Elk-Awesome! I thought something weird was going on with all the bumps today and even posted a little blurb about it. I'm finishing my Day 3 Quit and I haven't slept and I'm in a fog so I couldn't figure out what was going on but glad it got resolved.
So your finishing Day 4 right now? That is great. I will be trying to catch up to you-one day at a time! We are in this Quit together. Peace
See, it's hard for me to say. We might be dead even... April 14th? I guess this is my intro thread, I can getcha all caught up :)
I'm calling March 16th, 2011 my "Quit Day". That's the day I left the new DDS' office in shame, knowing it was time to put away this nasty old bad habit; and off I reluctantly went to Wally World, for all my painkillers. 21mg patch, 4mg gum, chewed a piece every hour or so those first few days. Let me derail right here and say that a 21mg (patch)+ 96 mg (4mg gum x 24 per day) was NOWHERE NEAR the amount of nicotine I was used to. Less than half, for sure. The smoking websites say the average cigarette gives you about 1 mg per cancer stick. If those numbers are right, a pack a day smoker would get about 24mg of nicotine a day then. I am telling you right here and now as God as my witness 117mg per day of
Store Bought Pharmacutical Grade Nicotine was LESS THAN HALF of what us can-a-day dippers get. I don't care what anyone else says, I know what I went through that first week. Freaky dreams. Tossing and turning, fits of sleep mixed with insomnia. Jonesing so bad for chew I wanted to scream! Irritability, the constant common denominator throughout. A freaking monarch butterfly could have landed on a kitten and it would have pissed me off. But I didn't give in. Oh, I looked at it. I opened the lid and inhaled deeply, eyes closed, held it in like a hit off a joint, and exhaled slowly through pursed lips. Then I snapped the lid back on and set the can aside. Memories of a lost love.
*que romantic melody: "Killing me softly..."*
I have not touched tobacco since March 16th, 2011. I'm proud of that. I know you guys don't recognise that date since I still had a trickle charge of nicotine flowing, and that's cool- your house your rules, but that is the day I quit. Those first days were the worst. That's where I experianced the signs symptoms of withdrawel. Maybe I just prolonged it all by going the NRT route, I don't know, whatever it worked, I'm clean :)
On April 8th I started the first low dose of Chantix on a day off. It made me sleep all day, after that... nothing. By then I was using one patch by day, nothing by night, and a few (1 to 4) losanges depending on how bad the wife was pissing me off that day. I truley believe by the end of this week I could have just gone Cold Turkey and succeded, but I had already bought the expensive Chantix prescription and bought in to the hype. BTW, side note: losanges work WAY better than the gum. Worth the extra expense if youre going that route.
April 14th, 2011 I pulled off the last Nicotine Patch following an episode of violent nausea vomiting; full on toilet bowl hugging-bile up the back of my nose-tap water tastes as sweet as Mountain friggin Dew afterwords. Appareantly Chantix should be taken on a full stomach, and in the absence of nicotine at the higher "Week 2" dose. That's a tip from your Uncle Elk, for you guys thinking about Chantix.
10 days in to the Chantix treatment now, which is 7 days of low dose "starter pack" and then many weeks of a higher dosage. 3 days into that HD routine and so far aside from puking my stomach inside out on that first pill I have had no ill effects. I have not had the urge to kill myself, or anyone else that I did not want to kill previously. No freaky dreams like that first week of withdrawel, which makes me wonder if the weird dreams aren't just a symptom of nicotine withdrawel itself? I don't really even want to chew most of the time, though I really do enjoy my fake stuff and wish it would hurry the hell up and get here in the mail. Thank goodness a friend of mine had some frozen in his freezer from a 2009 quit he gave up on. He hooked me up w/ 5 cans of pretty awful 2 year old freezer burnt Oregon Mint Snuff which I am loving compared to the NOTHING I had :lol:
I have promised to hook him up with Grape, Wintergreen and Mint Smokey Mtn when they show up, and help him quit for good with me. PS. Somehow, thank goodness this forum gets through the firewall at work (hehehe) so goodie for him and me, we can learn, support and get supported on the clock! :)
So yeah, I know I went a different route than the Cold Turkey Method, but you know I always have been one to do things the way I think they should be done, and fuck you if you don't like it- no offense! :) All roads lead to Rome, right? Whether I'm quit for 32 days or 3 days, the important thing is I'M QUIT!!!
