More addicted???

mkbilbo;9910231 said:

NotoriousJDP;9627107 said:

I think I have become MORE addicted to nicotine now that I vape instead of smoke. I smoked a pack of Newport 100's a day. Sometimes I could go 3 hours or so without having a craving. Ever since I started vaping I just can't seem to put my PV down. I vape 24/mg juice. I seem to constantly be sucking on my PV. I don't really have what I'd call cravings or nicotine fits, but feel like I might be more addicted to my PV than I ever was to analogs. Is this just me or does anyone else feel like this. Any suggestions on how to cut down the vaping? (Not that its such a bad thing)

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Everybody does this at the start. And I doubt it's "more addicted". I'm not even sure what that would mean. Addiction has to do with not being able to quit. What's the difference between not being able to quit smoking and not being able to quit vaping?

Anyway.

Fact is, the absorption of nicotine in vaping is different from that in smoking. Inhaling smoke into your lungs yields more nicotine absorption and much faster. Along with a few thousand other chemicals, many of which cause cancer.

In vaping, you absorb the nicotine through the mouth and nasal passages. It's slower and you may absorb less "per puff". Absorption through the lungs is just really, really fast and efficient. You ever try to quit using the gum? Bet you blew through the stuff like a maniac. I know I did.

Same issue. Getting the nic through the mouth is a slower process and less "efficient".

I firmly believe--based on reading the experiences of others and my own experience--that what is going on is smokers had some level of nicotine in their system that was their personal "normal". However we get the nicotine--by smoking, vaping, gum, patches, whatever--we seek that level. When you switch to vaping, your "intake" of nic drops so you increase your "puffs" trying to compensate.

Same thing happens when people try to "cut back" by switching to "ultra-light" cigs. They end up smoking more cigs. They get less nic per cig so they use more cigs.

There is, also, apparently, a phenomena where someone who is new to vaping has to adjust their inhalation habits. You were used to inhaling smoke into your lungs then, suddenly, it's vapor into your mouth and out your nose (the latter being optional but increases the nic uptake). Remember, you have (not fully conscious) habits built up from your time smoking. You didn't have to think about your "inhale technique" when you smoked. You had "practiced" it tons and tons of times. You were probably barely aware of the motions. A lot like driving. You don't concentrate on every single motion every single time. You think in terms of "turn right" and you do.

You'll have to play around with vaping to hit your personal "equilibrium". Your sig says about two months. That's still not very long really. Compare that to however long you smoked. Which for many of us is measured in years and decades (and I hate that I can measure anything in my life in "decades" ).

Also, since you've changed a habit, you may just be more aware of the vaping. Habitual behavior like smoking can "fly beneath the radar" a lot. We don't watch every single cig we smoke. We just do it. Sometimes barely paying attention. Then this new thing comes along and you notice it a lot more. So there would be a tendency to think of it as "doing it more" even if you're not. Or not much. Hard to say. But you're going to notice a new habit more than an old one.

Finally, does it matter?

No, seriously. Face it, we're nicotine addicts. If we weren't, we would have just walked away from smoking and never looked back. But getting your nicotine by way of smoke is seriously, seriously bad for your health. And modern tobacco products contain a stunning array of chemicals. The count is at least 4,000. Some 50+ that are known to cause cancer.

If you want to deal with the nicotine addiction later, fine. Many here do by stepping down their nic level over time, looking toward the day when they go to 0 nicotine liquids. But that's a separate issue. If you could just walk away from nicotine, you wouldn't need to be here at all. You'd just quit. The whole point of vaping is to get the nicotine in a vastly safer way (perfectly safe... nobody knows... but far, far, far safer than inhaling 4,000 chemicals eh?).

That is, you quit 3,999 other chemicals that were tearing up your health. That's pretty good in my book. If you want to set a goal of quitting the last one, great. If you can't, well, you quit the other 3,999!

And, by the way, nicotine may be addictive but it's not a terribly dangerous chemical. It's not a carcinogen for one. I mean, we know that. It's not the nicotine in cigs that causes the lung (and other) cancers. While it's not ideal to have a nicotine addiction in the first place, for those of us who started smoking, it's a little late. We can't time travel back to when we picked up that first cigarette and smack ourselves (I'd love to, soon as somebody whips up a time machine!).

So... what's the worst case? You're "more addicted" to a substance that isn't going to give you cancer but you've stopped inhaling 50+ substances we know do cause cancer.

Is that really so bad?

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