I had been trying to quite cigarettes, very unsuccessfully, for awhile now. I've avoided chantix due to a history of depression, and have tried nearly everything else. The caveat, as always, is smoking isn't without it's benefits. I like to smoke. It gets me up out of my chair at work, walk around, gives me a chance to socialize. Sometimes it's a great stress reliever. It's the other side of the equation that has me worried...I'd been smoking for 17 years, and I turn the big four-oh this year. First grandson was born. Mortality is looking down the barrel at me, and it doesn't make sense to just keep poisoning myself with analogs.
15 days ago, suddenly remembered I had an old joye 510 setup I bought 3 years ago, and haven't touched in 2 1/2 years. I found all the pieces, and was surprised to find all the batteries in good shape, including the PCC and the passthru. So, I started vaping that Thursday night. Friday morning, on the drive to work, I said screw it. No more analogs. I'm going digital. If I can't give up smoking, I can at least engage in harm reduction.
I'd love to say it was an easy transition, but it wasn't. As a pack a day red smoker, it was rough for about 1 week. Even at high concentrations (26mg), there was heavy withdrawal, cravings, and irritability. As Marcellus Wallace said though, that's just pride (messing) with me. You fight through that (stuff). About 4 days in, I had a cigar on a golf course. Since you don't inhale, I thought it'd be fine. Nope. That tasted like I dipped my thumb in ashes and started sucking on it. No thanks. So I stubbed it out after three puffs, and the next day I ordered an ego C instead. It's much easier to afford equipment when I'm not dropping 6.25 a day on analogs.
Shortly there after, I ordered a pro-tank, and I'm finding the fruit flavors growing on me, though I still like the tobaccos--which only proves I'm a noob.
I've found there's two camps in smokers. The first camps the easiest. They want to try it--which of course I oblige, and they want to know more, where to order, what it costs, etc. Camp two is harder. There's a surprising amount of die hard smokers that puff away with contempt, telling me that e-cigs are not regulated, the chinese put antifreeze in it, insert favorite misinformation here ______, I can't believe you smoke that thing. However, I haven't found a reliable counter for that yet; they don't want to hear about the 4,000 chemicals in tobacco smoke, carbon monoxide, the carcinogens, etc et al ad nauseum....
The amusing part about these two camps is I don't push my campaign on anyone. I let them ask the questions. If they want to know more, I tell them more. If they want to lecture me, I'll engage in debate, but I'm not about to smoke another analog. Ever.
I've tried my old salesman trick for handling objections of "feel/felt/found", but it's not getting through yet. Someone looks at me vaping and points to my PV and says, "You know, those eCigs are unregulated and imported from China, and they put in all sorts of additives that are bad for you like antifreeze." The salesman's automatic counter objection being, "I understand how you feel, I felt the same way--there's no way I'd want to smoke antifreeze. But what I found is that they don't use antifreeze--it's confusion between the chemicals used. Ethyline Glycol is used in AntiFreeze and is poisonous, and Propylene Glycol is a common food additive. They use propylene glycol or vegetable glycerine as the main base. Also, if you're concerned about imported ejuice having impurities, you can just as easily buy from US manufacturer's that make eJuice right here--and then you're supporting American jobs too."
I was rather proud of that response, as my old sales training came through and served me right on the fly, but it seems to fall flat.
I don't expect to convert all smokers off the analogs, but I'd like to at least open them up more to the possibilities. Anyone have a better way to handle the die-hard anti eCig smokers, or should I just ignore them, knowing that I've done my homework, and they've read some biased headlines?
15 days ago, suddenly remembered I had an old joye 510 setup I bought 3 years ago, and haven't touched in 2 1/2 years. I found all the pieces, and was surprised to find all the batteries in good shape, including the PCC and the passthru. So, I started vaping that Thursday night. Friday morning, on the drive to work, I said screw it. No more analogs. I'm going digital. If I can't give up smoking, I can at least engage in harm reduction.
I'd love to say it was an easy transition, but it wasn't. As a pack a day red smoker, it was rough for about 1 week. Even at high concentrations (26mg), there was heavy withdrawal, cravings, and irritability. As Marcellus Wallace said though, that's just pride (messing) with me. You fight through that (stuff). About 4 days in, I had a cigar on a golf course. Since you don't inhale, I thought it'd be fine. Nope. That tasted like I dipped my thumb in ashes and started sucking on it. No thanks. So I stubbed it out after three puffs, and the next day I ordered an ego C instead. It's much easier to afford equipment when I'm not dropping 6.25 a day on analogs.
Shortly there after, I ordered a pro-tank, and I'm finding the fruit flavors growing on me, though I still like the tobaccos--which only proves I'm a noob.
I've found there's two camps in smokers. The first camps the easiest. They want to try it--which of course I oblige, and they want to know more, where to order, what it costs, etc. Camp two is harder. There's a surprising amount of die hard smokers that puff away with contempt, telling me that e-cigs are not regulated, the chinese put antifreeze in it, insert favorite misinformation here ______, I can't believe you smoke that thing. However, I haven't found a reliable counter for that yet; they don't want to hear about the 4,000 chemicals in tobacco smoke, carbon monoxide, the carcinogens, etc et al ad nauseum....
The amusing part about these two camps is I don't push my campaign on anyone. I let them ask the questions. If they want to know more, I tell them more. If they want to lecture me, I'll engage in debate, but I'm not about to smoke another analog. Ever.
I've tried my old salesman trick for handling objections of "feel/felt/found", but it's not getting through yet. Someone looks at me vaping and points to my PV and says, "You know, those eCigs are unregulated and imported from China, and they put in all sorts of additives that are bad for you like antifreeze." The salesman's automatic counter objection being, "I understand how you feel, I felt the same way--there's no way I'd want to smoke antifreeze. But what I found is that they don't use antifreeze--it's confusion between the chemicals used. Ethyline Glycol is used in AntiFreeze and is poisonous, and Propylene Glycol is a common food additive. They use propylene glycol or vegetable glycerine as the main base. Also, if you're concerned about imported ejuice having impurities, you can just as easily buy from US manufacturer's that make eJuice right here--and then you're supporting American jobs too."
I was rather proud of that response, as my old sales training came through and served me right on the fly, but it seems to fall flat.
I don't expect to convert all smokers off the analogs, but I'd like to at least open them up more to the possibilities. Anyone have a better way to handle the die-hard anti eCig smokers, or should I just ignore them, knowing that I've done my homework, and they've read some biased headlines?
