June 16, 2002-2009
 

Happy Anniversary to me! Today I am nicotine free for 7 years!!! It was very hard to quit. I quit cold turkey and had cravings everyday for 11 months, but I waged a war against my body and I won!

yay!! Well done you :thumbsup: keep going.

Congratulations. Never smoked so I can only imagine how hard it must be to quit!

Superb. Well done!

No, neither have I and it does make me wonder, how people DO manage to quit, as it's so addictive. I'm of the "well, it's better not to start really " brigade. I must say I never had a problem saying no, to anyone who offered me one, so maybe thats the answer...saying No right at the start and sticking to ur guns..I dunno.My parents smoked and that put me right off!

When I quit cigs were $4.50 a pack and now they currently sell for $8.00 a pack. I feel real sorry for the smokers of today.:sorry:

Did you move on to some other vice? I replaced smokes with sugary things. Gummy bears, etc.

I don't know how people who smoke can watch the current commercials they show, like the one with the woman who had the tips of her fingers amputated, the man who can't swim because he'd drown if water got into the hole they had to make in his throat, or the one with them removing the fatty artery deposit I just saw, and not quit, or at least try to. My mother smoked and growing up, my sister and I always thought it was gross. My sister started smoking at 19 though. She tried to quit several times, but didn't manage it until after my mom passed away at 56 all from complications due to smoking. It's gotta be really hard like you said. I think people who can quit probably can do anything they set their mind to.

Because its "cool".

Duh.

Wow, I've never seen any of these commercials. For me the penalty was getting sleep apnea which means I have to sleep with a mask on my face every night which is connected by a tube to a breathing machine so I won't stop breathing in the middle of the night. And I must do this for the rest of my life. There was nothing more scarier than waking up suddenly and realizing I couldn't breathe. For many years I was terrified to go to bed.

Well done!

Um there's a bit more to it than that. I started it as a stress relief but I must be weird because I've never felt addicted. When I'm stressed I'll smoke frequently but when I'm not I have no desire for them. I haven't had one in a couple months actually. I don't know why I'm not addicted.

Wow they're about $15 here!

A relative died a couple of years back due to smoking related issues and I tell you what, it was horrendous to see him like that ( he got stomach cancer). Any smoker who can see someone like that, would surely have quit right then and there, if knowing it COULD happen to them. Maybe taking kids into cancer wards would deter them from starting.... a bit of tough love and all that.

Because when you're addicted, those things won't happen to you. I quit a 20+ year pack a day habit two years ago this month. Nothing I saw on TV or even my mother's own COPD/Emphysema made me quit.

We're human. We think we're gonna live forever.

In my twenties I was a heavy drinker of hard liquor the cigarettes just went along with it ..once I stopped getting sh*tfaced drunk it was easy for me to quit .So I guess I was just a situational smoker.

Bingo.

I just recently tried to quit, again, and failed. Now I'm back to buying cartons. Ugh. I'll manage soon enough, I'm sure. But when you're going through stressful **** and beginning to pick up a bit of a drinking habit, smoking is hard to put down. I'll get through it, as I always do.

how did you all get started, was it peer pressure??? See, as a non smoker, I don't really get how it all works and why it would have started.Interesting topic though.....

When I started smoking some 25 years ago(!), there wasn't as much anti smoking campaigning going on. My parents smoked and most everyone I knew smoked.

So I'm guessing, that you started because everyone else did it ? I think maybe this is true in quite a few cases, maybe it was considered cool to be a smoker back then.I'm so glad now, it's pretty much banned in most places ( certainly here anyway) like in work, pubs, planes/ trains etc..although not great for you exactly, I guess.

I would say I tried it initially out of curiosity. Then, again because lots of people I knew smoked. I can't remember when it went from coolness to addiction, but I do know that cigarettes had their grip on me for many, many years. I am so thankful to be rid of those nasty things. As I said, I hit 2 years smoke free this month. And yes, be thankful that you never picked up the habit.

Interesting. glad ur smoke free now. :nod: