I’m the same…I get near-migraines around cigarette smoke and terrible stomachaches, too. One thing I really like about living in Utah is the “clean indoor air act” that prohibits smoking in any public establishment except for “private clubs” (bars, etc.).
I’ve heard people trying to quit have had good success drinking a glass of grapefruit juice…first thing in the morning when they get up, after a meal, etc.–all the times they normally want to light up. I’ve never smoked but a lot of people swear by it and say it’s worked for them. Just a suggestion in case anyone wants to try it…
I’m into my fifth week of not smoking after 25 years. I also had to quit ALL caffeine,and most alcoholic indulgences, so that I could quit. Drink three Guinness at a session smoke almost a pack doing it.
I’m in the same boat but have made it 9 months. Due to a couple health reasons I gave up smoking, coffee and tea (even decaff)all sodapop, alcohol, acidic foods and chocolate. The mountain dew cravings were almost worse than the nicotine withdrawl. I’ve had one cigarettte three months ago(wife had to have another c-section, stressfull but all went well and have a big baby boy now) and had no desire ever to have another one since. I really didn’t notice too much of a change in whistle ability but noticed a huge difference after a couple months in my quena playing (they take a lot more air).
for all you youngin’s out there… Drinking 2 or 3 mountain dews and a cup or two of coffee a day, smoking, and letting up on the exercise WILL catch up to you.
If you need help to quit, wake up at three in the morning at age 31 with a pounding irregular heartbeat. If that doesn’t work then have two kids and think about what you’ll miss in their life and what you would put your wife through if you’re not there. Worked for me.
MarkV
[ This Message was edited by: markv on 2002-07-29 16:32 ]
MarkV — I gave up all those things you mention and I agree, giving up coffee was the hardest, harder than cigarettes; Guinness was next. One was fine, two did me in.
But I’m going to make it this time. The rumour in the province of Ontario (in Canada) is that the gov is going to raise prices again to near ten dollars a pack. They’re seven bucks a pack now.
I smoke. I quit 2 years ago for 1 yr (had been smoking for about 30 yrs at that point).Was miserable. Started back after that year when adult kid went into drug rehab for the first time and at the same time my Dad (who was a smoker, but it did not kill him) was dying. Yes it may kill me. So may a lot of things. Something will eventually, that is for sure.I must say I did not feel a great deal better when I was off them. It is a bad habit I agree. I do think there are other bad habits we indulge in also. I am not promoting smoking here, but, I do think the feeling has developed in the last few years that smokers are now the “lowest of the low”. There are other habits that are just as destructive, and deadly, that are politically correct and ok and acceptable.That is what gets me. Just don’t dare light up though. There are folks who are allergic I realize. And we smokers must be considerate of others. But, this anti-smoking/tobacco thing has been carried a bit far. Yes it is not healthy, neither is over eating, drinking, drugs, or any other thing we can think up to abuse our bodies.
I smoke, forgive me my sins.
[ This Message was edited by: cowtime on 2002-07-29 21:21 ]
I’m another person who gets migraines from smoke. I’ve been to the local session a couple of times (watched and listened; I’m not good enough to play yet), but the session is in a bar and the last time the smoke was pretty bad. I’ll probably not be able to go back to the session until the law prohibiting smoking indoors kicks in – in Sept, I think. I apologize to the smokers – I used to be one – but I’m looking forward to being able to go places I now have to avoid.
Living in Europe I was amazed by how
much people were smoking and in restaurants
and other public places, too.
I always thought Europeans were more
enlightend than us Americans, but
I came away thinking the reverse.
I agree that the anti-smoking thing
has often threatened to become a
kind of moral posturing and intolerance.
But if ever the benefits of
that sort of ‘political correctness,’
outweighed the costs, well, this is it.
Finally I think a good reason to
stop smoking is that smoking is obviously
a fundamentally stupid thing to do. Which
is not to say that stupid people do it.
I will confess that sometimes I
enjoy sucking up second hand smoke,
the closest I can get to smoking
these days.
fags here are relatively cheap, for us$1.30 you can get a pack. but prices have been rising, and i’m sure the gov. will be sure to increase it again. we’re not allowed to smoke inside buildings here, most of all in gov. offices. quitting wasn’t easy because there’s always a “one last time” which leads to another “one last time”. people would start offering and damn…it’s so tempting especially during stress-heavy times.
I’ve heard people trying to quit have had good success drinking a glass of grapefruit juice…first thing in the morning when they get up, after a meal, etc.–all the times they normally want to light up. I’ve never smoked but a lot of people swear by it and say it’s worked for them. Just a suggestion in case anyone wants to try it…
Well, if I had to drink a glass of grapefruit juice every time I had the urge to do something in particular, sure and I’d lose the urge to do it right quickly!
I considered a similar treatment for checkout line candy bars… If I wanted to buy one, I’d just buy one of those “healthy” substitutes called “sweet escapes” or summat like that, and before long I’d wonder what the point was of getting the checkout candy bar at all.
De,
I guess a lot of people don’t like grapefruit juice but it just happens to be one of my favorite juices. But most people think I’m pretty weird for that.
However, I didn’t think up that trick for quitting. I have heard it works pretty well..
About once in ten years, I get a really good grapefruit. The rest of the time… mphglzsgphls!!
My only comment about the smoking is the quick descent of smoking from omnipresent social behavior in 50s-60s to the pariahs I see hanging out in front of office buildings at 11 am and other break times. Like Toffler’s Future Shock, the turnaround was rapid. You can’t even smoke outdoors at baseball stadiums nowdays.
For good or bad, this has been some social engineering on a grand scale.
Just finished reading a great new book on Tobacco (author name at home) and its history… Tons of interesting factoids about the stuff. Did you know Marlboros were originally introduced as a “ladies” brand?? Also learned that tobacco wormed its way into many cultures to the point of becoming part of creation myths and rituals. Hottentots mothers let their adolescent boys smoke a cigar while they bit off and consumed one of their testicles for manhood inititiation…
Also she has found keeping Jelly Belly jellybeans around has helped curb the craving for the tobacco.
I love my wife with all my heart and I am so grateful to her for stopping smoking, as I want us to have a long happy life together and grow old together.
Many interesting and also some sad stories here about the evils of tobacco and what some people did to quit. I’ll add one more method that worked for me about 35 years ago. Cigarette ads hadn’t been banned yet from TV. I was trying very hard to quit and it made me furious when an ad came on showing all those happy, athletic people smoking up a storm! I used the ads to focus my anger on the lying, s.o.b. tobacco executives who I knew would sell their own mothers to get people to smoke even when they knew they were killing them. I decided I didn’t want to be one of their victims so I withheld my small contribution from their billion-dollar revenue!
I had to give up coffee, at the time, which I associated with cigaretts. The good news was I switched to tea, which they now say is good for your health! And my hatred has now shifted to the lying, s.o.b. corporate executives who pull millions of dollars out their companies for themselves and leave their employees without jobs or pensions. I think I’ll go and play “The evils of greed” on my whistle and try to calm myself down!
I started at age 12, smoked for 24 years, an quit 19 years ago. Oddly, it had nothing at all to do with music. I was playing a lot of league racquetball at the time and noticed that I’d spend more time sucking air between rallies than actually playing. So one day, about three in the afternoon, I threw everything into my desk drawer and shut it. Three weeks later, I was in a really tough match and suddenly realized how much easier I was breathing.
Never went back, though I didn’t get around to throwing away the stuff in the drawer for over a year.
For those who did kick it, my doctor once showed me a chart that shows that a smoker whose been clean for 15 years has no more risk than someone who never smoked.
damn…it’s so tempting especially during stress-heavy times.