Hey All,
Its been 40+ years of dipping,chewing.smoking you name it. I have decided to quit! Not because of the money, or the wife (who is still smoking), but because I'm sick of it controlling my life.
My plan was to start on 1/5, but I ran out of Cope last night. I had the choice to go out and get a can or start then. I quit at midnight 1/3, rinsed my mouth and brushed my teeth and went to be thinking it would be a good start.
I started out in 5th grade with a product by the name of Cannonball, it was small brick of tobacco plug. It was a thing that a bunch of us guys thought was cool to do after school. Yea, felt queezy the first time or too but continued doing it. After school soon turned into before school, recess, lunch etc.; then found that if you brought in your own paper cup to class that it was OK to chew in class. Maybe it was growing up in Texas that made it acceptable? I still think back and remember seeing quite a few desks in class with paper cups sitting on them that you could use to spit into as long as you didn't make a production doing so. I continued with Cannonball pretty much through 6th grade.
During the summer between 6th and 7th we moved to Arizona, and found that there were a lot of chewers here. I seemed to have a hard time finding my Cannonball, but was introduced to many others. For the most part I had switched to Redman after the various taste tests. When starting school found that not all classes allowed cups in the rooms so had to determine which ones did. Sometimes when picking a class schedule you could even find a way to make it through most of the day being able to dip/chew in class. This is when I also found out about the ease of Cope. It was much easier to transport in your hip pocket than Redman. There was always an abundant supply of Cope too if you ran out during the day. There were a few of the Skoal folks, but they were few and far between and almost always picked on for their choice.
Those were the days, there was always a dip to be had. You could go through the whole school day and maybe had to deal with 1 or 2 classes that wouldn't allow it. Sports were no problem back at that time as well. Thought it was kind of funny you could get busted for smokin in the boys room, but nothing at all for chewing everywhere.
I did try smoking some, ciggs, cigars, pipes... but never filled the place of my dip. I believe it was near the end of high school or beginning of college that I started putting pinches in my top lip. What a novel idea I had, none of my buddies had been doing it and I could even get more great flavor. I started finding out I could start swallowing the juice instead of disposing of it. I thought a few times that I should give it up, I'm doing more than a can a day. Swallowing all this juice can't really be good for me. Parts of my gums are receding and not looking real good. Nahhhh... Its ok. I will quite sometime in the future but no reason to now.
Through college, in year of work during that time and after... Even up to yesterday. It was also great have have my can or log close by. Now that everyone is cracking down on ciggs for the last few years I sat back laughing that I can still chew. Friends that smoke have to go out to the alley or patio to have their ciggs., while I can stay in the bar and drink while enjoying my tobacco. If I travel for work, don't have to worry about long flights or delays. Life is sure grand.
Well, now that can has had full control of my life. It has gotten to the point of even putting my dips in before bedtime. Approx. only 3 hours of each day was the only time I don't have a dip in. I can't remember the last time I even spit because I needed too. I have thought many times of quitting. Sometimes I actually even said I would but wouldn't even make it through the first few hours. I've been considering this for awhile now but always come up some lame ass excuse to put it off. I'm done with excuses and made the quit time now.
WoW, haven't been to sleep yet. Thought about 0500 this morning, what the heck just drive up to the station and get a can... This is stupid. I didn't get in the car, just kept drinking my water and trying to keep busy. After breakfast the urge got pretty bad, and started thinking just one wouldn't hurt. Luckily I don't have 1 left in an can. I've been snaking on candy, nuts, fruit, water, and some soda. I did have to get to the store and get some of that Smokey Mountain stuff. Its not bad... not the same but does seem to help the cravings and at least fills the pockets better than paper towels.
Its been 17.5 hours now. I'm rambling on in this post while listening to football in the background. I don't know if I mentioned it before but driving was a whole new experience. I thought I could actually get pulled over because they would think I had been drinking. Everything right now kinda seems like a version of the twilight zone. The one thing that I hadn't seen posted in the what to expect things was I seem to get these chills. Like all of the sudden I'm just freezing my butt off. Its not cold in the house, so the only thing I figure is that my blood pressure my actually be going down from the lack of the brown stuff in my system.
It hasn't been easy today, and know that it is going to get far worse before it gets better. But thanks for the sight, and letting me ramble on.
I think I have to go ransack the local hardware store before it closes to up my supply of horehound candy to make it through the night.
