I didn't enjoy smoking cigarettes

[Ladybug]

I think we enjoy things and then we grow out of them...and enjoy other things. 

 

I am still growing...I loved to smoke..........now I love to be an ex smoker. I grew...and I hope I continue to do so until the day I die. Can I tell you what I enjoyed about smoking?  No I can not, it's in the past and not important anymore...the now is important and the future ...and both is smoke free.

 

This is the only explanation I can come up with why I could enjoy and "love" two opposite things...I am growing...I am still growing!

[sgt.barney]

The Sarge still wants pizza ... or the cheese steak from yesterday's discussion ...

 

 

Easy Peasy

[TAC]

I'm weird...i liked the way menthol cigarettes tasted... I enjoyed smoking them with friends... but I dont ever want to smoke again 

 

I liked the menthols better than the plain as well, but they made me just a little more dizzy for some reason.

 

At least the menthols didn't leave that yukky after taste.

[Ladybug]

I liked the menthols better than the plain as well, but they made me just a little more dizzy for some reason.

 

At least the menthols didn't leave that yukky after taste.

how can you like menthol's better..if you didn't enjoy smoking?

[TAC]

how can you like menthol's better..if you didn't enjoy smoking?

 

I did not enjoy smoking the menthols either, but when it came to a choice of two evils, I chose the menthols. It made smoking more tolerable.

[comrade simba]

@MQ

Bad wording on my part. I meant you may ask a straightforward question but it's one that will inadvertently roust a "factional" response.

 

I like the White Robe name. Easy shorthand. I am wrong for using it on the main forum, though. I'll keep better watch on the thread category.

[babs609]

well....I smoked a minimum of 20 cigarettes a day..up to 30.  I can guarantee you...out of those....I probably only "enjoyed"  3 cigarettes.  

 

1 when I first woke up (after 8 hours of oxygen running through my veins and not smoking)

1 when I took a lunch break (after 4 hours of not smoking)

1 when I got out of work.  (after 4 hours of not smoking)

 

 

all 3 that I "enjoyed" were after a period of abstaining.  hmmmmm...coincidence?  I don't think so

 

the rest were all just in between and i either hated them...or I didn't even consciously think about smoking at all...I just lit up.

 

When I wasn't smoking....I wished I was

and when I was smoking...I wished I wasn't

 

really doesn't sound like enjoyment to me.  Sounds like prison.  Torture.

 

Even if I admit I liked those 3 cigarettes a day  (I believe i enjoyed the relieving of the withdrawal pangs)...I didn't enjoy the other 17...that's a guarantee.  

 

I also would enjoy taking tight shoes off at the end of the day....but is the enjoyment in taking off the shoes??? How about if I don't even wear the tight shoes...and then I won't really enjoy the removing of the shoes to begin with.?

 

I have relapsed enough to know..that the fantasy of this sensation is just that...a fantasy.  Each time I ever relapsed...that first cigarette tasted like shit.  It wasn't until after 4 or 5 smokes that I suddenly started to "enjoy it".....

[Aine]

I know a couple of people who seem to really be able to smoke one or two cigarettes a day and be comfortable with that. My mother in law, the greatest mother in law in the world, was up for lunch yesterday, along with my sister in law, to celebrate my son's birthday. She smokes about 6 cigs a day. I had put out an ashtray on the patio for her; but she didn't want to smoke around my husband or me. So she attempted, after a few hours, to creep to the car for a smoke. I felt bad for her; I didn't want her to be uncomfortable, but I felt good, because I really don't think it would have bothered me that much. I choose not to smoke to day for my own reasons, but if I had only smoked a half dozen cigarettes a day, honestly, I would never have quit. Yeah, yeah, I know. But there it is. I did enjoy many of my cigarettes during the day; not all, no; perhaps a handful or so, out of the 3-4 pack a day habit I had. Problem with addiction, though, is that I don't get to decide how much I get to smoke. I absolutely do not understand my mother in law's habit, nor one of my co worker's who smoked 2 a day, until she said the whole business was silly and stopped. I. . .do. . .not. . .understand. . ..  ..

 

I have never wanted to "quit" doing many of the things I have quit in my life. However, logic and sanity indicates that I do it anyway if I truly wish to live as long as I possibly can. Quitting smoking just pisses me off, these days. Better than the first week, though, when quitting meant a possible trip to a locked ward. :D

[babs609]

i love your honesty Aine.  It really helps me to read posts like yours.  Sometimes quitting smoking for me resembles childbirth in the sense that...as time goes one...we forget how bad it can be.  I do remember wanting to just crawl out of my skin sometimes.  But then I would go to my online support group and realize I wasn't alone.  and I would read funny posts, motivational posts....I would read the newbie package and I read a lot!  I googled everything I could about quitting smoking....I still do sometimes...

[El Bandito]

For me, I am moving from the Sarge's position, to the OP.

 

Partly I guess influenced by Allen Carr. I'm sure many have read it, but essentially he writes that we are brainwashed into believing that we enjoy smoking. I won't attempt to make his argument, but there are some parts of it that are persuasive. However, there are times when I am aware that I am remembering certain cigarettes with fondness.

 

Cristobal used to post a great graphic about 'How your cigarette tastes' with anticipation being much greater than reality.

 

I guess if you genuinely believe that you enjoy something, well you do.

 

However, looking back, I cannot identify a specific element of smoking that I enjoyed. I do identify certain cigarettes, like Babs above, and the 'experience'. Carr would argue these are pleasurable because they relieved withdrawals or were associated with genuinely pleasurable moments, finishing a chore, sitting down to 'relax' for example.

 

For me, the jury is out on whether I genuinely enjoyed some cigarettes.

 

What is certain is that the question is academic.

 

1. I cannot be the 1 a day smoker. Don't know why I can't and some can. But I can't. Therefore, the 5 good ones per day, come with the other 25.

2. I choose not to be told what to do by an addiction. So I don't smoke.

3. Even if I decide that 5 a day are 'good' cigarettes and I want them back. They kill me just as dead. So, I'll choose living, and do something else five times a day...I am working on sex as a concept but La Bandita seems less than interested :(

[sharonsiff]

I enjoyed the feeling of the throat hit in my throat, I really truly did.

 

I stopped using nicotine, in my liquid, and still got an amount of physiological pleasure from the rush and hit of menthol to the throat. I imagine it was a 'moment' where the world stopped just for a second and I got off it.

 

I completely agree that smoking cigarettes scratches a nicotine itch but I also, from first hand experience, can see that the physiological aspect is part of the attraction too.

 

I stopped looking for that 'moment' through my own personal reasons (faff to keep charging etc) but can see that many do enjoy the actof smoking too, there are many non nicotine using vapers out there.

 

So yes I did enjoy smoking and can understand others who did too. I don't miss it (smoking or vaping) but I did enjoy that 'moment' it used to give me. I sometimes use an Airways chewing gum to still get that moment of peace as it has quite a hit.

[millie]

I pretty much liked everything about smoking.  

 

I liked the taste and the smell.  I still don't mind sitting near those who smoke, although the stale smell after they are put out that lingers is terrible.  

 

I liked the time out, going off to have a cigarette as I felt like I had switch the day off for just a little while.  I don't take proper breaks at work now or when I am working at home in the evening.  I liked it with a glass of wine or two. 

 

Looking at the above You are probably thinking why did she quit then? 

 

I quit because I didn't want to be coughing and spluttering and gasping for breath when I am older.  I quit because I didn't want any more smoking wrinkles.  I didn't want to be a pariah any more hanging around outside bars and restaurants.   I didn't want to break a promise I made to my son.   I quit because I was the biggest smoker of all my friends and family.  None of them ever believed that it would be me who  would quit or even have a sticky quit.   Now they are all making their excuses and saying they will cut down to less than 5 day then stop.  I tell them there is only one way.  NOPE.  

 

Millie x

[bakon]

I was like Babs. Same amount and same enjoyment in the end. When I relapsed in my younger years from 1 and 2 year quits it was always the same way. Never liked the first one and had to suffer through learning to like it again. I currently hate the smell and have since day1 of my quit. Thank God for that.

 

 

MQ and Sgt- your both ok in this conversation but put up your shields rather quickly, no offensive tactics were displayed but quick defensive reactions. Lower your shields, same side here.

[sgt.barney]

I know a couple of people who seem to really be able to smoke one or two cigarettes a day and be comfortable with that.

 

We all know someone like this... and you'd never really know that they were the horrible addicts that we are - all the way up until you tell them they can NEVER have their "one or two" a day and take them away. Then they turn into one of us.

 

They're just like the rest of us.

 

Don't think they're  different, folks, because they only smoke a few - even only "one or two".

 

Mrs. Sarge smoked 3 a day for near a decade (one at wake-up with her morning coffee, and two when she got home from work).  That was it. For ... then it started increasing maybe 14/15 years or so in.  She's up to half-a-pack-ish a day now so it's progressing to just where Big Tobacco wants her to be.

 

 

Easy Peasy

[Amy]

I have to say I enjoyed smoking and if I only smoked 2-3 a day I would continue.  I am not sure if it was enjoyment or being comfortable in my habit. I smoked Marlboro Menthol light- the light part was supposed to be healthier for me just like I drink

1/2 caff coffee.   I was pretty much a chain smoker 4 packs for the weekend were needed.  This is why I had no choice

but to quit.  It was getting out of hand. 

[Aine]

We all know someone like this... and you'd never really know that they were the horrible addicts that we are - all the way up until you tell them they can NEVER have their "one or two" a day and take them away. Then they turn into one of us.

 

They're just like the rest of us.

 

Don't think they're  different, folks, because they only smoke a few - even only "one or two".

 

Mrs. Sarge smoked 3 a day for near a decade (one at wake-up with her morning coffee, and two when she got home from work).  That was it. For ... then it started increasing maybe 14/15 years or so in.  She's up to half-a-pack-ish a day now so it's progressing to just where Big Tobacco wants her to be.

 

 

Easy Peasy

 

I agree; addiction is addiction, no matter how much one uses. My mother in law is 79 and has always smoked that amount and she's been a smoker since she was in her 20's, I think. My feeling is that some people are more prone to heavier usage , perhas due to screwy dopamine receptors, or something? And, of course, the quantity does seem to increase for most due to desensitation of nicotine receptors, according to the studies I've seen.

 

Doesn't matter; results are the same for me and for her; she "needs" to go out for her smoke every 4 hours or so. . . she just pays less for her drug than I had to lol! Addiction is addiction, no matter the quantity.

[ChRiSpY]

"The Chris" enjoyed smoking as well.  In fact I kinda miss it.... sorry He kinda misses it.

 

"The Chris" also enjoyed playing naked games with his ex.... he misses her however did not want her back one she was cheating because he does not want an Gonosyphillisidia.

 

"The Chris" wants to live long and happy without cancer.  Therefore he will never smoke again.

 

Keep on keepin on.

[TAC]

I repeat, I did not enjoy smoking cigarettes