I should probably quit smoking. And please, before anyone jumps into comments with their former-smoker zeal and personal horror stories, you cannot scare me anymore than the Terrie the Smoker ad already has, she scares me plenty. That poor, incredibly brave gal’s rasping voice now haunts my dreams and swims in my blood. Other than that, I’m looking straight down the barrel of another insanely long day in the middle of another insanely long week. Hopefully I can grab a few minutes and find some tidbits to post in between crises.
Speaking of time management and lack thereof, are any of you regs interested in guest blogging for this site? I haven’t worked out the details or even thought much about it, but it’s probably time to tap some of the talent around these parts.
Out of curiosity, what state do you live in and how much does a pack of smokes cost there?
I smoke — well, used to — primarily at band practice, i.e. once a week I will (would) bum one or two off of my bandmates, but that was it. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, the high price of a pack in NYS has driven all of them to quit smoking! The last holdout quit the other week.
It’s over ten bucks a pack here, $10.50 plus tax most places. I don’t think they’ll be able to raise the price much more without creating a widespread black market (the current price is already pushing it, with cigarette smuggling starting to become a real concern here). But they seem to have found a price point, at least for now, that is incentivizing a lot of people to quit without causing the black market to become too widespread.
I think that’s the answer, from a public policy standpoint: PSAs and such have probably already reached most everybody they are going to reach, but I’ve been really surprised — at least anecdotally — with how many people I know have quite since the price went into the double digits.
Oh yes, and the other big factor of course is banning it from bars and restaurants. TBH, I really miss being able to smoke in bars… but from a public health perspective, it’s a no-brainer. I’m just so used to it now, I almost forgot to mention it. I still react with shock every time I am out of state or see a movie where somebody lights up in a bar. “OMG, you can’t do that! Oh right, most places, yes you can…” Seriously, it’s amazing how fast the culture changed here once they passed the law…
Texas, about five bucks depending on the brand.
Smokes were $5 a pack here when I quit (9ish years ago, I think?). Last I heard, they were something like $8-9 a pack now. I went the cold turkey route off of just shy of 2 packs a day of Lucky Strikes (nonfiltered). It was a week of total misery, followed by another month or so of retraining myself.
Quitting really isn’t too bad, once you get past that first week. I personally think cold turkey is the only way to go; you get all the suck out of the way at once. The people who try to wean themselves off just seem to be drawing out the pain over a much longer period of time. Withdrawal symptoms are just as bad when you drastically reduce your nicotine intake as they are when you cut it out entirely. Weaning just makes withdrawal last longer.
From a cancer survivor, be prepared:
Be prepared to spend a lot of time. Time waiting in doctor’s offices. Time driving to treatment. Time in treatment. Time recovering from treatment
Be prepared to spend a lot of money. Co-payments. Medicine. Gasoline and car maintenance. Even airplane flights and hotel rooms if you have to travel a long distance.
Be prepared to spend a lot of sleepless nights.
Be prepared for side effects of treatment. Hair loss, nerve damage, vomiting, food not tasting or smelling right.
I’m not exactly a regular, but I’m up for a few posts if you’d need someone to blog. My blog is linked, so if you want to see a sample of my work, it’s there.
I can be prompted to write on a specific subject, as well.
Troll what worked for you did not work for me. I quit with patches and lozenges. It took a couple months but it’s been over a year now. Yipee!!
The important thing is to keep trying. If you fail, tweak the process and try again and again and again.