I was buying my regular carton one day when I saw a Blu disposable and as I'd been hearing about this "e-cig" thing, bought one for the heck of it. Tried it on the way home and after figuring out not to inhale as deep as a cig (like ta coughed up a lung!), started liking it.
Realized several hours later I hadn't lit up a cig. Went to grab the receipt to see what the time stamp was and realized I'd
forgotten to light up for
nine hours.
I was freaking stunned. I'd tried to quit so many times, the idea I could just "forget" to smoke was just mind boggling. Went back to the same store with my unopened carton of cigs and exchanged for a Blu kit. Dropped immediately from a two pack a day habit to maybe a half dozen cigs per day? It blew my mind.
Blu (as so many find out) wasn't enough to take me all the way to zero smoking and though I like most of their flavors, they're way overpriced and the batteries don't last. Especially a heavy smoker. I went a Googling to figure out what to do and found ECF. Discovered a whole new world.
Went through two other kits before setting on an eGo set up. Started discovering not only was my smoking continuing to slow down but that the variety in vaping is just stunning. PG and VG and PG/VG ratios and flavors and recipes and... and... and... hit on some "favorites" in the flavor department and then just sort of forgot to bother with smoking. The last cigs were harsh and tasted bad and sometimes gave me headaches. Once I got really rolling with vaping and got my nic level right, the idea of a cig became... well... repulsive.
Took about six weeks for me to get to zero smoking but it was funny that last week or so catching myself wondering, "Did I even have a cig today at all?" I couldn't remember! Then, within a month after I stopped bothering with cigs, had a shipment of e-liquids come in, needed cabinet space and started tossing ashtrays and such into the trash. Without caring. They were just in the way.
Yeah, there were some rough periods and some nutty things happening as my body adjusted to losing those thousands of other chemicals in tobacco smoke (like the week of "the drowsies" that was really weird... like I could have slept two, three days straight and couldn't seem to wake up fully at all... but it passed).
What does it for me? The flavors. I simply no longer can imagine going back to repetitively inhaling
a flavor. And not even a
good one. Weirdly, I still like the smell of other peoples' smoke. Doesn't bother me to be around smokers. I still like the smell of tobacco. But I don't feel anything anymore about it. I just can't imagine giving up the variety I have and have access to now. Shoot, I switched flavors while typing this post!
19 months or so after my last cigarette (after smoking for over 30 years mind you), closest I get to a cigarette is I got one of the new NJoy rechargeables as a supplement to my Innokin VTR. I mean, I love my big, shiny brick but over 30 years of a habitual behavior, I sometimes seem to "miss" the motions of smoking. So I used to keep a few disposables around when I felt the need to "play smoke".
And NJoy was my "go to" for those times (though I'm still fond of Blu's "classic tobacco" flavor). Njoy's new cig-a-like is cheap and they have some flavors I like and I can nab their cartos at the Walgreens easily enough. I'm using it right now (I used to smoke at the keyboard and was in front of a keyboard a lot in my adult life) and while I like my VTR a great deal, it's really, really hard to let it "hang" from your mouth like a cig. So it's not unusual for me to use the NJoy when at the computer.
Also, I'm in one of my recurring "funks" where I don't like any of my current liquids. I DIY and have for a while and do this periodically. Have to experiment with new mixes. Haven't settled on ones I like yet. I'll find a set that I can use as "mainstays" but right now, I'm playing around with flavor mixes and trying new things. It's something you just can't do with cigarettes. They have "plain" and "menthol". And that's it. Well, both come with cancer of course!
The health benefits of course. Those have been great. I used to get winded just taking out the trash. After vaping a few months, I emptied my storage (to save money, it weren't cheap rental)
by myself. That included moving a four foot tall gun safe. Alone. And I'm in my early 50s. It's like at least a decade has been knocked off my age.
But the "drive" that got me going and kept me going? The flavors. The endless varieties that are possible. Being able to experiment and whip up something interesting. Or dropping by a vape shop to taste test and see if there's anything new I might like. I couldn't go back now. I'm "hooked" on taste.
