[MJB DIGITAL]

Actually exercise is the miracle drug.

It is well know that quitting causes depression-like symptoms in smokers.

Scientists at Dundee University have discovered that smoking causes physical changes in the brain which stop it being flooded with the body's natural stress-busting hormone, serotonin.

It is well known that generally seratonin improves mood and also that
exercise improves seratonin uptake.

Folks suffereing from mild depression are often "prescribed" exercise by their analysts because it does improve depression to an extent.

Exrecise IS the answer. Thought I must admit that I am now adicted to exercise - heh.

When I quit, I started swimming. It was taking me 50 minutes to swim 1000 yards. I am now swimming 2000 yards (a pool mile) in 32 minutes. Actually, that's my average 2000 yard time over three miles. At one point I tried for a best time and got a 25 minute pool mile. I think that's a 200% improvement over time.

FWIW. Seems you alreadu know this. Just trying to support what you already know.

woof!

Yeah, when I am working out, I definitely am addicted to getting in the ring with fellow blackbelts. It's exciting and full of seratonin production. I call sparring, fellowship.

What is GND?

Graduated Neutral Density

After over 40 years smoking, I quit a little over 2 years ago using Chantix which worked quite well except for the emotional side effects. Be really careful if you use this stuff and have someone else monitor your moods. I was a boiling pit of anger which is NOT me normally.

On the bright side, after 1 year without a cigarette, I bought a K100D Super with the money I didn't spend on cigarettes. This year, since Wolf was having the clearance sale, for 2 years without a cigarette I bought a K10D, a K100D Super for my wife so she would quit borrowing mine, a DA 50-200 and a tri-pod plus other goodies with the money I didn't spend on cigarettes. Granted the knowledge that I was smoking up at least 1 new camera every year didn't help me quit but that same knowledge sure does help me stay quit. Every time I get the urge for a smoke, I just pick up my K10D and hold it. Works like a charm.

My neighbor gave me a pack of Chantix. I have used it before and it really does a good job. Problem last time was that I was sharing it with a girlfriend who was so totally a bitch (before we started the chantix and after) that I broke up with her and continued smoking.
Emotionally Chantix has the opposite effect on me than it did for you. I have extremely positive emotions to the point where I remind myself that I need to settle down so I don't burn out from all of this elation...weird.

[24X36NOW]

Watch the scene in Dead Again where Andy Garcia smokes (and exhales) through the hole in his neck, and has to talk with the assistance of a voicebox device of some sort. Repeat.

[Fl_Gulfer]

I had to quit drinking first, then about 5 years later I just threw my pack of smokes in the trash and said thats it. Haven't touched a pack since, That was after 30 years of smoking.

[PeterAM]

I stopped smoking 45 years ago, while I was in the Air Force and a pack of cigarettes was ten cents in the BX. Most difficult part was when everyone else would take a "smoking break" and I was the only one not lighting up. I stopped because I had a yellow finger tip and would wake up in the morning, cough something up and then light up. Never really had a problem with quitting except when I would be having a drink with someone and missed the combination. Thinking back, it was one of the few smart things that I did back then; quitting while in my twenties and not letting it go any further.

[Steve Beswick]

Earlier this year I was sitting on the patio and I came to the realization that I had not lived a single moment of my adult life as a non smoker. I'm 34 years old. A couple days later I was walking through Target coughing and straining to keep up with my 12 year old daughter. Less than a minute later I saw a teenage girl pushing her mom around in a wheelchair. That was about all it took.

I feel ten years younger than I did a year ago.

[Ash]

That kind of realisation is just wisdom in action, Steve.
Well done.
And on all other testimonies I've seen here, it's good inspiration to continue talking about it with those who just don't realise how smoking can affect the smoker and his/her family.
Great stories, guys.

[cupic]

Quit about 18 years ago had surgery done by a Dentist was told to stop for a week and the rest is history.Mind you I did try Acupuncture nearly worked but the nasties keep haunting me back


cheers

[Stringmike]

I guess from the original post that you'd really like to quit. Let me encourage you to keep trying.

I helped a colleague quit some years ago. He had severe withdrawal symptoms and we'd drink beer and talk about lots of other interesting things for hours until he got over his cravings. It seemed to work for him, although his wife got a bit mad with me when he came home all beery. I recall it took him around six months to be over the worst and several years before the impulse to pick one up again left.

As I recall, nicotine is an alkaloid drug not too far removed from caffeine and cocaine and reportedly much more addictive than the others. Having trouble quitting is not your fault - you are addicted to a vicious drug.

What might help is to view it as socially undesirable (a colleague recently described a visitor smoking in his smoke-free house as similar to a dog peeing on his carpet!). Also, if you're looking for a mate anywhere other than Asia or South America, you'll find non-smoking women are in the great majority. Quitting will definitely improve your love life!

....and you'll have more money to spend on useful stuff like cameras and lenses!

Good luck

Mike

[pentaxian_tmb]

2 things.

First, you need to WANT to quit. I mean REALLY want to quit. Not as in, "I want to be more healthy," but "I don't ever want to smoke again." 80% of quitting is purely mental. I tried a and failed a number of times because I was always trying for the wrong reasons: girlfriend, family, money, etc. But every other time, at least subconsciously, I wanted to smoke. Thus, I would try and "cut-back" but would still relish each time I lit up. It sounds so self-evident, but the bottom line is you have to want to quit. You have to want it bad enough that the thought of inhaling makes you sick to your stomach.

What finally did it for me was a combination of factors. I got into cycling and one day I could not make it up a very small hill. I thought to myseld, I am 29 years old--and I can't ride a bike up a hill. I then considered that I had been smoking for over 10 years, and had not gone more than a week without smoking. Finally, I met a girl that I wanted to mary more than I wanted to smoke.

I have been smoke free for over 2 1/2 years now. I exercise regularly (endorphins replaced nicotine), drink a lot of cofee, and feel much better. I can't even walk into bars where they allow smoking because I find it too disgusting. Sure, there are times when I get stressed and I want a smoke.....But those residuals cravings pass in a few minutes.

[pentaxian_tmb]

again left.

Having trouble quitting is not your fault - you are addicted to a vicious drug.

While, technically this is true, I dislike this line of thinking because it allows people to excuse themselves and think "well, I want to quit, but I can't, and I can't because I am addicted, which isn't my fault, so its 'ok' to have just this one" etc, etc, etc.

Yes, smoking is addictive and you have to overcome the chemical dependency. But after 2-3 weeks, it becomes a matter of pure willpower.

Doing nicotine replacement patches, gum, inhalers, doesnt work, because your body still wants the nicotine. In this respect, if the physical dependency is what is holding you back, go to your doctor. There are many pills that will actually make your body have an adverse reaction to nicotine and make you ill, such that your body's desire not to be sick overrides its desire for nicotine.

[MJB DIGITAL]

ugh

i was down to one every other day. then i lost my mode of transportation. i haven't been able to get a hold of my boss. haven't been to work for two days. i've been steady working on my car to get it fixed so i can register it. during the process, i have been watching three kids ages 5 5 and 8 and im losing my f***ng mind. so yesterday i had four, which i will consider a major relapse.
so i was browsing the forums with dogs barking and kids running around, and i saw this thread....

...just wanted to stop in and say thanks. i was bent over my bed this morning praying for some help.

mitch

[Eaglerapids]

In my own experience monochrome has it right. I've never understood patches and the like, after all the ONLY way to kick the nicotine habit is to quit using nicotine. You have to rid your body of nicotine, period. In the whole scheme of things, you're torturing yourself by smoking one a day, the same as using patches. You're still throwing away good money to buy nicotine whether you get it in cigarettes or in patches.
You can tell yourself whatever works for you, rationalize it however you need to, use the ciggy money for something you've always wanted, give it to charity, throw it away needlessly, whatever. But whatever you do, just don't light up a cigarette today. It's just that easy. If you light one up under stress you've just shown weakness. Are you that weak? Each time you resist the urge you gain strength. Each day that goes by and you don't light up you get stronger, the urges get weaker. Well after two weeks, that is:-). Day three (of total abstiness) is terrible, god awful terrible, but you won't die by not lighting up, you'll just get stronger. Your mind will play every dirty trick on you imaginable. In it's "We're not going to quit goddammit" mode it will make every rationalization in the book and pound you with them, after all, your mind knows your every weakness and it will hammer you.
Now, who is in control? Are you man enough to take control? None of us can do it for you. When I quit for good....the first time, the guys at work would catch my eye as they went to grab a quick smoke. All the smokers around you don't want you to quit, they want to also, but they ain't man enough and if you succeed it makes them feel bad. At two weeks it happened again, I looked up and there went my buddy to go have a smoke.....and I truly didn't want one, I was free, as free as I can get anyway. Because, you see, I love to smoke, yes, it's true, I love it and nothing will ever make that go completely away. To make a long story shorter, I started smoking again 12 years later for no good reason, for 2 years, quit for two years, smoked again for 4 years and then in March of this year, facing getting all my teeth pulled and getting dentures I quit again. Talk about stress. But it's almost easy now because I've faced the dragon and prevailed before and I know I can do it.
I've never let other people who do smoke bother me, after all I'm one of them. If I'm in someone's car who smokes, let them light up I don't care because I'm not lighting one up today anyway. Doesn't bother me at all to go into a bar, those guys smoke, I don't. I could light one up right now, if I wanted, after all I haven't quit. If I did that my mind would take that and run all night. Hell I've got smokes left over from my smoking days in the fridge right now. I could light one up right now but as much as I love to smoke, I also like to get out in the woods and push my old body to see how far I can carry my photo gear and I can lug it much farther up steeper inclines when I don't light one up today. Food tastes better. Remember how when you were in great shape how you could push your body and your second wind would kick in and you could push and push and remember how freakin' good it felt?
Don't light up today and you will be amazed how much of that you can regain.
Try it man, for 14 days don't light up a cigarette, or a patch or anything. No nicotine whatsoever for 14 days. Even when you wake up in the middle of the night sweating the stinking crap out of your body. Jump in the shower but no nicotine for 14 days.......and then we'll talk.
You man enough?
Just tell your mind you won't have a smoke today, tomorrow you can smoke all you want, just don't light one up today and you'll be fine.

[Ash]

ugh

i was down to one every other day. then i lost my mode of transportation. i haven't been able to get a hold of my boss. haven't been to work for two days. i've been steady working on my car to get it fixed so i can register it. during the process, i have been watching three kids ages 5 5 and 8 and im losing my f***ng mind. so yesterday i had four, which i will consider a major relapse.
so i was browsing the forums with dogs barking and kids running around, and i saw this thread....

...just wanted to stop in and say thanks. i was bent over my bed this morning praying for some help.

mitch

Oh man!
You can't quit with all that stress about you.
Detoxing from nicotine is no joke as you know, you need all the help you can to do it ... less stress, dealing with triggers positively (snack, read a good book, exercise or log on PF instead ), avoid being in places where people smoke, esp with your friends who smoke, etc...

Eaglerapids' cold turkey approach works - one just needs enough discipline to hang in there when the going gets tough.

I wish you all the best in that mate.
It's tough, but you can be tougher!

[EsBee]

Oh man!
You can't quit with all that stress about you.
Detoxing from nicotine is no joke as you know, you need all the help you can to do it ... less stress, dealing with triggers positively (snack, read a good book, exercise or log on PF instead ), avoid being in places where people smoke, esp with your friends who smoke, etc...

Eaglerapids' cold turkey approach works - one just needs enough discipline to hang in there when the going gets tough.

I wish you all the best in that mate.
It's tough, but you can be tougher!

Oh man!
You can't quit with all that stress about you.
Detoxing from nicotine is no joke as you know

After smoking more than one pack a day for nearly 20 years, I just went cold turkey one night, and picked the height of one of the most stressful times of my life. No patch, no chewables and no stopping on my usual brew or hanging out with buddies. The next day I bought three fresh packs, one for my car, one for my drawer at work and the last one went into my garage at home. Not because I wanted them available if the urge took me over, but I wanted to make sure not smoking was as difficult as possible.

I tossed the packs away after a couple of weeks I think, and its been 22 months but who's counting?

The point of it is, I am just an average guy and I believe it can be done by anyone.

[Ash]

It can, and everyone has the capacity to do it, but...
The spirit is willing - the flesh is weak.

Physical discipline has no substitute...