Quitting Smoking for the LAST time.

[Shahed]

Hi All !

So as of today Monday 24th December 2007, I'm quitting smoking (again). But this time I'm defintely not starting again. I'm going cold turkey, got a bottle of fine Martinique rum (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--qYm7onS58) to celebrate my victory, somewhat prematurely, HAHHA!!! LOVELY !!! Enjoying my last couple of cigarettes until I stub out for good.

I wanted to make some sort of public declaration, in line with the "let everyone know you're quitting" procedure.

Soon I'll be a non smoker again!

[woad&fangs]

Best of Luck to you.

[Shahed]

Thanks ! Smoking the last one right now, with my last glass of rum (for today!).

[Kekvit Irae]

Good luck, though going cold turkey is one of the least-successful (and one of the most painful) ways of overcoming smoking.

[Boyar Son]

Good F'n luck

I'm tryin' to get my dad to stop but...............

[Shahed]

Thanks Boyar.

Kekvit Irae, it is as I've researched, but I knew on Friday that I want to quit again. So I guess I had 2-3 days preparation. I realise that people who go cold turkey have the most chances of relapse, but I've chosen to go this way. I'm a man and the whole nicotine patch, slowly cutting down thing just doesn't feel right. Besides I tried nicotine replacements but they became nicotine supplements instead. I'd put on a patch, chew a gum and then smoke 5 cigarettes! So this is just a way for me to OD on nicotine. I may try some gum or patches, not ruling it out, but I want an immediate end to the smoke inhalation. I want to feel the benefits of not smoking immediately. I'm relying on my will, concience and presence to avoid a relapse. I'm also dropping alchohol after I finish this bottle, other than the essential glass of wine with a nice Christmas meal, and the essential glass of champagne on New Year. This is to ensure that I don't substitute the addiction with another one. I will not stop drinking but over the next couple of months I'll be much more aware of what I'm drinking.

It will be painful, YEAH!... I will LOVE the pain and I will get over this for good. I will heal.

[Mouzafphaerre]

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Congrats Sinan!

Due to legal enforcement, they put large black-on-white labels on cigarette packs warning the consumer about several potential harms smoking will cause. Most of them show "Smoking kills" but there are others too.

This guy buys a pack, reads the label "Smoking kills sperm cells and decreases your sexual power", and immediately returns it: "Boy, take this back and give me the one that kills."
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[Kekvit Irae]

One thing cigarette packs don't tell you is that it also increases urination and thirst in some people. Nicotine is seen by the body as a toxin, and flushes it out via the kidneys. However, it forces you to drink a lot more often to replenish the lost water. Most people mistake the increased urination from smoking for diabetes insipidus, which has the exact same symptoms.
It's annoying as all heck to me.

[Caius]

Good luck, you are going to need it. And I don't say it for experience.

[Vladimir]

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Congrats Sinan!

Due to legal enforcement, they put large black-on-white labels on cigarette packs warning the consumer about several potential harms smoking will cause. Most of them show "Smoking kills" but there are others too.

This guy buys a pack, reads the label "Smoking kills sperm cells and decreases your sexual power", and immediately returns it: "Boy, take this back and give me the one that kills."
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That MUST have been Sinian.

[Ramses II CP]

I quit, cold turkey, about four times. The first two times were actually quite successful, I've always fasted regularly, including off of cigs, and so the cycle of addiction wasn't really well engrained in me. The trouble was 2-3 months after I quit I'd run into a friend I'd been avoiding specifically because he/she/they also smoked, and we'd have a 'good to see you again' bash that ended with 'Well, one won't hurt me.'

It's all downhill from there.

Then I quit drinking because I realized I was an alcoholic. That was the third time I quit smoking, and the two do not go together. Eventually I had to choose between wrecking my health and life, or just wrecking my health as a stress reliever, and I chose health, i.e. smoking.

Then the wife and I decided it was time to have a child. Before we went off birth control we both quit smoking. Never looked back, never had 'just one more,' or any of that hedging stuff. It's been a little over five years since I lit up.

Good luck. IMHO it's all about motivation. If you really have a reason to quit the power of nicotine is pretty weak, but if you're just quitting to quit you may find that you start back just to start back. It's a very enjoyable habit really, especially if you can keep your use casual to start with, but the consequences are horrific, if long term.

Think about it like this: If you saw a normal, healthy guy go into a building named 'Smoking' and come out ten minutes later hacking up a lung, pushing an IV stand, looking half dead, and sporting a traech tube you'd have to be out of your %^$&ing mind to follow him into the building. Just because you have to be in there for the next 15 years of your life rather than 10 minutes doesn't mean the end isn't the same, it just makes it harder to come to terms with. At least it was for me.

I was just a half a pack a day for ~6 years, and two more on and off. Obviously it's harder the more or longer. Good luck!

[Hepcat]

Good luck Sinan!

One of my uncle and aunts smoked frequently both before and after having children. I'd always thought it a shame that the kids had to grow up with the smoke around, though I'm glad to say that they both chose to quit only 2 years ago and they've stayed off them since and are all the better for it.

[Martok]

Good luck, man. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

[Warmaster Horus]

Good luck!

My mom smokes, and a few times tried to stop. She couldn't. My dad smoked, and succeeded in quitting. Now, he's the one going out to get the cigarettes. Poor guy (it's below zero here).

In any case, good luck, Sinan! I'm sure you can do it.

[Husar]

Won't wish you good luck, instead I wish you a strong will.

Also I wish some other orgahs would join in on that, we had a similar thread before with several orgahs who wanted to quit, I know of at least one who's smoking like a chimney again.

[FactionHeir]

If you want to motivate yourself, read lots of scientific papers on the detriment of smoking on your health

Hope you are successful with quitting Sinan.

[Mouzafphaerre]

That MUST have been Sinian.

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[Bijo]

Won't wish you good luck, instead I wish you a strong will.

Also I wish some other orgahs would join in on that, we had a similar thread before with several orgahs who wanted to quit, I know of at least one who's smoking like a chimney again.

You talking about me? :P

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Anyway, Sinan, take care with it. It would be good if you would somehow develop a "switch" in your mind. You could call it strong will, you could call it whatever name would fit. I call it a switch, I call it control. If you WANT to smoke, then do it; if you want to QUIT, then stop smoking. I don't know why people have so much trouble with it...

So, anyway, again, take care with it, and let us know how it goes.

[Shahed]

THANKS! for the support everyone.
I really appreciate it and am glad to see such good heartedness.

LOL ! That must have been me at the cigarette shop. I admit!
LMFAO! Good one Mouz & Vlad. Look there's many motivators for me to quit but certainly that is one of them. My main motivator is better overall health and avoiding any future health issues. I also think it's a habit that is so totally unworthy of ME! I can't do it anymore. I have asthma which started because of cigarettes and fast food, according to the doctor, so I want to be rid of that too. It sucks to carry this stupid inhaler around all the time. LOL! I was in hospital once and I didn't want to be hospitalised because I won't be able to smoke. They changed my mind because they told me I could smoke on the balcony. That is how screwed up a habit smoking is.

I've just had it with smoking in general. I KNOW it makes such a big difference if you don't smoke. I'm sick of destroying myself like this. Smoking is the one thing in my life, that once it's really gone, I know it will benefit me tremendously.

DAY1: Going fine, then I sit in front of the laptop and am reading some random news article (Thai elections I think), and I simply light up a cigarette by habit, but also because I start missing Thailand (TRIGGERS!). I fail to notice the triggers, take a puff and then EEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKK !!!! I stub it out. LOL! It happens again when I'm on the computer later on. So I lit up 2 cigarettes and smoke 2 puffs.

DAY2: Not a single puff, all's fine, don't miss it, but feel extremely light and slight passive very mild headache for an hour or so but no big issue.

DAY3: Took a cigarette in hand, but got aware just in time that it's a cigarette and I'm about to light it. Smelt it, smelt awful, like a paper factory, put it back in the pack.

So far so good !!!

Bijo I have a switch it's called AUTOPILOT. It's not just for cigarettes, but for doing what I need to do in life in general. If I feel I'm not doing something I need to do, but I absolutely know how to do it, I just say to myself "Autopilot Engaged" in the most robotic and cyborg voice I can. I switch my mind off and just get on with whatever it is I'm supposed to be doing. I got this from EVE Online. Sometimes I also press the "WarpDrive Active" switch. This is a more fun one ! heh! ;)

I have CONTROL. It's really not such a big issue because I want to quit.

[Csargo]

It might be a good idea to get rid of the cigarettes, and good luck to you.

[Shahed]

Thanks, I decided to keep a pack. It's supposed to be harder but I think it's better because I know I have cigarettes. Plus I like the feeling when I can see the cigarettes just lying there but I have no urge to smoke.

[Mouzafphaerre]

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You got asthma?! Now, if you start smoking again I'll find you and smite you in front of your harem.

Seriously man, I know it from my father, who's got bronchial asthma.

A balloon for quitting:
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[Shahed]

HEHE ! ok well... I have a small problem. I can't sleep. I'm not feeling huge urges to smoke, but I tend to pick up cigarettes randomly, and attempt to light them before AUTOPILOT kicks in and halts the procedure. So I haven't slept all night, am tired as a drug addict. I've had one single glass of good red wine with my lunch yesterday. I'm slow as a snail mentally. I've been to bed a few times but I can't sleep. Now that the sun in up I'm not going anywhere near my bed, this could screw my biological clock and I'll end up staying awake all night every day. EXCELLENT !!! .... not!

After some thought I guess I'll say awake till night tonight. The theory is I'll be so tired that I'll have to sleep. The reality is I have easily gone many times without sleep for about 30 hours straight so it's entirely possible that I may end up in the same situation tonight. As a preventative measure I've come up with a strategy; call a friend over tonight who needs my advice for some business matters and share a glass of Scotch with her. I have to be careful not to drink to any moderate level of intoxication. She's been Thai boxing for a few years and I'm gonna ask her to bring her gloves plus an extra set for me, do a workout to tire me out. This should work. Have another Scotch after and I should be down, worst come to worst, get her to punch me out. OUCH! That's gonna hurt ! Oh well... tomorrow shall be another day, and I'll have slept the whole night like a baby. heh! ;P

[AntiochusIII]

Keep it up, my friend, we'll cheer you on!

May be it's a good idea to put the pack in plain sight, but rather out of your normal reach? That'd keep you aware before you lit one up by mistake.

[Shahed]

Good point ! Taken.

[mrdun]

Good F'n luck

I'm tryin' to get my dad to stop but...............

I find dads are a lost cause!!

[Shahed]

My father still smokes after... well since he was a young adult. He won't see it as a problem, it's 'normal' for him. I do understand that though, because heavy smokers only see life as normal when they are smoking.

So... Will Smith style....

01:10 27/12/2007 Progress Log
I can taste better. I had a lot of fruit today, and they taste great. I had some brocolli and carrots, steamed. With 300Grams steamed salmon, with Nando's Peri Peri HOT sauce, for dinner. It tasted great. Better than ever. My sense of taste is improving. I've eaten some rice & lentils (Hindu monk syle) for breakfast. I could taste every grain. Quinoa & Chicken Stew for lunch, tasted great. Ate 6 whole green chillies as a post workout snack tonight. Directly imported from Thailand. Bird's eye chillies but not really as potent as you may find in South East Asia. I could taste every seed. Burnt the hell out of mouth though, probably won't taste anything till tomorrow !

I'm very lethargic, and slow. I guess the body is going through a process. I got my butt handed to me on a basketball court, face down in the concrete and all... by a chick (!!!???)... in a Thai boxing match. So that's a first, well my male friends are being rather apelike and calling me a wuss for going through this self improvement programme. YEAH RIGHT!!! THANKS PUNKS !!! So the fairer sex comes to the rescue in companionship once again! Bar you guys here at the TOTALWAR!.org, you guys have been a GREAT support. Had a couple of glasses of Scotch, it doesn't taste so good, still tastes great ofc but something is amiss. Don't know what it is.

Fell asleep sitting up straight for an hour or so during the afternoon.

Energy levels, emotional, psychological are very high. Feel great emotionally (even though I got a butt whoppin). Mind & thoughts are clear of worry, anxiety, or thoughts of the future. Cannot sleep but revising the current battle situation it seems probable that I can stay awake all night again. Hence I'm taking some Highland 'medicine' to help knock me out. Nicotine craving is at a maximum. This has proved to be a remarkable experiment.

Blood circulation, remarkably, is very high. In the fight it felt like slow twitch fibers are suffering and dying, it's harder to maintain cardio-vasclar endurance. Breathing is slower, general muscle tone is very high. High twitch fibers are extremely responsive, (feels like) even inside the lungs. I can literally choke myself or kick the air out of my lungs. Vascular recovery has begun!.

[Vladimir]

Well don't let your smoking problem develop into a drinking problem. Trading vices is an easy trap to fall into. If anything, try to enjoy your suffering. Where the hell is Odin on this?

It's good to see you can appreciate how much better food tastes. Pity is that a cigarette can be really good after a meal. Have you considered cigars? Not those meter long ones but something you can enjoy with scotch. I don't know, maybe cut one in half. Still not that good for you but it's more important to protect your lungs. BTW did you know that nicotine helps dilate the lungs allowing you to breathe better? Quite the destructive irony.

Anyway, you said you give advice on business matters? Help me find a new job. Preferably one where I can slay pixilated infidels (Imshi! If Allah is willing you will leave me alone! ). I hear Broken Crescent is in trouble.

[IrishArmenian]

This helped me: after the first three days, the cravings are just in your head, the physical ones only last for three days.
If you're having trouble falling asleep, there's one thing you can do: find your girlfriend and then...uh...you know. After that, your body relaxes a lot, and you can generally sleep afterwards. However, this only works for males, sorry to you women who are quitting.

[Mouzafphaerre]

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Reading in bed always brings on sleep. At least for me that is. Goes to read in bed...
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