[OT] Nicotine - What's your story

[COSM]

I thought it would be nice to get some insight as to what other people think about this drug. It's a sort of anything goes topic, quitting stories, justification, mental battles, non-smokers thoughts... I'm just up for gathering some information from people that have a similar lifestyle to me.

My story, I've been a 'social' smoker for about 2 years. I was having one or two only once a month at parties.... or if I had big long chats with interesting people I would smoke a bit more. About a year ago this slipped into a more regular regime as it does, and I was smoking about a pack a week... but I was quite dishonest about it to a lot of people which I really didn't like.

I ditched that regularity and am now back to a pretty minimal amount, if I smoke it's in the weekends and when I've had a few drinks, and I don't let it spill over into every day life, but buckle every now and then.

I'm well aware of all the facts, I think more than most people.. but I'm still fascinated about the hold it has on me still.... especially because I consider myself a pretty on to it person when it comes to areas of mental addiction, but the whole act of smoking has weeded it's way into my social life and it's hard to shake it away.

I really enjoy smoking, but I hate it. The smell, physical (and mental) implications, the look and the cost are horrible, but the whole process makes me feel happy.

I did some interesting testing out of things, like giving my body the required nicotine it needed without smoking (inhalers) so that I could get my physical addiction side in context so I knew what was completely mental.. that gave me some good perspective.

Self help type methods are pretty useless with me as I tend to focus more on the techniques the process is using for my own amuzment rather than playing ignorant and going along with it... the Alan Carr book was a fascinating read and I gained so much from it, but I didn't change my smoking habits one bit.

I don't smoke pot, hardly take any other drugs and if I do it's usually in a controlled environment for a specific purpose... and anything amphetamine based doesn't usually make its way into my life... no other physical addictions.

I've had some great conversations with people about it... hard core smokers who can give a good battle to justify why the smoke.. the best being an (eastern) doctor who claims he will live longer by not stressing about it and just keep smoking rather than the mental anguish of quitting...plus an interesting series of lifestyle choices based on eastern medicine and acupressure.

I'm curious to hear of peoples stories.... and it would be good to keep things as honest as possible as I've found people tend to white lie out of pride or something, I want to know how much the struggle was and what little things helped.

aaaaaand GO!

[Android Bishop]

I successfully quit cold turkey for an entire year with NO problems and then one day I was drunk with my friends and BAM! smoker again

alcohol and other smokers fucks up all my shit. Probably wouldn't smoke if it werent for those two things

[Pasha]

25 Years ago.... (Yes I'm Mathusalem) I wanted to date a nice girl.
She was a smoker. I had very little money so I bought a very low quality
packet of cigarettes to get her attention.. I wanted to smoke in front of her..
Then I went red as a pepper and began an endless cough.. That was my first
and last cigarette. Thanks to that girl... for ever.
Friends still laugh at me because of that.. I felt so stupid...
(BTW I wasn't able to date her )

- Best
- Pasha

[Machinesworking]

OK I'll bite. I quit 9 years ago, and it was the hardest drug I ever quit. <-- mentally, the physical addiction part is over in four days or less, the psychological part lasted almost a year. Anybody that uses any eastern medicine bullshit excuse is so far off center it's just crazy. The human body is not designed to ingest smoke, period. There really isn't any arguing with this. It could be argued that alcohol is natural, or that mushrooms are, but intentionally inhaling smoke is unnatural. There are no good physical benefits from doing so.
Seattle outlawed smoking in nightclubs and I'm happy about it. I let people smoke in my car, roll the window down and you hardly get any smell, but in a club man it gets freaking nasty.

The people who sell cigarettes, they know, everybody knows, the shit kills people left and right. It's not like a slab of bacon, while addicting and possibly deadly, it has at least some nutritional value. Not at all, it's a drug, it's highly addictive, and it kills you. These people selling this to you know this. There are rich families right now buying expensive cars and fur coats off of the addictions of people like you and your friends. There are people right now on life support because as little as 20 years ago the tobacco companies spent millions of dollars on add campaigns to convince people that the cancer wasn't connected, and that it was a 'choice'.
^^^ That right there is what really made me quit, it wasn't the hacking, or the nasty smell ( you grow to like the smell ), it was the fact an industry had grown around killing people with a pretty stupid drug, that barely does shit, that makes you unhealthy in a very real and easily observed way.

Anyway it's your life, you can do what you want, but my opinion is if it's not good for certain people, it makes them addicted and dependent, it kills them, but hey I can handle it, well then I'm more or less being a jerk. I don't drop acid anymore for this reason. I met too many people who did, and it opened up personal demons for them. Out of respect for those that can't handle it, I don't partake.

[funknotik]

I would suggest you save your money, purchase a vaporizer and some marijuana, and enjoy that occasionally. Trust me you will enjoy it much more and it won't damage you at all.

[musiker01]

I smoked for 20 years. It took me about 10 years to become a regular smoker. Now it has taken me about 5 years to quit. Guess I'm a little slow. Alcohol makes it much harder to quit smoking. I should probably give up on that too.

[Android Bishop]

I would suggest you save your money, purchase a vaporizer and some marijuana, and enjoy that occasionally. Trust me you will enjoy it much more and it won't damage you at all.

this person CLEARLY does not understand smokers at all

[IP]

Cigar after the food
Cigar after sex
Cigar with the drink
Cigar with the coffee
Cigar when shit
Cigar when render the track to disk
Cigar when thinking 'WTF is wrong with the track'

hard to beat
a legal drug

[nathannn]

I would suggest you save your money, purchase a vaporizer and some marijuana, and enjoy that occasionally. Trust me you will enjoy it much more and it won't damage you at all.

and what is this suppose to do?

does it actually get you high or relax you?

[gjm]

Non smoker. Sooooooooo glad.

[logic_user99]

I started because I ran out of pot; how stupid! Smoked constantly for a few years, and tried to pack up for the first time about three years ago. Failed. Started again, and tried to stop again. Failed, but not so bad. Smoked, but smoked much less than before. Decided that it wasn't for me anymore and just stopped, just like that.

I'll still have the odd one or two at a band practice (just because I like to) but I don't ever buy cigarettes, or smoke them when I go out.

[robfoster]

I successfully quit cold turkey for an entire year with NO problems and then one day I was drunk with my friends and BAM! smoker again

alcohol and other smokers fucks up all my shit. Probably wouldn't smoke if it werent for those two things

+1, i also gave up nicotine for 18 months, went on the bong instead, fucked my brain up wholesale by taking this approach, developed panic attacks, ocd etc, finally decided to knock the bong on the head, started to feel much better, fancy that! Still an occasional nicotine smoker though.

[nq]

i really do have a love/hate-relationship with smoking. i really do enjoy it. to be honest. i love it. but i also hate all the side effects, being short of breath, the smell, the taste, you name it. i tried to quit so often and i managed to have longer times without cigarettes (5 years and 1 year) in the last 12 years i was smoking. i used to smoke a pack of cigarettes a day, when i was younger, but especially the last year it was mostly about 6-8 cigarettes a day, which is still consider a huge amount.
at the moment i'm off cigarettes for the last couple of days. time will tell, if i have enough strength to make it through.

On the other hand, i'm really annoyed with all the health related issues and topics, that came up the last decade in society, but discussing that would open up a complete different can of worms

[bodhi71]

Reading all this makes me want to go buy a pack...

[smartass303]

i stopped for a year because of a bad acid trip and went something like *straight edge*
that was like 10 years ago and after that i stopped smoking industrial manufactured cigarettes.
now i roll my own and smoke like 35 gram a week with charcoal filters. its ok for me. i know its a bad habit but i have no problem controlling it. if theres no tobacco, then theres no smoke.
i never tried to stop after that.

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