Does anyone have any great insights on quitting smoking?

I can tell you that smoking has a medicinal effect on a lot of people. When my son (who is bipolar) tried to quit he went wacko! The doctor told him to never try that again unless they worked on it together.
If your boyfriend suffers fom depression this might be true for him.
The doctor changed my son’s anti depresant to welbutrin and he cut his smoking way back.
Ultimatly, the person quiting has to WANT to quit. Preasuring him will only make it harder.

My boyfriend smokes, and he has been diagnosed with hypo-bipolar and ADD. He takes drugs, and goes to consoling for both. It was recommended to him that quit smoking for the sake of his health, and he took up the offer – at least from a while.

He was drawn back by the oral fixation of it. Also, a big drawn of going back to smoking is meekly seeing other people smoke. I was surprised when he told me this, but for him it was really true. Maybe this has something to do with his mania, because he needs to have something constantly distracting him, and cigarettes kind of do that.

I agree with @Judi, in that a person has to want to quit. My boyfriend tried, but ultimately wasn’t ready for the commitment.

My experience helping a smoker to quit was that as long as I made her wrong for it, I was giving her something to resist by smoking. She was able to quit when I quit managing, but instead told her I knew she could take care of herself and that I wouldn’t make her wrong for it, but would assist her and support her however I could.

My experience never becoming a smoker myself was that I got that it did bad things to people, from seeing health films that showed the awful lungs of smokers, and just smelling second hand smoke and finding it disgusting and awful, so I’ve never wanted to do that at all.

I was in a relationship with a guy who smoked and I never once told him he had to quit.

However, I did make it clear that I had asthma and was highly allergic to it. If he wanted to smoke when he was with me, he had to go outside, brush his teeth and use mouthwash afterwards. (Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray was on one of my refrigerator magnets)

After a good long while of this routine (especially in the middle of winter) he himself decided it was easier just to quit. Obviously I was very supportive of his efforts and even suggested he consider going to his Doc and getting some quitting patches.

Did you know that continuing to smoke while wearing the patch (or also for several days after removing it) can precipitate a fatal heart attack? Fortunately he was intelligent enough to take the doctor’s word for it so that was enough to get him over any of those tempting sudden cravings.

He also joined a quitting support group.

Statistics have demonstrated that people who only use one approach have significantly reduced chances of long term success compared to those who combine two or more approaches.

But as others have pointed out, you can’t make anyone else quit. That has to come from them.

But, there’s nothing keeping you from making it as inconvenient as possible when they are with you to help them get to that point. :)

That honestly was not my primary intent. I just wanted to be able to protect my own health. But the end result was certainly a happy one.

Go back in time and make sure he doesn’t start smoking.

If you tell him to quit, he’ll dig in his heels.
Address the anxiety and stress issues. We all have those issues by virtue of being alive. Everyone deals with it differently. Your boyfriend deals with it by smoking.

Using that as a premise, if you can teach him healthier ways to deal with stress, you can eventually get him to the point that he sees smoking as the self-destructive habit it is.

If he refuses to change his behavior in any away, that’s going to be a significant problem, both with the depression and the smoking.

Does he drink? This stuff all ties together.

@The_Compassionate_Heretic He doesn’t drink. I think you are right, he needs to find a way to reduce his stress.

@Buttonstc That sounds like a wonderful idea, i hope he doesnt take that as a sign I reject him. I don’t want to make him feel unwanted or abandon just because he smokes.

@Buttonstc said: ”Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray”
That’s right on the mark for sure. I had a girlfriend that smoked Marlboro reds. When I smoked I went with the “lights” myself so kissing her and tasting Marlboro red was a bit gnarly at times.

Give him a copy of Alan Carr’s Easyway. Just the book. I smoked for 17 years, and tried to quit at least 4 times. I quit the fifth time with the help of this book. Cold turkey. I’ll never smoke again. The book addresses stress and depression and other emotional reasons why people light up. Mr Carr was a three-pack-a-day smoker until he quit. He died last year after having quit 25 years ago, but unfortunately, before he quit, he’d been a three-pack-a-day smoker for almost 35 years. Imagine how soon he would’ve died if he hadn’t quit.

I kinda quit last year. I still smoke a few if I am out drinking. But I used to smoke a pack everyday. Now it is five per week instead of 140.

Really. You can not get him to do this. He needs to want to do it and it is so incredibly hard. If you haven’t been there you shouldn’t judge. Seriously. It is so fucking hard to quit. I was in a ball on my bed for the first few days. ha

My late dad smoked 50 years. He stopped when he wanted to stop. You can too. Stop making excuses and get on with it. You are strong and deserving of health for you, your friends, and family.

The American Lung Association offers a 6 week course in how to stop smoking. It is a learned habit, it can be unlearned.

But you have to want to stop. Stopping for another person will usually cause resentment at some point in time and often ends in failure because the commitment and desire are simply not there.

So trying to get someone else to stop is pretty futile. They have to want to stop for themselves.

I think trying to make someone quit smoking for their own good is misguided and foolish. If I had a girlfriend who tried to pressure me into quitting smoking, I’d consider getting a new girlfriend. You cannot change anyone’s behavior, they have to want to change it themselves.

That said, quitting smoking is FRIGGING HARD!!!!! I have tried many times to quit, only to fail. I’ve tried everything. The patch, the drugs, nicotine lollipops, cutting back, cold turkey, replacement therapy, and snuff. The only thing left is hypnosis or acupuncture. Hypnosis doesn’t work, and I’m not real sure if acupuncture can be used to regulate behavior.

Statistics show that most people smoke until they get cancer or some other serious and debilitating disease, and even then, quiting is not always a result. My Dad smoked up to the last day of his life.

I say bravo for the people that do quit, and for those like me, I say, just keep trying, maybe we will succeed some day.

If kissing a smoker is like licking an ahtray, then kissing a self-righteous know-it-all b***h who seeks to regulate your behavior for her own selfish reasons is like still living with your Mom when you are over 30. ~

Well, let’s make one crucial distinction here. I was fully aware that I couldn’t change him and whether or not he ever gave up smoking.

But in my own apt. I certainly had every right to regulate what went into my own lungs. I was also aware that at any point in time he could choose to no longer be with me because he no longer wanted the inconvenience of going outside to smoke. It was HIS CHOICE either way.

You may find it difficult to believe that I never once tried to persuade him to quit smoking but that is the truth. I was mature enough by that time in my life to realize that the only person you can change is yourself.

But I was also assertive enough to realize that I have the right to protect my own health and not subject myself to secondhand smoke.

He made his decision on his own. But I was prepared that it could go the other way also.

It wasn’t a bait and switch either. From the first day we met he knew I was a non-smoker and why. The first time we went to dinner we most certainly did not sit in the smoking section.

There was no nagging or being a shrill harpie about any of it. It was what it was.

Again, it was his decision. He could have chosen to smoke until the day he died (as long as I didn’t have to breathe it into my lungs, I was fine with that)

But he chose not to do that and it truly was his choice.

You are a different person and have different choices, that’s all.

@evelyns_pet_zebra

I am not okay with him smoking as long as he wants. I honestly cannot imagine how anyone can just let their loved ones to commit a slow suicide.

Smoking is dangerous and evil, I might not be able to change him, but I won’t give up because I don’t want to give up on him.

My dad quit cold turkey when he saw the black thilth they were draining from his lungs one time he had to go to the hospital.. I bet it scared the shit out of him.. he’s been clean for about 6 years now.

@airowDee driving is dangerous as well, but no one seems intent upon changing people’s transportation habits.

I’m curious, how do you figure smoking is evil?

@evelyns_pet_zebra

well, drinking and driving is dangerous, but it is possible to drive responsibly and safely. There is, however, no safe way to smoke ciagrettes. It is toxic and deadly period

Deadly and evil are two different things. Rattlesnake bites are deadly, but not evil. Calling your children stupid and ugly is evil, but not deadly.

There are some cases of smoking being injurious to your health, but that also covers marijuana, which has as much tar (if not more) than tobacco. Nicotine is deemed a poison, but then, so is ibuprofen.

Things and people are not evil. Evil refers to actions performed by people. Hitler wasn’t evil; he simply performed and condoned evil actions. Tornadoes and hurricanes and earthquakes and mudslides kill as many people as smoking does, but no one calls those things evil. They call them natural, or even more ridiculously, acts of God.”.

@evelyns_pet_zebra The truth is, smoking is in no way good for you. I don’t understand why you’re so upset about her trying to help him quit. She’s really doing him a favor. Unfortionatley, if he doesn’t want the help then there’s not much she can do. With that said, people can do whatever they want with their body even if it means rotting it from inside out. In the end, they’re the ones who suffer the most. Every action has a reaction and smoking is not the exception.

@kheredia

EPZ (if you read his post in other parts of this thread ) is a smoker himself who has tried numerous times (unsuccessfully, according to him) to quit . Consequently he is kind of prickly about the subject in general.

He also bristles at the thought of others trying to get someone else to quit.. But, technically speaking, he is correct that no one can make another adult do anything especially something as difficult (for some) as quitting smoking. In order for it to be successful long term the person has to want it for himself.

Even tho he and I are sort of on opposite ends of the spectrum, in one sense, in fairness I agree with that as well as his point about the use of the word evil. I noticed that also and was going to comment about it but he beat me to it so I just left it alone.

I understand the OP’s distress about this for her friend, but calling it evil won’t help the situation at all. The word evil implies a moral judgment. Someone who chooses to smoke is neither moral nor immoral regarding smoking, They are physically addicted to the substances that the IMMORAL, EVIL, CIGARETTE COMPAMIES chose to put more of into their product.

These companies cared little that it would cause the illness and deaths of millions of hapless smokers who were unaware of this. As long as it lined their pockets with money, they just didn’t care. And as Jeffrey Weigand testified, they knew about this for years through their own research and ACTIVELY covered it up and took steps to ensure that this info never saw the light of day. THAT IS EVIL.

You can pass a moral judgment upon people or corporations (headed by evil people) but saying that cigarettes (an inanimate object) or smoking is evil just serves to distract from the main point. It implies a moral judgment upon the person doing the smoking and that is just extremely wrong-headed and counter productive. If your goal is to get him to want to quit smoking, passing moral judgments where they are not called for will definitely NOT get the job done.

You cannot MAKE another fully grown adult do anything. You can speak to him about your sincere concerns but there is a fine line between that and nagging.

It’s true that there are some people who can quit cold turkey, but they are few. Most folks don’t have that easy a time of it. And as I mentioned before (and research clearly shows) using a combination of approaches at the same time increases the odds for success—usually combining a physical treatment with either counseling or group therapy. But a person has to be highly motivated to follow through on that. Passing moral judgments about good and evil just don’t help AT ALL.

I am sorry,maybe there is a better choice of word I can use other than evil.

I understand your intention which is good. Just trying to prevent a catastrophe if you use that approach on your boyfriend. I guarantee he will not respond well to the word evil.

Unhealthy does the trick nicely, but I’m sure he is already familiar with the statistics for how smoking is harmful to him (also not such a bad choice of phrase) and it’s still basically his choice.

How much of his secondhand smoke goes into YOUR lungs is however your choice. That was the main point of my original post. If you don’t think it’s harmful to you, do a little research. You were concerned about his misinterpreting this as a rejection of him. What you are rejecting is the smoke, which you have every right to do. Just make the difference clear to him. Rejecting his secondhand smoke is not rejecting him. It is protecting your own lungs which you have every right to do. If he doesn’t respect you enough to honor that, isn’t it better that you find out sooner than later?

Fortunately, my guy was intelligent, did his own research and was very well aware of how his smoking affected others (not just me) so it didn’t take a whole lot of persuading.

Your mileage may vary.

I read somewhere that smoking marijuana makes it harder to quit smoking cigarettes.

Did it ever cross your mind to show him how much much he’d save in a month or year by not smoking?

It is bad for your health (duh). Not just the cancer part, but it makes it hard to be athletic. I know a couple of Marines who have quit smoking because it was hurting their running time (and they are tested on it). It makes it harder to run or go up a lot of stairs. Then, there is eczema. And if he doesn’t care about doing that to himself, he should care about doing it to the people around him.

It also makes you smell that way (super noticeable to those who don’t smoke, trust me. I can’t stand being around someone who has just come back inside from smoking). If you smoke in the house, your house and clothes smell that way too. Its inconvenient for the people that don’t smoke. I am usually the DD, but smokers wont ride with me (and instead drive drunk, the idiots) because I won’t let them smoke in my car.

In the end, he will only quit smoking if he wants to. Don’t force him, just tell him your concerns. Honestly, I would never date a smoker. My husband chews (yuk!) but it doesn’t smell, it doesn’t hurt me, and I don’t taste it when I kiss him (where as when he smokes with other smokers (when he’s drinking) I can taste it).

If a smoker tries to quit but isn’t completely into it (aka the smoking doesn’t bother them that much (often, financial reasons alone aren’t enough)) then they will likely fail, and it will only hurt future attempts.

I’ve noticed a lot of it is habit. You probably get used to smoking whenever you’re in the car, or after work, or after you eat or something (I don’t know specifics, I’ve never smoked). You can try to replace one habit with another. My mom chews gum instead of smokes. My husband tried sunflower seeds to stop chewing, but the salt made the inside of his mouth raw and hurt (otherwise he’d probably just be sucking sunflower seeds all day). You could try using a nicotine patch (because some people are addicted to it for the stress relief abilities or something…) and chewing on a pen or something during the times you’d usually smoke.

It would certainly be hard if he has friends that smoke, though, because he’d be smelling it on them. He could try chewing instead of smoking, I know of a friend that did that. At least he isn’t hurting anyone else that way, and it may be cheaper (depending on how often he smokes). The friend that went from smoking to chewing doesn’t chew as often as he smoked.

@dee1313

thank you so much. He just said it’s disgusting to chew on ciagrettes. But you provide a really insightful answer.

Not a problem.

And to clarify, I meant using chewing tobacco, the stuff that comes in the cans. I didn’t know people chew on their cigarettes. They have chewing tobacco pouches so the stuff doesn’t get all over, but it is still disgusting. Spit bottles, having it in your teeth, yuck. Though I do find it rather amusing when my husband accidental spits in is water bottle instead of his spit bottle. He’s done it in a beer too.

Eewwwwww

The physical withdrawals from smoking only last 3 days. If you can white knuckle your way past those 3 days you’ve got a chance. Also, smoking masks all kinds of minor and not so minor aches and pains so it’s worth noting he may feel worse before he feels better. Keep hydrated, exercise and get plenty of sleep.