No quest for health is complete without quitting…

Smoking, that is.

Because I like to tackle all big things at one time so that my life will be as difficult as possible, this is something else I’m trying to do.  Along with completely changing every single thing that I eat every day, all the time.  So in addition to struggling with all my food changes 3 or 4 times a day (or actually twice a day, because I still haven’t gotten the hang of eating more often than that), I also want to struggle with quitting smoking.  Something that is a struggle at least 20 times a day, sometimes more.

So now there are 25 to 30 things to struggle with each day.

Of course, all of this is hyperbole and jest because I’m not really quitting.  I’m just making the transition to something less deadly.

At least I hope it’s less deadly.  No one is 100% sure.

As I make my transition to ecigs, I wanted to document, for those who are considering it or who are also trying it, what it’s like.  Myself, I do not consider it a magic bullet insofar as I still want real cigarettes, like, all the time.  I switched over entirely about a week ago, with one mid-week breakdown because I ran out of cartridges.  Thankfully, the cartridges came 24 hours later so I only back-slid for one day, which was enough.  Because, like the devil, smoking is a demon that possesses your body and soul and is relentless in its demands for gratification.  The son of a bitch is ruthless.

Even though I watched my father die (terribly) of lung cancer, smoking is not an easy thing to quit.  I know it will kill me and yet day after day I convince myself not to quit.  Because the agony of quitting is so much greater than my fear of death.  Virtually every time I have taken a drag of a cigarette since my dad died, I have done so with the knowledge that it was killing me.  No doubt about it.  Maybe it doesn’t happen to everyone, a nice comforting thing to tell oneself when one is a smoker, but it happens enough that it always appears on those “top things that kill people” lists.   Plus, if it’s not the lung cancer that gets you, it could just be that one stray piece of smoke that latches onto the wrong cell and scurries over to some weird hiding place in your body and lays in wait until you are least expecting it and BAM, big toe cancer.

Or something.

Who knows if that’s how it works?  That’s how it works in my head.  And since the mind and the body work in such close conjunction with one another, I assume that just thinking smoking is going to kill me will kill me.

There is zero reason to keep smoking other than it is stupid difficult to quit.  And you know what I’m saying is true.

You don’t even have to smoke to know what I’m saying is true.  You could just be an alcoholic or a heroin addict.  Or someone addicted to judging people.  Because some people are.

And I got news for you, nonsmoker who bitches and complains and waves your hands around in disgust when our air gets near you – we hate you.  We hate you with such a passion.  Honestly, we do not care at all that you don’t like our smoke.  We don’t like your FACE!  Just kidding.  We know what we’re doing is bad and we know it affects other people.  But we are powerless, you understand?  We are enslaved by a beast that would just as soon kill us as look at us, and we pay for the pleasure of it.

But you pay for everything that’s really delicious and decadent in life.

Um.  Not sure what happened there…

Anyhoo…

So the ecigs!  Yeah!  Okay, so they’re pretty nice.  They totally take the sting out of not being able to smoke real cigarettes.  A lot of people on the interweb say “once they picked up an ecig they never smoked another real one” or that they “don’t even miss real ones” or whatever other bullshit they’re spouting.  Maybe those people do exist, but I dare say they are not true junkies and are more likely fake junkies who smoke like 3 cigarettes a day and call that a habit.  Still, ecigs are so familiar, you know?  Like seeing someone in a crowd that looks like your old best friend and you get really excited and maybe a little nervous because you have not seen them for AGES.  So you want to run up to them and grab them, and then, right at the last second before you totally you embarrass yourself because they’re ACTUALLY a stranger, you realize..  oh yeah, it’s an ecig.  They’re like that.

They don’t feel smokey.  They feel steamy.  And they don’t taste like (yummy) scorched earth and burning bushes.  They taste like bland incense or a really wimpy ass cigar.  Unless you use the fruity or minty flavors, in which case it’s like holding your head over the simmering pot of potpourri on the stove or inhaling a Vick’s-filled humidifier.  Plus, they do not have a concise start and stop like a real smoke, so there may.. sometimes… most of the time… be some question about whether you should suck on them, like, all the time or you know, just every five minutes.

Also, and finally, ecigs don’t really pack the same punch as real ones.  They’re just a bit kinder and gentler, which you know, isn’t so much what we’re after when we’re smoking.  Clearly we like being roughed up a little.

On the other hand, there is no filth.  There is no stench.  There is a faint chemical tinge to the vapor that is exhaled, but if you are using an ecig anywhere besides a car with all the windows rolled up tight, no one will even notice it.

Shockingly, though, there are still a lot of people out there who have never seen an ecig or heard of one and who will, in total dismay, dramatically accuse you of smoking in a no-smoking zone even though there is no smoke smell or ashes or filthy glowing ember with which to burn them.  Which you really want to do.  But you can just laugh at them and blow steam in their face.

And although I have only had one pack of cigarettes all week (so that’s minus 6 packs over the usual), I have not threatened to, wanted to, or tried to murder anyone.  Not one time.   Miracles DO exist!  I guess that is courtesy of the nicotine, primarily, but anyone who has ever tried the gum or the lozenges or the patches can tell you that nicotine does not equal the entire equation or everyone would be able to quit with a sticker and a pack of gum.

I do think I’m going to make it, though.  I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself, but if I can do this, I can step down the nicotine, too.  And if I can do that, I may one day be able to quit altogether.  I’ll just take this one step at a time, though.

xo