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okay folks i'm 56 years old started smoking at 13 won't even begin to pretend that i've got the will power to go cold turkey, so has anyone got any method that they have used successfully to stop smoking?

Chantix is working for a friend of mine, see your doc.

In my opinion, and I quit a four and a half pack a day addiction, you have to decode you really want to quit. All the fancy treatments a gimmicks are worthless until you really want to quit.

I did it and I am no towering monument of strength. I just made up my mind and quit right then. Had half a pack in my shirt pocket and a carton and a half in my pickup. Gave them all away and have not had a cigarette in my mouth ever again. That was 32 years ago last November.

A heart attack will help alot. I had one two months ago after smoking for 35 years and haven't lit a cigarette since.

the only true key to success in quitting.

I had three bouts of bronchial pneumonia in one year, that third one I was still trying to smoke cigs while it felt like I was hacking up a lung. I saw a pulmonologist who told me I was fast-tracking for emphysema if I didn't quit.

I did, and had the heart attack a month later. That was over two years ago. 35 year smoker.

As with any habit find a good habit to substitute for the bad habit. Working out is a good step in the right direction. Even if it's just a short walk whenever you want to light up.

One thing's for sure. After about 30-60 days you'll wonder why you ever started to begin with.

As others have said, you have to really want to quit. I used the patches. My first attempt to quit was kind of half azzed and led to the second attempt which has been successful for over ten years. I was off the patches in about three weeks YMMV. The mental part of quitting was the worst for me. I cut cigarette size pieces of wooden dowel to hold when driving. It was such a habit to light up when I got behind the wheel.
The cravings do become less frequent and go away faster as time goes by. Best of luck to you.

Ernie

Like others have said.........You have to WANT to quit.

Then you just find the easiest way for you......whether it be with chantix, patches, gum, or peppermint sticks.

I quit after 35 years by using a patch for 3 weeks, still have a desire every now and then for a smoke, but can will the feeling away. Good Luck to you!!

if you truly want to quit you will. that's basically what it boils down to. i use to smoke 2-3 packs a day. when i quit the booze (was a hard core alky)i realized chit if i can quit drinking i can quit smoking so i did. the first week was tough but after that it was just a matter of not doing it.

You've already heard most of what you need to know.

The rest of it is simply recognizing what smoking is, which is nothing more than an involuntary habit brought about by repetition.

In other words; it's the same simple act as not thinking about what sock you put on what foot first thing in the morning, nor knowing what leg goes in your pants first. What you'll realize is that you'll do it the same way every morning with your pants and your socks because that's how it got all started years ago when you were little.
Smoking didn't start as a perfect habit right out of the gate, but rather evolved into one from you nurturing it.

We smoke after dinner, with coffee, during driving and funny as it seems; right after a long hill climb or exertion, which should have been the furthest thing from our minds.

As it has already been said; you have to want to quit and I've quit for 5 years on a patch and started back. Last time I quit cold turkey and that was Dec. 7, 2009. I've smoked for five quit for five and smoked for five again. I've seen dozens fail on the gimmicks, pills, patches and you name it.

I'm done for good because I finally figured out what it was and the nicotine consists of almost nothing of the habit. It's the act, not the content of the cigarette that is really addictive.

Get your mind right first and you won't need anything else but the willingness to throw them down and never look back.....

Good luck.

Smoked 40 years, at 2 packs a day.

With Zyban my wife and I quit in 2 weeks, 8 years ago.

You have to want to quit as has been stated.

I quit cold turkey.

13 years ago I decided I wanted to quit, and I went to my Dr who prescribed Zyban. I took it for 10 days smoking as I reguarly did and woke up on the 11th morning and quit smoking. I haven't smoked since and have had no desire to. I didn't feel it was that bad but that was just me. I had smoked for 40 years and had tried to quit before. I highly recommend Zyban but YOU HAVE TO WANT TO QUIT!!

My method for quitting smoking is not a method I would want anyone else to ever have to use.

Eight years ago I got sick, bad sick, diagnosed on a Tuesday, quit smoking on the Tuesday, cold turkey, started treatment with chemo meds the next day. Been there, done that, not going there again. I love my kids and Granddaughter way too much to play that game of risk ever again.

Lynn

There it is, right there.

I have never smoked, and am a very light, infrequent, one glass of wine with dinner kind of drinker, so I can't say that I can truly "relate" (or in the words of Slick Willie.... "feel your pain" ).

However, I have a very good friend who quit smoking, and another who is a successfully recovered alcoholic, and without fail, they would say the same thing. Until they made up their own damned mind, there wasn't anybody else, or any other way, that they were going to be made to quit.



To you, and all of the others on here who said they quit, CONGRATS and kudos to you!

This answer should be good enough.

It should, but smoking was never about logic or doing the right thing. If it were, no one would smoke now, except those that are truly wanting to commit suicide.

My dad put out his last cigarette in the waiting room of the hospital the day I was born and never lit another. It's one of the many things I respect him for! (you know it was a while ago, when they still let people smoke in the hospital..)

That's what my dad said=for 35 years. weird, after see the x-ray of the tumor in his chest he quit smoking-at 76. died-77.

Just watched a friend die from lung cancer, had a pain in his chest early February was dead two months later, smoked all his life, had just retired at 59 years old, 6 months retirement then dead.