your ass get kicked back. My own mind tends towards the more mechanical: Alcohol? Check yeast and fungus and other reasons for carbohydrate dependency. Lithium and other trace minerals. Nutritional analysis, both blood and hair. Alcoholics are almost all hypoglycemic - how's the chromium? What's the fasting blood sugar? Ok, and what's the level after meals? Niacin, niacin, niacin. Inflammation. Knock it back, that's a killer that most people are self-medicating. Where the hell does God factor into such a mechanical universe? But I get stuck in these practical, mechanical, 'plumbing' sorts of things unless I very consciously redirect my attention. If I really look for it, that majestic expansiveness is right there between the spaces. Between the details.

Maybe ahead of his time. Ahead of mine, anyways.

I'm only half kidding when I suggest that the reason I got so skinny was because I couldn't shut off my brain. It burns a lot of glucose to churn and churn and churn like that on every detail about everything all of the time. This got much better when I figured out the physiological underpinnings and finally got some sleep, but you're absolutely right - smoking helps in that it gives you a regular reminder to just. stop. for a second. It also gives you a nice little blood sugar boost. But there are better ways to manage both.

Around these parts, I think I've developed a reputation as a know-it-all asshole who has an opinion on everything. Really, I'm just a guy who couldn't sleep for days because he couldn't stop thinking about some topic that he read on some message board.

[rubberdinghy]

Champix is a wonder drug. At least, it was for me.

Are you still taking it? I hear once you go off it can be trouble.

[Booche]

I think I've developed a reputation as a know-it-all asshole who has an opinion on everything.

I wish.

[d_rawk]

Do we have heat? I can never tell when you are calling me out because you seem to dance around it.

If we have heat, let's have it out.

[Basher]

I've been off Champix for almost 2 months. I partied in NY for Phish - not a single drag.