• Stalinwolf@lemmy.ca
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      26 days ago

      It’s weird how the perception of coolness plays a big part in starting up. I smoked for ten years, and teenage coolness was only half of it. The other half was the brief burst of euphoria it would give us every time we lit up, though that did subside after a few months of regular use.

      I find the habit disgusting now, and I can’t help but judge smokers as being a little trashy now whenever I see it. But I remember what it was like to be dependent on them, and I definitely remember that false sense of rogue-like coolness I felt whenever I was walking down the street taking a drag on one.

      I was able to get off of them fairly easy by switching to a low concentration e-liquid/vape for about a year or two, and then going cold turkey from there. I didn’t even get cravings. Just found myself reaching for my pocket every time I took a piss for a couple of weeks.

      Now I just hope my daughter never starts.

      • UncleArthur@lemmy.world
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        26 days ago

        I smoked for over 30 years and couldn’t break the habit until I tried vaping in the early years of the technology. I slowly reduced the nicotine level in the e-liquid and quit completely within 18 months. It was easy and fun and cheap. Now I see vapes marketed to kids to get them addicted to nicotine and eventually onto cigarettes. I find it crazy and not a little tragic that a technology designed to get people off tobacco has been re-purposed by the tobacco industry to cause addiction.

        • bier@feddit.nl
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          25 days ago

          I never smoked smoked, but for 10 years I daily smoked joints (tabacco and weed). I stopped about 15 years ago, but when I’m drunk a cigarette will still give me sort of a stoned feeling for a few minutes.

      • HugeNerd@lemmy.ca
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        26 days ago

        How do you feel about coffee, as I sit here with my three machines and five cups ready to go.

        • Stalinwolf@lemmy.ca
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          26 days ago

          I have a moderate energy drink dependency, so I’m certainly in no place to judge on that one. I’ve tried to get into coffee many times, but it always makes me feel dehydrated and as though I have a mild toxin coursing through my veins, and I don’t know why.

      • slaneesh_is_right@lemmy.org
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        26 days ago

        I smoked so much from 14 to 20 it was crazy. Especially from 18 to 20. I had a job where i was bored and i would just smoke all day. I eventually quit when i was 26, and learned that i don’t really have an addictive personality, or i necer really liked smoking that much, whatever. I just stopped buying cigarettes and never touched one again.

        But seeing my sister getting back to smoking after she quit when she was pregnant for about 5 years is soul crushing. She quit like 10 times in her life and will probably die smoking.