[rabidrat]

I was a half-pack-a-day smoker for about 10 years, quit several times (once for several months), and the only thing that "worked" ultimately was realizing that I simply could never have another cigarette. After the physical cravings subsided, I still had frequent longings for that wonderfully ubiquitous way to 'fix' my internal itchiness/discomfort, but I had made such a commitment that I would have literal nightmares in which I smoked a cigarette--and then woke up in a panic, similar to dreams where I found out I'd accidentally killed someone and was debating whether to turn myself in or go on the lam.

Then one evening about 10 years later I was at a festival wandering around and I had this desire in my brain for something, I didn't know what, and it was a few hours later that I realized the thing I really wanted was a cigarette. It was that night that I changed my internal conception of myself from "ex-smoker" to "non-smoker". I don't have cravings any more for cigarettes, though there is a certain pang, I guess I would call it "nostalgia", and maybe it includes "envy" of people who can smoke a cigarette/cigar socially at an event and then not think about it again for years. Occasionally I will have accidental contact with nicotine (like buying a joint on vacation and getting a weird taste while smoking it and realizing half-way through that it's actually a spliff), and for a few days or a week afterward the light switch is again visible in my mind--though I'm thankfully not tempted to flip it. I wonder in those times whether a never-smoker who has a cigar once does have the same cravings in the days after, but doesn't recognize them as such.

So at least for me, who admittedly was never a heavy smoker, it doesn't resonate that I will struggle with this addiction until I die. The only apparent lasting (mental) consequences are that I have to consciously refuse nicotine even when it would be a legitimately fun and interesting experience (like when I was offered some fancy snuff at a party which everyone else got to enjoy). And when I see someone smoking a cigarette I might get the nostalgia or envy I mentioned above. But when I get within smelling distance it's just foul and unappealing.

Best wishes for anyone who's thinking of or trying to quit.