I thank the folks here on ECF and especially Baditude for the education and support I needed to continue to vape and to find the right products and use them safely. But a big thank you should go to the sales person in the vape shop--who recognized I was a 'sucker' and sold me WAY more than I needed. Even though he did that he gave me some great advice and I took that advice to heart. He said--don't go in to this with the attitude that you are going to 'quit smoking' go in to it with the attitude that--"I will use this but if I want to smoke I will smoke". For my personality that was perfect advice--within 1 week I was smoke free and haven't had a strong desire to smoke cigarettes since. Everyone in my life could not believe that I gave up cigarettes because they all had the belief that I was so hardcore--that I could never quit. My father was a smoker and had his first heart attack at 48, and several bypass surgeries and finally a heart transplant and all the doctors completely attributed his heart problems to smoking. Even that did not motivate me to truly want to quit. But I honestly had tried everything out there to try to quit--none of it worked, and the truth was that I did really enjoy smoking and really did not want to quit.
I smoked the same brand of cigarettes for 32 years--there was no really bad residual smell in my house, car, hair, clothes etc. When the Tobacco Act was passed and the FDA took over--Brown and Williamson quit making my brand. There was a great guy at a convenience store that I had purchased by the carton from for years, and when they were eliminated--he stocked up as much as he could for me. That served me for about 6 months. When the supply finally ran out I made the switch to another popular brand in a gold box.
Soon after that-- the flame resistance paper was law and that is when the problem began. The smell of stale smoke was so bad in my house, my car, on me, I could hardly even stand to walk in to my own home or get in my own car, and I was sure people wanted to run from the smell on me! So I began to think that at my age I really did need to start thinking seriously about quitting.
I purchased a Blu system and that commitment lasted about a day, because the batteries would run out--I was busy and did not have time to fool with the hassle so I would pick up the cigs and smoke on. But the stink got worse and worse.
In June of 2013--I decided that if Blu was out there there must be other things that could work so I looked up a local Vape Shop and went to buy whatever it would take for vaping to work for me. The sales people recognized a sucker and sold me MORE than I needed but instructed me how to use the ego battery and T3 tank that I purchased. The sales person also told me about ECF, I wrote down the info but did not immediately visit the forum. My goal was to cut down and hopefully cut down on the smell. I really did not intend to quit but within one week I was smoke free--and I was stunned. About a month later, I decided I wanted to learn more about vaping so that I could help other people and finally visited and joined this forum.
I think that the information here helped keep me on course and as I continued to educate myself and learn about new products--I never looked back.
So thanks to that Sales person and to all here on ECF who have been so willing to share!