Stop Smoking: Secrets of Successful Quitters

I've smoked off and on for 15 years. I quit the first time when I found out I was pregnant with my son and was smoke free for about a year and a half. 9/11 happened and I relapsed. It took another 4 years for me to quit and that was because I took up cycling and wanted to ride more than a mile without sucking air. I was again smoke free for about a year and then went thru a divorce and started up again. I really was disappointed in myself. I began a new relationship (with a smoker) and we both knew we needed to quit. He gave it up as a new years resolution, it took me a little while longer. I put it in my head that when we went on vacation, the cigarettes were not coming with me. 6 weeks after he quit, I smoked the last one in my pack and got in the car for a week long vacation. It was easy to do it then because we were enjoying our trip, my mind was off of cigarettes, I wasn't in my usual habits. We pointedly stayed in non smoking rooms, ate in the non smoking section of the restaurants ect....I came back still a non smoker. 2 weeks later we discovered I was expecting. That was all the motivation I needed to stay a non smoker. Our daughter is 3 months now and I'm still a non smoker. I can be around others who smoke and it doesn't bother me. I think what worked for me was transfering those bad habits to something positive. Coffee and cigarette in the morning went to coffee and feeding my daughter her morning bottle. Cigarette at work turned into a brisk walk around the building. I feel much better and I know I'm healthier for quitting. It can be done!

Michelle of MO 9:28AM January 24, 2010

We should give up the habit.

of 1:23PM January 13, 2010

Quitting is easy. It's the staying quit that fails, 3 weeks later, 6 months, 2 years, twenty. You haven't quit until you realize you've been addicted to nicotine all this time, and what a mark the nicotine companies are playing you for. Afterwards you look at smokers with great compassion, not secret envy.

nicotine is as addictive as heroin according to science. We build all of our ideas and attitudes around cigarettes, but they're all lies made up by the addiction. It's not the cigarette, it's the nicotine, and knowing the difference can change failing into succeeding.

I read Alan Carr - his book is out of print in the U.S. (wonder why) but you can find it on UK Amazon. He used to smoke 100 per day and he knows all the tricks we play. You smoke while you read the book and when you finish the book you know that you will be HAPPY to be a non-smoker for the rest of your life.

That's the difference, not quitting as some kind of sacrifice, but being happy not to smoke, Then there's no danger of going back (the biggest reason to fail).

It works. I never think of cigarettes but I don't have to try, because I know what they are now. Cigarettes are not the enemy, nicotine is the enemy. The tobacco companies know this full well, and you're being gamed.

Ross of TX 5:06PM November 19, 2009

I smoked a pack a day for 25 years. I put my last cigarette out on November 9, 2007 at 8:34PM CST. I used Nicocure which I bought on-line. It is suppose to clean the nicotine out of the body at a much faster rate than quitting cold turkey. For all I know, it was an expensive placebo, but it worked for me. I don't miss the cost, the smoker's cough nor the smell! It was a mind game in the beginning. I kept telling myself I could have a cigarette in six months. When May 9 (six months) came around, the last thing I wanted was a cigarette! I am thoroughly enjoying my freedom from nicotine addiction!

Jean of WY 1:49PM November 19, 2009