Photon Lexicon Quiters Support Group

[dkumpula]

If you are looking for an alternative to soda, Brad, you may consider making your own flavored drinks. An old colleague of mine was a soda addict and switched to water with lemon juice. I tried making my own soda with carbonated water, lemon juice, stevia and artificial caffeine. After a while, I got tired of paying for CO2 canisters and dropped that part of it. (SaltyRobot took that aparatus on. )

Admittedly, there is still caffeine in the mix, but its a lower doss than soda and the rest of the ingredients are all good.

-David

[zerowaitstate]

/Insert Tongue in cheek

The real reason it it so hard to give up smoking is that carrying around a smoke machine or hazer is a PITA, when you can just light up a fag and blow smoke into that beautiful coherent light ....

Also lighting a Cig from a laser, whilst it can be harmful to ones health, there will be no argument it is the coolest lighter there is

[Draco]

quiting smoking has to be the hardest thing i have undertaken and kept it up for well over a year and then relapsed over the holidays, i had smoked the clove cigars and i have made the transition over to a vape pen and that's what i currently use, it still gives me something to do with my hands, now the idea is to back off on the nicotine over time, i started with a cheap vape pen called a Tsunami V-Power(starter kit was 30 bucks and uses a regulated power) although i quit using there liquid and found a fruit flavored brand that's 50/50 VG and PG, i find my coil lasts longer with that ratio. since it's a pen i feel like i should be playing it rather then vaping with it, kind of looks like a flute. since i switched i have only bought one pack of the cigars and that was over a month ago and still have half left, right now i still view the pen as evil but only partly less evil if you will, and i can puff it at lasers! But that said when i tried quitting the first time i just stopped and managed to keep that up for over a year, i wish i had some advice other then to try the vape more then back off on the nicotine content, my mom started using candy but for her it was too late but she was almost a 3-4 pack a day habit and cancer evently won out.

Another goal i have set is to eliminate high fructose corn syrup from anything i can, starting with pop and i drink one of the worst, Mountain Dew. i switched to a version called Throw Back that uses sugar instead and i can find that in glass bottles, i never have liked any kind of pop/soda from a plastic bottle. I am too wary of diet pop, i don't like the sweeteners and i don't think they are any better then normal pop with moderation.
I can't imagine me ever quiting caffeine though, that must have been hard

[dchammonds]

I haven't used the vap pen at all today. I did yesterday but, you don't really get past the nicotine withdrawal by still using the pen so I've been resisting that today too.

It's best to get away from nicotine period. Keep strong! I'm glad I didn't try that vap stuff or I might still be puffing today...

[zerowaitstate]

It's best to get away from nicotine period. Keep strong! I'm glad I didn't try that vap stuff or I might still be puffing today...

This is so true i actually gave up 15 20 years ago, recently i was at a friends and was fascinated by Vape, i never saw if before. IT was such a surreal experience to have a draw and get a pure nicotine hit. man i can tell you some thing in my brain had a little flutter it new that chemical signature.

[kitatit]

Hey guys,

I must commend you all on your efforts to quit I'm not a smoker but did have a stint in my 20s where I drank a lot of Coke and Red Bull due to low energy from poor diet.

Below is a bit of a ramble, as I tend to do, but stick with it. You may find something useful from my friends and my experience.

Generally Australa has a pretty low smoking rate these days, about 13% I think. The industry I work in is a lot higher though, about 20% or more. The E-cigarettes/vap pens ect use has exploded and seems like it's working for quiet a few people.

If it doesn't work for you, maybe try this...... It's pretty brutal but I have seen it work 2 times and it's lasted over three years for these two guys.

What they did was actually ramp up their smoking over 2-3 weeks until they couldn't stand it anymore. I can't quiet remember the quantities he used to smoke, maybe a pack a day. He ramped it up to over 2 1/2 packs a day until he felt so sick didn't want to smoke anymore. A bit drastic, I know, it's the sort of guy he is. I guess apart from the short term health impacts and unpleasant experience, I wasn't a bad idea. He. Theorised that the memory of how bad he felt would be burnt into his memory. That is in fact how it played out for him. Brutal but clever, Now he consciously and subconsciously associates smoking with feeling terrible instead of it being his friend that helps keep him relaxed.




Regarding sugar addiction to soda ect. I find with a committed effort you can trend your taste buds in and out of having a sweet tooth over a couple of weeks. As I mentioned before, I went through a patch of a few years in my twenties drinking a lot of caffeinated/sugary/stimulant drinks. I finally decided to get my diet sorted out. I was as expected much better off for it and pretty much wound my soft drink (Soda) intake back to about 10 cans a year for the last 10 years. However a few months ago, I drifted back into drinking sugary drinks. I accidentally trended my taste buds back to a sweet tooth and I'd started stocking sugary drinks in my fridge at home. Well, I've just about trended myself back out of the sweet tooth zone (Still eating a lot of berries and grapes) ect but no soft drinks.

I used to eat a lot more salt too, if I have that much salt now, It tastes terrible. Also Red Bull and Coke taste different now too. Actually I never liked the tast of Coke when I was little, but the powerful effect the sugar and caffeine had on my brain in my twenties made me crave it badly.

Essentiall, I'm a bit lazy and I find whatever food I have easy access to, I eat. Answer? Don't stock your home/environment with sugar.


In our western world full of toy food for our brat taste buds it can be hard to know what normal is. So many things on offer are nuking the shit out of our tastebuds until they lose their sensitivity. I few years ago, I felt myself feeling like shit almost all the time. If I ate or drank something that my body didn't really like, I wouldn't really notice.

What made a big difference was this. I did a two week "detox diet" yeah ,yeah, fad I know... But I did notice one very useful thing after it. My system was more sensitive after that. E.g. Because I now felt pretty good, If I ate something my system didn't like, I'd get a head ache or feel generally crappy. It became obvious what It didn't like. You can do a trial by elimination and find out what your system doesn't like (Usually artificial additives)

For me, It was;
-Sodium benzoate preservative.
-Caffine.
-Artificial orange colouring (Sunset yellow) (110) Banded in many countries.
-MSG

If you want to try the "Detox thing" you don't need anything drastic or high tech or expensive. What me and my girlfriend did was basically eat like a rabbit for two weeks. No Meat, fat, alcohol, drugs, artificial food, pretty much water, fruit vegetables ect.

Was it hard? Yes but nothing life threatening. Definitely recommend having a buddy to do it with.

Apart from feeling much better and having more energy, skin cleared up ect. It seemed to recalibrate my pain/discomfort "this is not food" feedback system. Yes I'll still eat these things that make me feel like shit from times to time, but now I know what's causing the problem and limit it.

Anyway, keep fighting the good fight. It's your victory and as well as you getting to live an extra 20 years, your families and your PL friends will get to enjoy your company for longer too.

Good luck
Kit

[rodman1369]

I try to limit my coke drinking to ones with Crown Royal mixed in...Badda Boom!

[Diachi]

Best of luck with quitting!! I find it's much easier if you can stay busy all the time or at least engaged somewhat in something, when you're sitting doing nothing that urge to smoke comes right back. At least for me. Maybe avoid Coffee too if you can (Assuming you drink coffee...), that always makes me want a smoke. Avoiding drinking if you're a drinker is probably wise too... Not sure why I'm pointing all this out, anyone that smokes/drinks/drinks coffee probably already knows all this.

Couple of summers ago the forest fires up here were so bad that I ended up finding it easy to quit - then I headed further North to Cambridge Bay where the air was clear, there wasn't much to do and the guy I was working with smoked. Ended up right back on it, haven't been able to quit since. Up to nearly a pack a day over the last couple of weeks. Oh well. Working on my weight and fitness first. Best to focus on one thing at a time.

Agreed with Kit on the sugar - takes a couple of weeks cutting back but your taste will adjust (Same goes for salt). Used to drink coffee with 3 sugars, now 1 tastes rather sweet. Something I discovered last night that seemed to satiate my sweet tooth was eating a few pieces of frozen fruit (The mixed kind you get in a bag at the store), had a piece of each strawberry, pineapple and mango. Might work for someone else with a sweet tooth instead of candy.

Again, good luck!

[Bradfo69]

Thanks. I wasn't intentionally quitting the soda... it's just kind of happened along with it. I ended up having a cup of coffee late this morning because I was going a little bonkers though. So far, not having a cigarette has been fairly easy. The craving for "something" hasn't gone away and while I think I'd be satisfied with a drag or two on the vap pen, I've resisted it.
.
This all kind of started with the uncomfortable feeling of my annual winter weight gain. I always seem to add few pounds over the holidays and winter and then shed them in summer. When your my size, even 4 or 5 pounds is noticeable and I really didn't feel good at FLEM so I wanted to cut back on the unhealthy eating habits and make a concentrated effort to drop the few pounds more quickly. I've been a long time recovering addict and alcoholic and so caffeine and nicotine are all I have left. I don't view the caffeine as a problem but, all the talk about how bad diet soda is for you made me want to switch to something more healthy and it's been grapefruit juice and bottled water the past few days. I'm kind of going into calorie counting/starvation mode for a few weeks - and trying to stick with more healthy food options.

[Draco]

except for the artificial crap my view on food stuff is every thing in moderation, i could not imagine my self ever giving up caffeine, sugar and salt, i had my doctor tell me i need to intake more salt, i don't eat enough of it as is so i guess i am alright on that.
that's great you guys could cut some of that stuff out, i have read that moderating calorie intake can help you live longer as well, up until this week i was cutting out fast food, this week i have been helping some one move half a factory and i need much more so even though fast food tastes like crap it's fast, i think thats where a lot of people run into that loop, fast and cheap and is hard to break