For the super-addicted: Is vaping really needed?

[collateral diarrhea]

Can you remember what it was that caused you to start smoking again? Being around smokers? Dropping the nic from your juice? Life stresses? Vaper's tongue? Getting too involved in the hobbyist side of it and then losing interest? Self-sabotage? A combination of factors maybe?

Might as well go into each reason and see what I think, will help to write it down:
Wouldn't be the smokers around me, i don't feel like i'm that susceptible to that kind of influence although it was the reason why i started smoking in the first place a long time ago. Can't be the nic, in fact i know i'm able to bring my nic down quickly without much effort, it was done in the past. Can't be vape tongue...but i do feel i'd find vaping a lot more enjoyable if i didn't have it (been pretty much taste-less for 98% of my vape life). I do enjoy the hobby side of things and in fact feel it did help a lot originally, so not that. Now self-sabotage seems credible in a way, of course none of it is deliberate but it seems like i always have at least one really bad vice and for most of my life it has been smoking. Stress, i believe, does play another big role in this but i don't think it is as big of a reason. Mainly because it seems like i smoke the most when i'm actually relaxed and just chilling by myself while reading something. If i had to single out a reason, i'd put it down to just habit - i seem to have a huge problem with breaking habits irrespective of whether it is a good or a bad one.

CarbonBoy summarizes this pretty well:

What I am addicted to is the 'act' of smoking. The ritual. I've known this for quite some time. I'm not sure if this makes me even weaker or just plain stupid. With the exception of the fact that I do love a couple of the juices I vape, there is nothing I'm substituting.

This is why I do plan to stop vaping. I haven't set a hard and fast date, but I do think it needs to be this year, before I plough too much money into this hobby.

This is the way i feel too. Just loading up on nicotine simply doesn't do it for me, i will still smoke after i vape even if the nicotine rush turns into light poisoning and makes me feel somewhat ill. It is almost as if i have a duty to finish that cigarette no matter what while also thinking "why the fuck am i doing this? i know this is wrong".

Don’t ever forget that you, I and many others here are addicts. Like any addiction, it only takes one slip to get back to where you don’t want to be. But if you do slip, remember that you’ve done it once, you can do it again.

YES! It seems that applying the "once and addict always an addict" principle is the right way to go for people in this type of situation, no matter if its smoking or whatever other addictions people have. It took a while to come to this conclusion and break the "well i made it in the end! i won't do it again" mentality.

As leni said. Perhaps a shift in perspective is all that's required. Don't look at the vaping stage as a race to the quitting line, look at it as a step in the right direction that eventually may lead to you quiting. If it does then great if not you've still achieved a lot. If you should eventually vape less or stop. Keep a mod, tank and your favourite high nic juice in th cupboard for moment's of stress. It's not going to cost a lot to replace your juice every 18month's to keep an emergency set up fresh just in case and to stop you buying smokes.

While i recognize these words as the truth, i can't help but think about all the good that was undone by a relapse. Perhaps this is just my way of trying to punish myself or apply the same sort of chastising i would to those who are close to me and did something they knew is bad for them.

I especially like your comment about the change in respective, this surely must be a pre-requisite for quitting smoking successfully but more importantly - keeping it that way.

Like many, I'm a bit confused too.

You've used vaping to give up smoking, why do you want to give up vaping?

Failure to kill the habit properly has drawn me to a conclusion that this is a smaller fragment of a larger picture. Now that i think about it, what i'm really after is the complete liberation and freedom that can only come with temperance. I keep asking myself, how can i achieve that when i'm relying on something like vaping just to keep my brain from throwing tantrums because it didn't get what i wants but doesn't truly need? I suppose that deep down in my mind i blame my vaping for smoking again - yes that does sound ridiculous but as you know this is just my subjective opinion. Is vaping to blame? I don't know, but i do feel that i wouldn't smoke again if i developed and lived with an idea that vaping is like smoking - eliminate the need for foreign substance in my lungs.

Thanks everyone for all your input, whilst i didn't reply to each comment i did read all of them and this has given me some food for thought. This is exactly why POTV is such a great community, because no matter the difference between all of us we all have one core goal in mind .

I will get there. But i must start from square one again - stop smoking properly is step 1. Keeping it that way is 2. Once i'm there, i'll have to take a step back and consider the future.

 

[philabos]

You are an experienced vaper so I am not telling you anything you don't already know.

One thing though that has helped me is having 5 tanks with different favors. When you smoke a cig, it's the same all the time. The change ups are what really keep me interested and vaping.

I have been off cigs for only 5 months now and unlike others I find I really still love the smell of tobacco smoke when around others who smoke. I do not try to avoid them because I still like the camaraderie but I vape or two chases the desire away. I always tell myself I enjoy vaping more but still get the second hand smoke free. Not that I spend a lot of time around other smokers, but when you vape that's many times where you find yourself in public spaces.

Good luck.

 

[zouzounaki]

I remember you talking about your problem with flavours a few months ago. Is it possible that this has made vaping, as a thing, problematic for you, and made it more likely for you to go back to smoking? And if so, would it be worth trying unflavoured liquid? It might make it easier to not have expectations of vaping which are being disappointed, to try and get away from the act of chasing something that isn’t being satisfied and use it purely as a stop smoking aid rather than as an enjoyable hobby. Once you are passed the point of constant fag cravings, gradually taper off the nic and then stop? Just a suggestion, I wonder i it might be worth a try? You already have the vaping gear, I assume...

 

[icepie]

I tried all the other standard methods to quit smoking: Patches, gum, "inhalators"... no effect whatsoever.

Cigalikes enabled me to cut down but not quit. Since buying my first vape tank I have never smoked.

Is it needed? Subjective question, but for me it worked where everything else failed so my answer is yes.

 

[icepie]

One thing though that has helped me is having 5 tanks with different favors. When you smoke a cig, it's the same all the time. The change ups are what really keep me interested and vaping..

Same here. I have at least a dozen juices in rotation at any given time. I could never go back to smoking... it's so boring in comparison.

 

[SuperSmithens]

When I smoked I loved it but had the guilt of knowing it was bad for me. Now I vape and I love it too and I know its better for me than the cigs to boot - People (non smokers) often venture into the usual convo... "oh that smells nice not like cigs" being the start and then we get to the "so what, you reduced your nicotine to 6mg from 18? thats good - when are you going to 0?" At that point I roundhouse kick them in the face. I enjoy my addiction, I dont stink anymore which you moaned at - now fuck off and leave me alone. Mothers - who'd av em.

 

[glendower]

I see vaping as more of a gradual way to wean off smoking/nictoine alltogether. Going from smoking to just vaping is a lot easier than going off smoking entirely. Going off vaping to doing nothing at all is a lot easier than going straight from smoking to doing nothing, this has been confirmed by numerous people. The reason suspected is that the 100s of other chemicals in cigarettes also have an addictive component of their own in addition to the nicotine whereas in vaping the only addictive component remaining is the nicotine.

I transitioned to vaping last year then after a few months stopped alltogether and for most of last year I didn't use anything, the only side effects I had from coming off vaping 10ml of 3mg nicotine a day was mild hunger and mild tiredness for a week. I did not feel any major impact on my mood although my life was in a good place at the time (stable relationship etc). The scary thing was that the same day my ex walked out I went straight to the local newsagents 5 minutes after she left and sparked up a cigarette and smoked a pack in a day, then pulled out my vaporiser, charged it up and began the cycle again.

Nicotine is like this crutch that lingers in the background long-term even if you give up and whenever you fall on hard times in life your brain will always remember that old crutch and call for it to be brought back. That is the scary part of it for me, I know I can give up when my life is in a good place though. At least with vaping we have a far less harmfull way to get the nicotine whenever this happens again.

 

[collateral diarrhea]

Nicotine is like this crutch that lingers in the background long-term even if you give up and whenever you fall on hard times in life your brain will always remember that old crutch and call for it to be brought back.

Damn! Thank you!!!
You are basically simplifying a maths equation that I can't work out into simpler terms!
What you just said more or less summarizes my position, only i couldn't put it into words like you did!

On a side note, i've not yet had a cigarette or tobacco since the making of this thread. Not a victory by any means but it does feel somewhat promising. Time will tell i guess, i remain hopeful!

 

[collateral diarrhea]

I remember you talking about your problem with flavours a few months ago. Is it possible that this has made vaping, as a thing, problematic for you, and made it more likely for you to go back to smoking? And if so, would it be worth trying unflavoured liquid? It might make it easier to not have expectations of vaping which are being disappointed, to try and get away from the act of chasing something that isn’t being satisfied and use it purely as a stop smoking aid rather than as an enjoyable hobby. Once you are passed the point of constant fag cravings, gradually taper off the nic and then stop? Just a suggestion, I wonder i it might be worth a try? You already have the vaping gear, I assume...

Back when I started smoking again, i kinda thought that this would be a huge reason for doing it but ended up sorta embracing the whole "well fuck it" attitude. I can't taste anything, but i don't think this was the decisive factor. I mean, maybe it did have a big difference on some kind of subconsciousness level but i never quite felt like i care enough. The way i see it is that any cigarette i don't smoke is good and if it happens to not taste like raspberry then tough shit - at least it doesn't taste like shit lol!

So i'm accepting that i can't taste it. But at least it isn't as bad as the taste of tobacco...the problem is that whenever i smell tobacco i feel like i get drawn to it. It is truly fucked up how the mind can become so conditioned that it is drawn to all this bad stuff. Nonetheless resistance is a choice, so i will try resist as long as i can before failing. If i do fail, i'll get up and try again.

Trying to derive a positive i will say this, which i wasn't able to say for several weeks: i have not yet smoked in the last 3 days.

Fight goes on.

 

[steviebee]

Attaboy!