How I Quit Smoking Cigarettes

[Alexeus]

It doesn't bother me if other people smoke, even though I used to love cigarettes and now the idea of smoking one makes me nauseous. The smell doesn't even trigger cravings anymore. I've been off cigarettes for more than sixteen months now and I am sure that I will never go back to this habit. For what it's worth, this is how I did it and how I used Cannabis to help me. I don't readily advise people to misuse nicotine replacement products or to disregard their physicians, but this is, in detail, how I stopped using cigarettes.

 

I'm a 28 year old male. I smoked tobacco cigarettes from age 17 until age 26. I was thoroughly addicted from 19 onward. At one point I smoked about 40 unfiltered cigarettes per day, over the course of more than five years I reduced this to less than one pack of filtered cigarettes per day. (I was able to afford "real" cigarettes when I was 26). I was already using cannabis to relieve various persistent maladies, such as depression, chronic pain and the side effects of the medications I was taking.

 

I gave up alcohol one year before I gave up tobacco. I stopped drinking because it was counterproductive to overcoming depression. I had enjoyed cannabis before I stopped drinking, but I felt guilty about using it and did so only intermittently. When I decided to abstain from alcohol, I decided to treat myself with as much cannabis as I needed to feel good. It was under the spell of Cannabis that I was able to engage in productive therapy and begin really enjoying life. Wanting to enjoy life and not feel bad inspired me to quit using tobacco.

 

I probably tried to quit smoking tobacco literally about 50 times before I finally succeeded. The first 48 or so were before I stopped drinking. I tried to quick tobacco roughly at the same time as alcohol, but this was too stressful, so I waited a year until my mind and spirit were ready. My last cigarette was at about 12:15pm on Saturday, April 4th, 2008.

 

I had chronic bronchitis for a few years and chronic tonsillitis for six months by the time I finally stopped sucking down Parliaments. I had invited my mom out to help me with a paper I was trying to write.[My senior seminar paper.] My mom hated cigarettes, but wasn't mean to me about it. Many of the times I tried and failed to quit were times that I tried to quit while I was visiting my non-smoking parents, this was good practice. I bought about 14 grams Cannabis. It was a strong, but inexpensive variety of Mexican schwag, as I was then living in a nearby State where cannabis is decriminalized but not medically available. At the time I had a limited amount of money and a little only a little bit of dank left (about a half a gram or so); I reasoned that even the nastiest schwag smoke was actually better for me than the finest tobacco.

 

I dug out my cigarette shaped metal hitters. Since my mom still wasn't so keen on grass (or weed-smell) in those days I decided to use cigarette shaped hitters instead of joints for those first 3 days while my mom was in town. For this same reason I used about two or three 8ths to make Brownies. I used Nicotine patches, starting at 14mg per day since I was smoking about 15 cigarettes per day at that time. I waited until it would have been time for me to have a cigarette, and I applied the patch. I ate a brownie and excused myself to the bathroom for a quick toke. Then I went to work on my paper. Leaving the patch on, I excused myself for toke after the toke whenever I wanted a cigarette, which was constantly. I found, as I had hoped, that Brownies really helped the physical pain of withdrawal, as well as the emotional pain and anxiety...I was coughing so violently that I was not able to use my hitter much by the end the first day so I'm lucky I decided to do some baking. Fortunately, I did manage to get valuable work done on my paper!

 

My mom headed home on Monday, April 6th, and I broke out the rolling papers and re-upped on cannabis. The constant, barking coughs had subsided. I continued to use one 14mg Nicotine patch per day. I enjoyed about 1/2 once of cheap,[relatively] strong schwag each week over the next month and a half. I smoked like 12 joints a day on some days that first week, plus a probably fifteen or so tokes from the cigarette shaped metal hitters. In the evening, or when I couldn't smoke, I snuck cannabis edibles. I also used about 3.5 grams of medicinal quality Cannabis per week, again through cigarette shaped hitters, to treat my fibromyalgic symptoms and depression.

 

When I saw other people smoking, I thought about the Nicotine I was getting form the patch and the sweet Cannabis smoke that would send me to my dreams. I thought about how beautiful a thing Cannabis is, and how much more I can enjoy it without being sick from cigarettes all the time.

 

After one a week, when I was getting to the point when I would have relapsed to tobacco, I went out and bought some nicotine gum. I switched to the gum because it gave me something nicotine-obtaining to do with my mouth. If possible, I bought the 4mg gum, mint flavored and bit it in half. I started with eight or nine, 2mg nicotine gum chews during the day. After week 1, I only used patch at night, and I ceased using it, mostly, after the first few weeks and completely by week 8. Smoking cannabis with a nicotine chew became a special pleasure of mine, much more enjoyable than smoking cigarettes had been, because cigarettes so exacerbated my asthma. I reduced the number of pieces of gum I used by one 2mg piece every two to three weeks. My schwag connection fell through six weeks into the experiment, but with plenty of different strains of high quality smoke around i made the adjustment, using about 3/8ths of the available sensimelia per week instead of 4/8ths of schwag and 1/8th of sensimelia. (Even with about seven different hook-ups at that time, under decriminalized prohibition, one is at the mercy of the dealer, with most dealers having only one or two different types of cannabis. I always made sure that I had some cannabis to smoke after work and in the morning and at all the times when I would have smoked cigarettes. Except at work, because my co-workers were a bunch of muffin makers. There I started sneaking edibles if I was really craving or having trouble with my chronic pain. Before I knew it, about five months from quiting, I was down to taking only 1 mg of Nicotine per day. At this point, I was finally able to break my Nicotine dependence. I intended to take it every other day for 3 weeks but this seemed silly, I alternated like this for about a week, always enjoying my cigarette shaped hitters, and decided that it was silly to subject myself to such an inferior substance as Nicotine any longer. Since quitting Nicotine, I've probably only suffered ten or so different distinct times when I craved a cigarette, but this is always very mild, and I know that I can smoke some cannabis when it's convenient. These days, 16 months from quitting tobacco cigarettes I primarily adjust my dosage of cannabis to my chronic pain condition as I rarely suffer from sadness anymore either, using about 1/4 to 1/2 the amount of Cannabis I needed just a year ago.

 

 

In my opinion, under the right circumstances, the fact that Cannabis is enjoyable ("get's you high") is one of it's great therapeutic values. Nicotine withdraws is a horrible feeling, but Cannabis can ease your pain and make life feel worth living. From here, life begins anew...

 

I envy the future ex-tobacco users of MI for all of the great Cannabis options they have to help them through their time of turmoil! But I don't envy the cigarettes in their pocket today! :)s

[avatar144]

great story, i'm happy you made it happen. another cannabliss success!

[Zombiefied]

Congratz, I am going to be walking down that path tomorrow. I am going to use fan leaves to help me. Roll them up in a tube and hope they trick my brain...lol

[+420Atheist]

That story sound familiar. That is about what I did 20 years ago. I had some really bad home grown. A huge bag of it. I must have rolled 500 joints and just smoked them in place of cigarettes. I have been smoke free since. It was my third attempt. What is really funny is after 20 years I still have dreams about smoking cigarettes.

[Alexeus]

I have a friend who was able to quit, some years before I did, on cannabis and willpower alone. As we know, it definitely is possible, especially if Cannabis is readily available. I would say this friend tried to quit about five to ten times, maybe more, before he finally quit successfully. Whatever method finally works, it is the willingness to try and try again that prevails. With cannabis, quiting smoking can actually an enjoyable experience, although it is still difficult at first.

 

I have the dreams about smoking cigarettes too. I usually realize now that I'm just dreaming it though.

[+420Atheist]

That lucid dreaming thing is weird. The older I get the more I am able to know it is a dream and even control it to some extent. I can't really say if it was cannabis that helped any or if dry lettuce would have filled my oral fixation as well. I see they have smokeless cigarettes now that some people have found helpful.

[Irishgreen]

I also quit this way my story is very similar! It works! I have been cigarette free for 10 years!

 

Congrats! You will be a happier healthier person.

[ArgonAlgorithm]

That was very inspirational. I'm glad to see a success story of that magnitude.

I may try that myself. Thanks!

[Alexeus]

@420Athiest Yes, I think that the mind remembers how to lucid dream and this memory is reinforced each time one realizes that they are dreaming. So the older you get, and the more sleep cycles you have, the more one lucid dreams. It is very fun and, I must say, quite restorative. I usually fly around in my dreams now, exploring different worlds and such. Like most experiences, lucid dreaming is also much enhanced by cannabis. Also, these devices which deliver nicotine vapor do sound quite promising, although I never used one myself.

 

Once again, I'm grateful for all the positive feedback! I posted it because I've talked to cannnabis users in the past who insist that they won't quit smoking tobacco because they feel like the would have to quit smoking cannabis as well. "After I smoke a bowl I always need to smoke a cigarette" used to be my habit too; it is possible to separate the two regardless of what the conventional wisdom seems to be.

 

Condensed, the most important advice I can give is: 1) NOT to beat yourself up for relapsing, but to affirm that now, you have a chance to try it over again another time. 2) Keep trying, try different methods of quitting, but try each method more than once. It takes MANY tries, usually. 3) You don't necessarily have to stop using cannabis medicine in order to stop using tobacco.

[BubbleBerryKush]

I am going through this right now.....doctor said it was needed because of my bounty of aliments.....

 

cant wait till I can quite everything....or cut back to almost zero....