Staying in Shape (my rant on smoking)

[sidewinder22]

I don't care what anyone says, Cold Turkey is the only way to quit anything. Otherwise you are just trading addictions. Addiction may be a disease, but its a behavioral disease and the only way to change that behavior is to stop doing it.

I quit last October, cigarettes that is. And I feel great.

Congrats, but cold turkey can be very dangerous even life threatening depending on the drug, so that is not good advice. Tapering off is the safest way to get off any drug. Cold Turkey is fine for cigarettes because the withdrawal is not serious and its more mentally addicting than physical. Many alcoholics have died from cold turkey withdrawal. Benzos like Xanax and Valium are also life threatening withdrawal cold turkey. Opiates like heroin and Vicodin can be done cold turkey but its very nasty.

There is also a difference between being an addict and being physically dependent on a drug with overlapping of the two states.

 

[bazillion]

Fine distinction, if you ask me. If the choice is "quit or die", you get a different perspective on consequences.

 

[simpletwist]

Maybe I went off the deep end a bit. And I'm sure some things out there could kill you if you stopped cold turkey. So whats the trade off? You're killing yourself slowly or quickly but killing yourself nonetheless.

Wasn't meant as advice, but my version of addiction ranting.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Just buy the nastiest tasting cigarettes you know of and when you can't fight the urge to smoke, pull one of those gross ones out. No matter how much you love cigarettes, the taste of that one should make leave them alone. After a while, that urge would go away.

Viceroys, Salem, Kools, all those nasty brands. Nothing beats a Marlboro Red but only buy the crappy brands.