I’m so fucking irritable right now, every little thing is annoying me and my chest is tight, I keep clenching my teeth. I’m very familiar with these things, these are how my body is telling me “go smoke a ciggy”
Problem is, I haven’t done that for a year and a half. I’ve had this happen before, sometimes years on into my quittings, its always random and it’s always insufferable, like I’m a former psychonaut who accidentally cracked his spine 20 years later. Does this happen to anyone else out there? Any tips? I had a glass of wine but it didn’t help take the edge off much
Does this happen to anyone else out there?
No, you’re completely unique and utterly alone in that uniqueness. Tragic, really. RIP.
Any tips?
Is $5 too little?
Okay enough jokes. Yes, every other addict ever gets craving symptoms down the road, but they’ll clear up soon.
In rehab, doc taught me something that’s remarkably powerful and yet insanely simple: BHALTS. Are you Bored? Hungry? Angry? Lonely? Tired? Stressed? All those make cravings worse and make relapse more likely, especially since we’re talking about the thing we used to do to avoid dealing with those feelings properly.
If anything on that checklist checks out, attend to it ASAP. You’ll be shocked how quickly the cravings leave your body.
On the contrary, i hate the smell way more than my have-never-smoked peers.
I quit cold-turkey ages ago, after a decade as a pack-a-day smoker.
I never missed cigarettes, never really craved them except when binge drinking. But i quit that too, mostly. By the time I quit, I absolutely hated the smell and taste, so that helped a lot. It caused me to just avoid places where I’d encounter lots or smokers. Bans in restaurants and bars helped a lot.
You probably don’t hate the smell more, nonsmokers have just learned to be polite about it.
Dated a smoker once. I love the man, but kissing him was like licking ashes. A major turn off. I never let on.
Right, my lived experience isnt valid because of your lived experience.
Agree. Quit twice, the 2nd time was real bad. Now I am a stereotypical hardcore ex smoker. Get away from me with that stuff.
Almost 3 years after quiting a heavy 26 years habit. I quit cold turkey.
Currently being forced to move having no income and no social circle and family is distant.
Super proud I haven’t broken yet. I want one ALL THE DAMN TIME.
I use physical exercise to help me get through my cravings.
If a random internet stranger’s comment means anything to you… keep it up dude!
Quit coffin nails five years ago after 15 years. Maybe a couple times a month after work I think about how good a cigarette would be right now
Except maybe ten percent of those times I’ll actually bum one from a coworker and it’s never ever ever as good as I imagine it’ll be in the moment. I bum them less and less because it keeps getting harder to pretend it’ll be as good as it used to
So in essence I guess I actually quit pretty effectively overall
Once a junkie, always a junkie. At least for me with nicotine. The cravings have never gone away. I just learn to live with them and not think about them too often. It gets easier with time.
I quit smoking by switching to vape about 12 years ago. I had smoked a pack and a half of Marlboro reds a day for 30 years prior to that. After 30+ years of being hooked on the coffin nails I found a way out and I (and my family) are so grateful.
I still have my nicotine fix, obviously, but I am so much less a slave to it. It used to be that I could not imagine being without a box of Marlboros and a lighter if I was leaving the house. Now, I don’t think twice about heading out for a few hours with no vape (nicotine) with me…it’s just not that important.
I will probably always ingest nicotine in one form or another (vape, gum, patch), as I do caffeine. I no longer feel like I am controlled by it thanks to vaping.
Give alternatives a try.
Vapes actually turned out to be worse for me, something about having the freedom to do it just wherever really shot my nicotine dependance up. Definitely easier on my lungs but oof, glad they work well for you though
I struggle with this and it’s frustrating. That damn ease of fix adds a real detriment to my life in its own way - although I still think even casual smoking is worse.
I hope you can truly resist the temptation if that’s what you want! I am envious of that control.
Try doing deep breaths. You get the relaxation of inhaling, but no toxic smoke. Avoid the vapes and alcohol. Drink water. Lots!
I quit 24 years ago. And although I don’t have cravings, I sometimes having smoking dreams. So much of it is about breathing to relax.
Also important to cut out caffeine if you are stopping nicotine. And understand that caffeine can be a trigger, nicotine accelerate caffeine metabolism (cuts the edge) which is why the coffee-drinking cigarette smoking trope exists. Caff and Nick are the best of friends.
Funnily enough I’m pretty addicted to caffeine. I’ll get a headache when I miss my 11am or 1pm coffee. But I’m not getting addicted to smoking at all. The pack of tobacco I bought dried up before I could use more than half of it, and that’s with me sharing.
I still vape but I haven’t had a real cigarette in almost a decade and I still get cravings for them when I’m stressed. Whenever I think about buying a pack I try to remember waking up coughing up phlegm every morning, getting winded from even a little bit of exercise, and how I used to get sick way more often and I can talk myself out of it
I’ve tried them a few times over the years when out at bars when my vape died, after vaping for… fuck since like 2009 or so? Real early on. Can’t manage to give up that habit but… meh.
They are quite honestly terrible. Super sickening (like wicked strong urge to vomit on the first small drag even if you don’t fully inhale it sort of sickening) because they are so so much stronger than a vape. Plus they taste like shit. Very unappealing to actually do after quitting so long ago. So you can add that to your reasons not to do it. :)
I had way more of an issue the first time I quit, made it like just over a year and it was easy to go back. This is much different.
Essentially the same story and timeframe, but no independent cravings. I do occasionally smell one, a good one that takes me right back to high school. Those are the only tempting moments for me.
This is an anxiety response, your body is coursing with cortisol, the stress hormone. These exercises should help. I find square breathing to be especially helpful, but everyone’s different. https://www.choosingtherapy.com/anxiety-exercises/
Another thing to consider: nicotine accelerates caffeine metabolism. Therefore, if you are feeling irritable and have recently ingested caffeine (coffee, tea, energy drink, etc.) then you can expect a craving for the antidote.
Think of all those folks who used to hang out at coffee shops, smoking cigarets. Up on the cup of coffee, down on the smoke. Just riding the roller-coaster all day.
An ex of mine would only smoke when she was drinking.
Nothing better with your 3rd beer than a cigarette… Apparently.
If she didn’t have that 3rd beer. She’d never drink.
I mean yeah I can relate, drinking specifically mikes hard makes me want to smoke
Yes - to the extent I no longer have Sunday roast dinner. Every time I’d just crave a cheeky smoke after a big ol satisfying meal. It’s been several years and I know I’d end up coughing up a lung and it’d taste like shit but that fleeting thought doesn’t care about that… It’s just the enshrined idea of a ‘nice’ smoke after a roast.
i often have cravings, especially when i’m angry or drinking beer, then i remembering myself how double hangover feels like and whole this stench
Sometimes but then I remember the taste and the craving vanishes.
I’m one of those people who has never really stopped having cravings. It only gets bad when I’m really stressed but it is low key there 24/7.
Thankfully, it’s only really a battle when I’m stressed.
Hey I just want to share,a thought I had about the nature of stress that has helped me reframe a lot in my life, maybe it’ll help you or somebody else
We know scientifically that stress hormones speed up our aging. So stressing is literally life at 2x. If you’re like me, and 95% of the rest of us, then you have to earn a paycheck/ ,have to sell your labor for finances. If you’re like the 75% of us that’s one missed paycheck, or one t-boning that you’re 100% the victim for but still spend weeks in the hospital just to end up evicted but still like 5 years from any insurance payout (murica), and you’re stressing your bills…does the stressing over a debt to a faceless, soulless corporation lower your interest rate? Will the stressing and mental berating you submit yourself too erase those overdraft fees? If you’re stressing over these kind of ‘faceless’ things you’re literally spending your life double time, but…they don’t accept that kind of currency.
If anything, the time lost to stress is also time thats twice lost because you could’ve been working towards a quickfix if not a perm solution.
All I’m saying, is don’t spend your hours on things that don’t appreciate them. I will never get upset at a phone company or utility or whatever’s behest and torture myself for them. They don’t care about any of us, it’s high time we stopped caring about them too.
Try it out. Refuse to stress for a few days. Does life fall apart then? The biological imperative of the day is to simply survive, if youve done that, you’re already winning. Don’t let the faceless steal your thunder. ✌️
I did in the first 3 or so years, but now I don’t have any cravings at all. I’m now 17 years on from quitting and it has gotten better over time.
I found spite a great tool for keeping emotional investment. The tobacco companies are all steeped in slavery, abuse, scientific fraud, and general indifference to the suffering of others. Those companies are trying very hard to get kids addicted, to insulate themselves from legal accountability, and to stop governments from phasing smoking out. They are evil if that word is going to mean anything and if I am going to be able to do anything about them it is withholding my business.
