I started smoking when I was 16. I am now 68. I have gone long periods without smoking. I quit, then start up again, then quit. Usually, when I quit, I quit for years. My longest stretch was ten years while I was married to (now ex-)wife #3, who was a non-smoker.
I know that I am an addict. I know what I am addicted to, and I know why.
When I was an Instructor for the IBEW (electricians' union) Apprenticeship Program, one of the classes that I was required to teach was a drug & alcohol awareness class. The Apprenticeship Program has all of the training material needed, from workbooks to videotapes.
One of the videos for this class was done by a former Medical Examiner in Texas (Houston or Austin). He said that addictions cannot be cured; they can only be managed. They cannot be cured because they have a genetic component and are hereditary. There is also an environmental component, such as how often you are exposed to a substance.
Both of my parents were smokers, as were their parents. I do not doubt that I inherited the cigarette addiction gene. Genes are like switches in your DNA, on or off. If the switch is on, you have the potential to become addicted if you are exposed to that substance. If the switch is off (like ex-wife #3), you can be exposed repeatedly and not become addicted. For pharmaceutical and recreational drugs, my genes are switched off. But for cigarettes, it is switched on.
Over the years, I have learned many tips and tricks on how to quit smoking. I have studied many aspects of this because I wanted to know why cigarettes and not any other form of tobacco or nicotine. In my attempts to quit, I have tried patches, gums, sprays, lozenges, and vapes. None of them quenched my craving for cigarettes. Only a cigarette will do. My research revealed that cigarette manufacturers add ammonia to the tobacco during curing. They do this because, when burning, it changes the chemical structure of the nicotine to make it more addictive.
The patches, sprays, gums, and lozenges do not have that. I have tried other methods: cold turkey, a rubber band on your wrist, lollipops, acupuncture, and, as a hypnotherapist, hypnosis. The funny part is that I had clients who came to my hypnotherapy practice to quit smoking, and most of them did. I was invited to speak at local businesses about quitting, and the companies offered to pay for employee sessions. But these techniques did not seem to work for me.
Before getting married to #3, we lived together for about five years. A friend of mine knew about my struggle to quit, and she gave me the remainder of her prescription Wellbutrin tablets. Those things gave me some very strange dreams! But I managed to quit. When we were getting divorced, my stress levels were through the roof, and I started lighting up again. That is my drug of choice. I don't want to be drunk or high. I don't want to be out of control. I just want to relax, and it helps me do that.
When I was going to start my transition, I knew I needed to quit (again). My doctor offered everything, but I have done all that. Then she offered Chantix (Varenicline). I stayed on it for three months and was able to quit. Transition made me feel alive again, and my stress levels dropped. I had some serious bouts with anxiety and depression, but I refused to light up. We found that the depression was due to low vitamin levels, and the anxiety was due to PTSD from when I was attacked in the military. We got those problems addressed, and things were going well again.
And then Executive Orders began flying out of the White House. The VA cancelled some of my transition services, removed the LGBTQ Care Coordinators, and forbade VA employees from discussing "gender ideology". My stress levels climbed. South Dakota began passing anti-transgender laws. My stress levels soared, and I started smoking again after four years clean.
The first thing is to break the habit part.
I smoke with my right hand. No more. I must now use my left. It feels awkward, and that is the point. Make smoking as inconvenient as possible. I cannot keep my cigarettes in my house. I leave them in the car, so I have to go outside to get them. In the winter, that is a deterrent.
Notice triggers. I know I smoke when I get stressed, so when it happens, I will do Resonant Breathing instead until I calm down.
I smoke when I am hungry. This took a bit of research, but I discovered something.
Long ago, Vitamin B3 was called nicotinic acid and was derived from tobacco plants. Nicotine and nicotinic acid are totally different substances, so to avoid confusing a nutrient with a poison, they changed the name to niacin.
Most Americans are low on vitamin Bs. This is due to poor food quality, which is due to processed foods and depleted soils in farming. Vitamin Bs are the "feel-good" vitamins that help us deal with stress. When we are stressed, our body loses vitamin B. Maybe, just maybe, when I am craving nicotine, in reality, my body is saying it needs vitamins. Another possible angle on this is that when smoking to quash that craving, if the body thinks it is getting vitamin B but is getting nicotine instead, then any vitamin B from food will be seen as excess and eliminated. This could further deplete your vitamin levels. This is just a theory, but my doctors say it is possibly true.
To combat this aspect, I would take Super B-Complex vitamin supplements. The B vitamins work best together, so taking only one is not as effective. Take the B-Complex type instead. I take 1,000 I.U.s in the morning with breakfast and 1,000 I.U.s in the evening with dinner. You cannot overdose on vitamin Bs because they are water-soluble, so you will pee out any that your body does not need. And your pee turns a bright yellow, so you know you are getting plenty. What happened was that my cravings for a smoke diminished big time. Another vitamin B in the complex is Biotin, which helps grow hair and nails, so win-win.
I have found that it is not one technique that works, but a combination of them. Attack the problem from all sides as it were.
The next strategy has worked every time for me and most of the time for my clients. The ones that it did not work for was because they did not follow the rules. I call it the Count-Down. Instead of setting a specific date to quit (that causes stress with the added pressure of quitting on that day), you gradually quit. No cold turkey. First, you look at how many cigarettes you smoke in a day. If you smoke a pack a day, that is 20 cigarettes.
Think of it like a game. Games have rules.
1. You must never carry a lighter.
2. You must never carry more cigarettes than that day's allotment, and you can only smoke your own. No bumming a smoke from others.
3. Each day, you will carry one less cigarette than the day before.
So if you smoke a pack a day, you carry one pack or 20 cigarettes, and smoke as you normally would. The next day, you take one cigarette away and destroy it. You can have 19 and smoke them as you wish — the next day 18, and so on.
There is a subtle psychology behind this method. There is no pressure to stop now, or on any particular day. Each day is only one less, so it is no big deal. But when you get down to six cigarettes allowed, you start to plan out when you are going to smoke them. The next day, you only get five, so is that one in the morning, then after each meal, and one before bed? Easy. The next day, you only get four. How will you plan for those? Then three.
What I found, and my clients agreed, is that when you are planning when to have your next cigarette, sometimes you tell yourself that you will wait. I'll have that one later, I'm okay now. But the next day, it is one less. Between the Chantix and the Vitamin B, the cravings are easier to resist, so it feels ok to say, "Not right now".
On my last day, my allocation was one cigarette. I kept putting it off, then decided I would wait and have it in the morning. But then I waited again. I carried that last cigarette with me for five days. Then I suddenly realized that I had quit smoking almost a week before, and I threw it away.
So, I talked to my doctor, and she sent me some Chantix. I started taking it yesterday. My Quit Day is November 2, but with the Count-Down Method, it may not be exact. It will be close. I am confident that I will get this under control.
And now, I have published this on the internet, so I have to quit or lose all integrity.
No pressure! 😁
