JB 883

I am kind of in the same boat as these two. I didn't/don't specifically set aside the cash I would have spent on smoking. Prior to Oct 2017, I was spending only $40 a month on it (RYO cigarettes) So it wasn't significant. I guess no matter how one spends their previous "cigarette money", it makes buying "needs" more affordable and "wants" a little more guilt free. "I really don't need this but what the heck, at least it is not tobacco". I said that each time I upgraded my already gawdy stereo system. Lead us not into temptation, for that we can easily find on our own. Two things - What is PBS? Here it is some TV station. Also, you know that kids, especially teens, cannot survive without brand name... well anything really. When I was 10 (84/85), I wanted this torn up jean jacket they had at the store, it was only $80 and didn't understand why my mom wouldn't spend that much on a torn up jacket.

I would bet it was probably taylor swift. I think every song on the radio is her. For us Gen X'ers, every song they played for like 8 years was Madonna, so now the kids have Taylor swift. Sadly enough the kids now will one day say, "We had good music when it was actually artistic." No, their music is "autistic". I just looked up this week's top 40 songs, I do not know a single one. From most charts in the 80's though, I would know 90% of the songs. Here in Indiana, there was some vacation commercial on TV talking about taking a trip to Ohio. The sheer excitement of vacationing in Ohio was causing people to scream and faint, like when The Beatles first came out. But where I am, there is more than corn in Indiana. There is.... there is... well let me get back when I think of something. Oh my GYOD though do not get me started about those damned "Pure Michigan" commercials.

One thing I would have recommended is maybe buy a window AC unit for at least whatever room you are in most and sleep in. I think like $140 for a 5,000 BTU unit that cools a room up to 150 square feet. Not as good as central air but If you run into this situation often then it would be a good backup. The house I stay at just doesn't have central but both rooms have a window AC and they do fine.

Here is one, it is about money - I wasted $160 in two months on smoking, going through 3 packs a week. I thought, "$160 could have gone to something more fun or useful". For me, when I would spend that kind of money on any other luxury/useless things, I would feel strange but when I bought smokes, it was somehow easier to justify. Maybe cause "Oh only about $6 here and there". But then it adds up and is like, "Whoa, THAT was dumb". So I learned the nicobitch steals slowly so you don't notice til it is in the three figures in weeks. Even if one spends that money on other useless things, it isn't going to kill you.

In short - I will see how this one goes. So far it has been harder cause I was smoking real cigarettes instead of those "roll your own" using pipe tobacco. Yeah that stuff is weak. Quitting it was not hard. Steps to not relapse - Just don't buy cigarettes. My room mate doesn't use it so there is none. HERE is what caused my hard relapse - Oct 2017 was the start of the 1.5 year quit. In April I smoked like 6 cigs, but just wasn't into it and quit. Then toward the end of May, some kleptomaniac decided to rip me off. Maybe my fault but it kind of set me back at a bad time. I was pissed and had all kinds of negative emotions, more than I had experienced in years. About the first week of June I decided "Oh screw it" and bought a pack, thinking, "It doesn't matter anyways". Well earlier this week, I woke up and could hear my own breath. Smoker's cough was coming back. I had spent $160 in two months on my habit. I thought, "This just needs to stop." So far, I have been playing referee to several imaginary fights going on in my head. Now either you or Jillar has a thread, "what have you learned..." I need to put something important in there, lemme find it.

These are going to hurt to read. Proceed at your own risk. My room mate and I have a habit of making "dad jokes". Some are so bad it causes physical pain. One time my tire was going flat. So I pulled up to this air pump and it was like $2 to use the stupid thing. I told her, "It didn't used to cost but 50 cents to use these, IF they even charged at all." And she goes, "Yep, that's inflation". BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooo One time we were trying to figure out what to make for dinner. She said, "...nothing sounds good". I said, "HEY, I hear that is a popular meal in starving countries". Jokes like that are just one of the reasons that when I die, I am going someplace that is a smoking section in it's entirety. One time I was at a friend's house and we were watching some movie called "Rubber". It is about a tire going around killing people. In one part it goes by this place where they are throwing old tires into a fire pit. It left. I told my friend, "Yeah, he seen that going on and figured he better ROLL!" She got mad and said, "OK that is the worst groaner ever..."

Jillar - Thank you. Thank you. When I blew my 1.5 year quit, I got the mixture of reactions you mentioned. Some came across kind of rude, some were polite. There was one person here in particular who was not judging but "professional" with feedback. It was the last person on here I expected to be so (insert whatever positive verb.) I have more respect for this person now than I could have imagined. One of the true leaders around here. As someone told me, when you take a fall, it is interesting to see who steps up and who kicks you when you are down. So for Jillar in particular, I think we may have disagreed at times (probably cause I tend to be smart ass). If so, I would now like to bury the hatchet.

No matter what one does or wants to do, good or bad, SOMEone will undermine it. Even if it is just something you take pride in, someone will want to put it down. Maybe "Oh you cannot/will not" or there are the one-ups men. Like if you are good at a sport but they know someone who is 10 times better at it. Now I almost hate to give this advice but if you do relapse, start asking those same people for cigarettes or money to buy packs. I promise they will then encourage you to quit or stay quit. Shoot, maybe ask for cigarette money even if you do not relapse (but spend the money wisely like ebay stuff). They will stop undermining your quit. EDIT - hey I forgot, - The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person who is doing it. So ankush, next time they start flapping their lip, just say, "Hang on, I am on my not-smoking break"

So if he were semi-interested, would you turn into the preacher for his funeral?

So you live alone and have quit smoking. Basically your life is yours to live as you see fit. Freedom. Plus, since you are not tied down to smoking anymore, that is even more freedom. "Ending it all" is not a good option. Most of us are luckier than we could even understand because of the things we DO have.

Welp, There goes my desire to perform auto-erotic activity for the evening.

Boo would be proud of that innuendo. oh my gyod... I'm done.

Something like this came up on another board I frequent. Here is the fact - even if you are using NRT, it is still better than smoking. Gums, patches, whatever... at least you are not roasting your lungs. As far as the guy at work or anyone putting you down, ask this - are they doing you any favors? They are not living your life. Even if you need NRT, just don't light up a smoke. I know from recent experience that it is not as pleasant as we imagine. I would also say if you DO smoke, maybe keep silent about it cause you know how people are, you screw up once and they act like you just personally handed Jared Fogel a license to run a day care. Think about this too - when someone relapses back to a habit or lifestyle, people say "you can only blame yourself". OK so when you quit smoking and next when you quit NRT the credit is al yours Yeah there is such a thing. I work with some brain dead idiot who keeps saying h is going to find another job yet there he is three days a week walking around with his nose buried in his cell phone. He is a "fake quitter". Now my nephew on the other hand, he has quit many jobs, had quit high school, quit trade school... he is a REAL quitter. HUUUUUU HU HU HU HU HU

First of all, when you get off the patches and nicotine completely for any amount of time, then you can talk crud about other peoples' relapses. Second, I could care less about "Fanfare". I imagine those who got the most upset and talked crap probably used other NRT stuff after their so-called "quits". Yeah I talk a lot of crap but I do not personally attack people who relapse. Funny how I am no where close to being part of the in-crowd of this board yet a few took interest when I posted about a relapse. And "a" hot dog? Just one? I would be picking up probably three or four. But then I am no vegan.

Since hipsters are fading away, the world needs something to laugh at. Now CLEARLY those guys need to have off spring. So he dumped in his drawers for all inceldom to see? Who the heck wants to be watched while taking a dump? For the incel, NOPE stands for - Not One Piece Ever. And yeah, it is short for "involuntarily celibate". They tend to hide in the basement so they can NOT get laid in peace. What they do not understand is sex brings with it awkwardness at best and life-ruining results at worst. It was said best in some movie I saw (blood in blood out), some crooked guard and con were business partners, the new guy walks in on something, the con says, "He's alright, he is with me..." and the guard said, "I am not risking everything over some piece of ass!"

Boo, Corporations are often clueless about things. The current way to say one wants to fornicate is "I'd smash it", which despite being a really dumb and nerve-grating phrase, is today's thing. I personally believe that "I'd smash it" was probably invented by incels who are so unlucky that even pornhub won't welcome their virgin existence .

You know, I am thinking it was probably a bad idea to post about my little relapse. It seems you and a few others here have attacked and blown things out of proportion, like you are glad it happened. Like, "alright! an opportunity to pounce!" Funny thing is, there are three people on here who I would have expected backlash from but were either very polite or said nothing. All three of them I have not been nice to in the past and feel worse about that than anything. Also - I smoked 15 years and had quit long before anything crippling happened. So if 6 cigarettes over 3 days is a "full blown 5 alarm relapse" then what exactly is it when someone quickly relapses to a pack (or more) a day and stays smoking for months or years. For those (except Doreen) who ARE acting like it is your place to decide what I do, exactly why are you so upset about my small relapse? Are you assuming I am sitting here smoking right now or something?

What you mentioned though could help someone quit smoking. I mean they would be too busy scratching their heads trying to make heads or tails of it. Can't do that while smoking. Might ask - the first few smokes after the years quit, how did it feel? Was there a lot of guilt involved? Was it more like, "Screw it, I do what I want"? When "average" makes it's way into statistics, it offers only discouragement I think. If someone has tried once or twice, there would be that lingering thought, "I still have to try 5 more times..." I remember before my Oct 2017 quit, I had read and heard how nicotine is harder to quit than meth, crack, heroine, glue, Oxycontin, and porn combined. Of course seeing on TV over the years how they portrayed someone quitting any of those, they were flopping around like a fish and screaming. It makes one think, "what is it gonna be like to quit nicotine?" Not as bad as big pharm would have us think (they gotta sell gum and patches somehow) One week ago I bought a pack and over the next three days, I smoked six cigarettes. Saturday in the real early AM (like 2:00'ish?) I gave the pack to my room mate and had her crumble the rest. So what do I call those six? A relapse? Slip? Complete and utter disgraceful failure to mankind? 1) I quit after three days. The smoking experience was pretty nasty and I just haven't wanted it since. 2) I have no clue what the trigger was. Usually when I get a crave is when I get real happy or excited. Me and a couple acquaintances have this running joke about Nipsy Hustle's passing, maybe that did it. 3) I learned that smoking is nasty, well, was reminded. I try not to learn new things sine my brain is mostly filled to capacity at this point.

Smoking cessation products are more about making companies rich and not so much about helping people quit smoking. We have heard "I tried gums, patches, etc..." I do think though more nicotine is absorbed in the mouth than through the lungs. It seems to me then like nicotine gum would be more addictive than cigarettes.

I will erase it but not put anything simply because I do not need a thread showing up each month saying "Jet black is so many months quit"

I think mine dropped a little but nothing significant. I believe mine is now typically 140/90 and probably 145/90 when I smoked. Not sure exactly but it wasn't much. I think raised blood pressure is a short term effect of smoking. Depending on the source, it takes between 20 minutes and 24 hours for BP to drop. Of course they keep lowering the number of what is "safe" so they can sell more BP meds. That part has nothing to do with smoking and more about them pushing meds.

Now I am going to say it. I may get chewed out for this but I feel it is the truth - There ARE habits much worse than smoking. Like ohh, setting up cameras to look up skirts. I mean imagine trying to explain THAT one to the boss. Of course then the boss whispers, "hey umm, look, you didn't happen to record that did you?"

There will be easy times and also tough times trying to keep the quit. Just during those tough times, do not give in. I went through a recent "Slip" and the few cigarettes I did smoke, here is what it brings - frustration, dizziness, guilt, nasty taste, wondering if we just set off a pattern full force. I was thinking, "Maybe I can do one or two cigs a day" but we ALL know where that leads.

Few things - Awesome. I thought pretty much everyone here but Doreen hated me. Now as far as doing something besides smoking, I can recommend a few other habits (some bad) - Spending too much time on ebay, staying up all night and sleeping away the day (I work an evening shift), collecting LP's (hipsters are not the only ones who do that), cursing loudly at work when frustrated, eating way too much sugar, hitting the thrift stores to buy more BS one doesn't need, and most important - being a reason forums have moderators. There is something else I should mention - One of my co-workers is a chewer. Probably since he was a kid. Anyways, he had been quit for 3 1/2 years. I told him I had smoked, and he mentioned he picked up chewing again, like back in November. I said, "I need to stop, I do not want this habit". Then he said something horrifying! He said, "It is like the love of my life. I know it is bad for me, cancerous etc but I cannot quit, like I am married to the habit". Man, I have NO desire to be married again. Especially not to the nico-demon.

I guess it was Friday night/Saturday morning when I had my room mate destroy the remains of the pack. Weird but I haven't really wanted one since. Feeling my lungs burn when I smoked the last one kind of put a stop to THAT desire. One thing, I had someone on this board I had become good friends with (even if but e-mail pals) but she kept relapsing and ran into some kind of pretty serious health issues. Maybe the damage was already done, maybe if she had kept the quit, the problem would have lay dormant. It wasn't even lung related but supposedly was connected to smoking. I forgot to add earlier - when I was in the process of a relapse/slip/whatever, it was like some disgusting, dreadful chore to step out and smoke.