another quiting smoking thread

[Pork Chop]

Originally Posted by GunnedDownAtrocity

the hardest part is when that novelty of not smoking wears off and you're just left without cigerettes. for me it was about 2 months in, and then again around 6 months in. if you can make it through that your golden.

First three months are almost a gimme because of peer pressure.
Or rather, I should say "reverse peer pressure".
One of my buddies from work likes to try to derail anybody that's doing anything healthy.
It's mostly tongue in cheek, because he knows he's screwing up at the moment.
For me, he's saying I won't make it through St Paddy's day; so I'm d@mn sure I'm going to make it to April - of course that's not just smoking, that's alcohol as well.
April's going to be the tough month.
In May we're having a baby; June's my birthday but July's right around the corner so I'll make sure not to mess up that month.
A drink anytime the last week of July wouldn't be a bad thing.
I only get nicotine cravings when I'm drinking; but it's definitely worth it not to indulge again if I hit the July mark without alcohol.

[Pork Chop]

Originally Posted by Chief_Suicide

Has anyone ever tried Chantix? I'm not keen on getting on one drug to give up another, but I know a few people who have used it successfully.

A close friend of mine did and it worked like magic.
He was a heavy smoker and since he's been on Chantix, it looks like he's reversed the aging process.

[bakxierboxer]

Originally Posted by sanjuro_ronin

Now, a gentleman never tells.

Oh?
and, pray tell, does a "gentleman" grease his credit card, or not?
(and just what kind of "grease" would that be?)

[Lucas]

Dont give in, never stop the fight until you win.

one thing that helped me to quit was looking at my addiction like a weakness. because, it is. one that can kill you.

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

Originally Posted by sanjuro_ronin

Pick up another addiction like slapping old ladies or kicking cats or my personal favorite, swiping credit cards in the butt cracks of sexy strippers.

. . . or catching homeless people on fire. catching homeless people on fire was my anti-drug.

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

Originally Posted by Pork Chop

First three months are almost a gimme because of peer pressure.
I only get nicotine cravings when I'm drinking; but it's definitely worth it not to indulge again if I hit the July mark without alcohol.

oddly enough i used alcohol to help me make it through the first few months. it was rough after a beer or two, but as soon as i knew i was in trouble, i just started slamming them until i passed out. probably not the brightest approach, but i made it work. i wouldn't want to do that with the beer i drink now, but 5 years ago i was still drinking crap.

ironically, i just picked up a cohiba today. i've never had one, but i wanted to get a good cigar to celebrate my month without alcohol or coffee. it was a rough month because suzi got me 3 cases of really really good beer for christmas and i had to look at it all month. i even had one in the fridge that smiled at me all month long. im gonna get that sucka tomorrow at midnight.

[GeneChing]

The Ruyan V8, yea, that's just what I want to take a drag off of...

Chinese e-cigs gain ground amid safety concerns
By AUDRA ANG – 2 hours ago

BEIJING (AP) — With its slim white body and glowing amber tip, it can easily pass as a regular cigarette. It even emits what look like curlicues of white smoke.

The Ruyan V8, which produces a nicotine-infused mist absorbed directly into the lungs, is just one of a rapidly growing array of electronic cigarettes attracting attention in China, the U.S. and elsewhere — and the scrutiny of world health officials.

Marketed as a healthier alternative to smoking and a potential way to kick the habit, the smokeless smokes have been distributed in swag bags at the British film awards and hawked at an international trade show.

Because no burning is involved, makers say there's no hazardous ****tail of cancer-causing chemicals and gases like those produced by a regular cigarette. There's no secondhand smoke, so they can be used in places where cigarettes are banned, the makers say.

Health authorities are questioning those claims.

The World Health Organization issued a statement in September warning there was no evidence to back up contentions that e-cigarettes are a safe substitute for smoking or a way to help smokers quit.

It also said companies should stop marketing them that way, especially since the product may undermine smoking prevention efforts because they look like the real thing and may lure nonsmokers, including children.

"There is not sufficient evidence that (they) are safe products for human consumption," Timothy O'Leary, a communications officer at the WHO's Tobacco Free Initiative in Geneva, said this week.

The laundry list of WHO's concerns includes the lack of conclusive studies and information about e-cigarette contents and their long-term health effects, he said.

Unlike other nicotine-replacement therapies such as patches for slow delivery through the skin, gum or candy for absorption in the mouth, or inhalers and nasal sprays, e-cigarettes have not gone through rigorous testing, O'Leary said.

Nicotine is highly addictive and causes the release of the "feel good" chemical dopamine when it goes to the brain. It also increases heart rate and blood pressure and restricts blood to the heart muscle.

Ruyan — which means "like smoking" — introduced the world's first electronic cigarette in 2004. It has patented its ultrasonic atomizing technology, in which nicotine is dissolved in a cartridge containing propylene glycol, the liquid that is vaporized in smoke machines in nightclubs or theaters and is commonly used as a solvent in food.

When a person takes a drag on the battery-powered cigarette, the solution is pumped through the atomizer and comes out as an ultrafine spray that resembles smoke.

Hong Kong-based Ruyan contends the technology has been illegally copied by Chinese and foreign companies and is embroiled in several lawsuits. It's also battling questions about the safety of its products.

Most sales take place over the Internet, where hundreds of retailers tout their products. Their easy availability, O'Leary warns, "has elevated this to a pressing issue given its unknown safety and efficacy."

Prices range from about $60 to $240. Kits include battery chargers and cartridges that range in flavors (from fruit to menthol) and nicotine levels (from zero — basically a flavored mist — to 16 milligrams, higher than a regular cigarette.) The National Institutes of Health says regular cigarettes contain about 10 milligrams of nicotine.

On its Web site, Gamucci, a London-based manufacturer, features a woman provocatively displaying one of its e-cigs. "They look like, feel like and taste like traditional tobacco, yet they aren't," the blurb reads. "They are a truly healthier and satisfying alternative. Join the revolution today!"

Smoking Everywhere, a Florida-based company, proclaims it "a much better way to smoke!" while a clip on YouTube features an employee of the NJoy brand promoting its e-cigarettes at CES, the international consumer technology trade show.

Online sales make it even more difficult to regulate the industry, which still falls in a gray area in many countries.

In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration has "detained and refused" several brands of electronic cigarettes because they were considered unapproved new drugs and could not be legally marketed in the country, said press officer Christopher Kelly.

He did not give more details, but said the determination of whether an e-cig is a drug is made on a case-by-case basis after the agency considers its intended use, labeling and advertising.

In Australia, the sale of electronic cigarettes containing nicotine is banned. In Britain, the products appear to be unregulated and are sold in pubs.

Smoking is tightly woven into the fabric of daily life in Ruyan's home turf of China, the world's largest tobacco market where about 2 trillion cigarettes are sold every year.

Tobacco sales, the biggest source of government revenue, brought in $61 billion in the first 11 months of last year, up 18 percent from 2007, the Communist Party's People's Daily newspaper said.

In a country where the cheapest brands of cigarettes cost about 20 cents a pack, the e-cig is far pricier. Ruyan's V8 costs $240 and includes batteries and 20 cartridges of nicotine solution, roughly the same number of puffs as 20 packs of tobacco cigarettes. The line has expanded to include cigars and pipes crafted from agate and rosewood.

Ruyan is suing a Beijing newspaper for questioning its safety and for claiming in 2006 that its products have more nicotine than regular cigarettes.

Miu Nam, Ruyan's executive director, blames the newspaper for a hit in sales and profits but declined to give details.

"We have to restore consumers' confidence, we have to clean up people's doubts," Miu said.

An operator at the Beijing Times refused to transfer calls seeking comment Friday to managers at the newspaper. A reporter said she had heard of the case but would not give any details.

Some international experts back Ruyan's claims its product is safe.

David Sweanor, an adjunct law professor at Ottawa University and former legal counsel of the Non Smokers Rights Association in Canada, said e-cigs have the potential to save lives.

With smoking, "it's the delivery system that's killing people," Sweanor said. "Anytime you suck smoke into your lungs you're going to do yourself a great deal of damage. Nicotine has some slight risks but they are minor compared to the risk of smoke in cigarettes."

Dr. Murray Laugesen, a New Zealand physician involved in tobacco control for 25 years who was commissioned by Ruyan to test its e-cigs, said he found "very little wrong" with them.

"It looks more like a cigarette and feels more like a cigarette than any other device so far and yet it does not cause the harm," he said. "It's the best substitute so far invented for tobacco cigarettes."

In the U.S, both Philip Morris USA and RJ Reynolds have introduced cigarettes that did not burn tobacco, but the technologies were very different from the e-cigarette. Neither has been successful.

In 2006, Philip Morris USA, test-marketed the Accord, which used a heating unit activated by puffing. RJ Reynolds introduced its cigarette, the Premier, in 1987 and still sells the Eclipse, which heats the tobacco rather than burning it. Sales are "not great," said spokesman David Howard.

Li Honglei, a fast-talking 28-year-old public relations manager in Beijing, has been smoking since he was in his teens and desperately wants to quit. He thinks he may have found his answer in Ruyan.

"I was intrigued by this new technology," said the pudgy, bespectacled Li as he surveyed products displayed in glass cases at Ruyan's brightly-lit shop in the capital. "I heard acupuncture is effective as well, but this method sounds more painless."

Associated Press writers Chi-Chi Zhang and Yu Bing in Beijing and Vinnee Tong and Carley Petesch in New York contributed to this report.

[uki]

i have stopped smoking cold turkey several times over the years... the last time was nearly 3 years ago, of course there have been a few drags slipped in here and there, mostly when i was outta my head drunk. just recently in december i quit drinking altogether after waking up one day with a swollen liver... haven't had the desire since and i don't plan on it... i even passed on some free bud that my friend owed me for a truckload of firewood i gave him. seems the year of the ox has brought in some new change that is much welcomed. goodluck everyone, i know first hand that its easier said than done, but where there is a will, there is a way.

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

5 years no smoking.

also just had my 5 year cancer check up. im considered as cured as one can get ... they dont even bother doing scans from here on out unless there are some symptoms that warrent it.

[Lee Chiang Po]

Originally Posted by GunnedDownAtrocity

5 years no smoking.

also just had my 5 year cancer check up. im considered as cured as one can get ... they dont even bother doing scans from here on out unless there are some symptoms that warrent it.

Congratulations. That is indeed an accomplishment. Also, congratulations on the no smoking. I quite about 6 or 7 years ago myself, after about 45 years of doing it. It was one day at a time until I was completely over the urge.
My wife is less willing to give it up, so I bought her some of those American made E smokes. They seem to be taking over the habit for her. Even if it is trading one addiction for another, it is still nicotine, but without the other 1,000 smoke poisons that you get from burning tobacco. It can not be good for you, and has not yet been determined just how bad it might be, but I see it as far lesser of the 2 evils. Also it is much cheaper.

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

thanks man. i had to google e cigerettes and found this vid: http://awearnessblog.com/2009/04/fda...about-e-sm.php

does your wife say that it is even remotely similar to smoking an actual cigerette? if so, kudos to the company that made them. i think.

[Lee Chiang Po]

Originally Posted by GunnedDownAtrocity

thanks man. i had to google e cigerettes and found this vid: http://awearnessblog.com/2009/04/fda...about-e-sm.php

does your wife say that it is even remotely similar to smoking an actual cigerette? if so, kudos to the company that made them. i think.

Actually it is pretty much like smoking a real sig. It has an artificial taste that is remotely like tobacco, but the wife says it was more like cinimin. It looks just like smoking a sig too. The smoke is actually a water vaper of sorts that contains nicotine. She actually smoked less from it and smoked no real sigs at all for that first day. Then she got sick, but not from the esigs, but something else she ate. Anyway, She says it is different, but not a lot different.
Something I noticed is that people tend to try to hot box the esig. It is like it is going out and needs to be puffed on harder. So they waste some of it by doing that. I told her to just breath the air straight into the lungs and she did. She says it is like real smoke when you do that, and another thing is that at first they tend to smoke it more than a real sig. They soon slow down because they get a real nicotine high. Just 4 or 5 tiny little drops is equal to a full pack of smokes for an average person. If a person must smoke, the esigs are the way to go. It feed the nicotine addiction, yet it will not blacken your lungs with the nasties. I am still taking notes on this so have not completely come to conclusion.

LCP

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

Originally Posted by GunnedDownAtrocity

. . . my reasoning is that if im just going to want one 5 years later anyway whats the point. on one level i know exactly what the point is ... but on another it sounds nice to ignore it sometimes.

ha! that was pretty cool reading that quote. been five years now and i dont want one at all. of course i still drink entirely too much. victory baltic thunder right now.

[uki]

Originally Posted by GunnedDownAtrocity

ha! that was pretty cool reading that quote. been five years now and i dont want one at all.

good stuff!!

of course i still drink entirely too much.

meh. we are drinking precisely the amount we should be.

victory baltic thunder right now.

i am a fan of the victory hop devil myself...

[Lee Chiang Po]

I have never been one much for beer. I can handle a bit of wine, but I prefer stronger spirits. I have even considered buying myself a still. People misunderstand me when I say I don't drink any more. Actually, I really don't drink any less either. But who knows? If I had myself a still things could move on up.

LCP