So You Quit the Stinkers - But are you still hooked on Nicotine?

[Anjaffm]

Originally Posted by wv2win View Post

Interesting and predictable that the OP is challenged to back-up his comments and he just disappears after starting this thread with all of 9 posts to his "credit". I'm always surprised that more ECF members can't "smell" these threads from the "get-go".

*sniff sniff*

Yup, I just made good use of my "ignore" list. Looks like some people who are opposed to vaping are having a little outing and have decided to visit ECF.
I most certainly hope that they brought teir own sandwiches. As I have no intention of feeding them.

 

[AndriaD]

With the community of e-cig user (the majority ex tobacco smokers) you are generally looking at individuals with patters of additive behaviour. So maybe that is why people blow all their money on supplies or chain vape. You can get transferred addiction when you stop one thing and replace it for another, so maybe thats it.

That's true! But all this other addictive behavior is so much less harmful than smoking, that's why to me the OP's complaints about being even more addicted to nicotine just hold no water -- so what if we're more addicted to nicotine (which isn't true anyway, vapor delivers so much less than smoke does), it's not nearly as harmful as SMOKING CIGARETTES!

I also work part-time, study full-time at uni and have a family. I just have a week off and i'm new and enthusiastic and vaping and the forum. You shouldn't throw around comments about others 'living' on forums, pretty unnecessary.

Also very true -- I'm probably one of the very few around here that actually has the leisure to spend many hours a day at the forum. I'm a housewife, no kids at home, and a raging addiction to beat -- so the forum is just another resource for me to use in beating it, and it's a life-saver! To me, beating that cigarette addiction is my #1 priority right now, so whatever I need to do in order to maintain that, that's just fine. If I needed a whopping 36 mg in order to stay free of cravings, that's what I'd vape -- fortunately my body/brain is content with 7-10mg, but that's because I smoked those ultra-lights for about 20 yrs -- another reason the OP's complaints about nicotine seem utterly ridiculous to me.

Being addicted to nicotine may not be *optimum* for a human body, but then so few things we enjoy are *optimum* for the human body. It stills beats smoking cigarettes HANDS DOWN.

Andria

 

[NymeriaSand]

*sniff sniff*

Yup, I just made good use of my "ignore" list. Looks like some people who are opposed to vaping are having a little outing and have decided to visit ECF.
I most certainly hope that they brought teir own sandwiches. As I have no intention of feeding them.

That's true! But all this other addictive behavior is so much less harmful than smoking, that's why to me the OP's complaints about being even more addicted to nicotine just hold no water -- so what if we're more addicted to nicotine (which isn't true anyway, vapor delivers so much less than smoke does), it's not nearly as harmful as SMOKING CIGARETTES!




Also very true -- I'm probably one of the very few around here that actually has the leisure to spend many hours a day at the forum. I'm a housewife, no kids at home, and a raging addiction to beat -- so the forum is just another resource for me to use in beating it, and it's a life-saver! To me, beating that cigarette addiction is my #1 priority right now, so whatever I need to do in order to maintain that, that's just fine. If I needed a whopping 36 mg in order to stay free of cravings, that's what I'd vape -- fortunately my body/brain is content with 7-10mg, but that's because I smoked those ultra-lights for about 20 yrs -- another reason the OP's complaints about nicotine seem utterly ridiculous to me.

Being addicted to nicotine may not be *optimum* for a human body, but then so few things we enjoy are *optimum* for the human body. It stills beats smoking cigarettes HANDS DOWN.

Andria

Ah you are both totally right! Guess I'm too green to spot the trolls drumming up trouble! Anyone who was addicted to smoking tobacco with everything that comes with it wouldn't be worried about becoming addicted to nicotine!

OP if you are for real and really are that worried about it, don't vape! Simples [emoji4]

 

[classwife]

So it's a slightly different question...

I was reading the thread about vaping helping people to quit smoking. That's great of course, but I want to know if you're all still hooked on Nicotine. How much? If not, how long did it take you to get off the nicotine completely?

I ask because vaping has helped me cut way down, but I still crave smokes... and it's probably because I'm using zero-nicotine juice. Reason? Because the cigarettes I smoke are SO light in nicotine, it's impossible to find juice with a low enough amount. I've actually considered buying two bottles of the same flavor, one with nicotine and one without, and mixing them myself to try to get lower nicotine.

I don't want to end up addicted to MORE nicotine.

So what's the deal folks... How much nicotine are you still sucking on?

I don't have any plan to quit vaping... I am SO addicted to the behavioral habit of smoking, that without this whole e-cigarette thing, I would likely die with a cigarette in my mouth. If I can ditch the nicotine though... well it's just one less harmful substance I'd be putting in my body.

Rick,

No, I'm not missing the point. I readily admit I may need to add some nicotine to my juice to help get off the cigarettes. Point is though, I don't want to add MORE nicotine, nor do I want to indefinitely be hooked on it. I don't want to "need" vaping the way I need smoking... I'm talking the physical addiction part of it.

I think we all are well educated at this point on the dangers of cigarettes, so no point rehashing it. Maybe we could debate the dangers of nicotine, but I'm already pretty firmly in the camp that believes it's not good for us. It's the lesser of evils to just have that and PG/VG juice, but it's still an addictive substance I'd like to be off of eventually.

I haven't disappeared... I just don't LIVE on forums. I have a busy job and a family and other things to do. I'm so sick of people in forum communities who like to call people trolls just because they don't reply within 5 minutes or have an opinion that doesn't jive with their own.

I'm not all that interested in arguing with people over whether Nicotine is "healthy" or not. I've read a lot of the studies and yes, there are some interesting thoughts out there, particularly in relation to alzheimers and parkinsons. There's also a lot of science that backs up the fact that Nicotine is physically addictive (like heroine or alcohol). Whether you are okay being addicted to it yourself or not, that's up to you. Hell, I've been addicted to it via tobacco cigarettes for over 20 years... and myself have argued with people that it is NOT exactly the same as being addicted to heroine... with regards to how it effects our behavior and ability to function. I think you'd be hard pressed to find an example of someone whose emotional life spun out of control -- lost their job, their marriage, their house -- due only to cigarette smoking.

And as I said right at the beginning, I'm not adverse to the idea of adding a little nicotine to my ejuice... I just don't want to vape MORE than is in my tobacco cigarettes.

Quoting internet articles and trying to prove nicotine (or even PG) is "good"... the problem is that at this point, it's hard to find a truly neutral, objective source of the information. Even us here, we have a BAD HABIT of justifying and convincing ourselves that what we are doing is okay. Lets face it, we wouldn't have been addicted to and smoking tobacco for so long if that wasn't at least partially true. There's a lot of big business and big industry behind tobacco, and now e-cigarettes, and a whole lot of misinformation, or at the least, misleading information out there. Come on folks, learn your tobacco history. There was a whole lot of time when people didn't know the dangers of smoking, and to the contrary, were even promoting it was good for us.

I'm honestly not trying to be inflammatory or argumentative. The thing that bugs me is that I was reading the post about quitting smoking and if vaping helped... and a lot of people were saying how easy it was. But then I'm also reading how people are chain vaping and spending tons of money on vaporizer upgrades, and I don't know that it's the complete picture to just be like "yeah, I quit and it was SOOOOOO easy". I agree with all of you that it's the lesser of two evils (as far as we know right now)... but ended up addicted to more nicotine than before? I'm not sure that's a good goal.

Thanks to those of you that chimed in to share how you're cutting your nicotine down. I'm going to go in to my local vapors shop and see what strengths they offer. I may buy a couple of empty bottles so I can mix and experiment myself with trying to get the minimum amount of nicotine that I'll be comfortable with, to help me get off tobacco. With my tobacco cigarettes I'm getting between 2-4mg of nicotine in a whole day, so I don't want my ejuice to give me higher than that. Can anyone recommend how exactly to mix it down?

Where did people's manners go ?



This is a legitimate question here.

Some people DO want to get rid of nicotine usage...and are struggling the hard way trying to quit smoking with 0 nic.


It's clearly stated that there is the desire to be off of nicotine and help wanted to not use much.




Not everyone is online all of the time...not everyone is on every day. It does not lessen the value of their question TO THEM !

 

[Mikepresjr]

I'd say so, but hopefully not nearly as bad, seeing as I started at 12mg which was waayyy too harsh for me. Went down to 6, loved it, and have since moved down to 3 (which the shop didn't have but went ahead and mixed for me, very grateful)

 

[CabinetGuyScott]

Where did people's manners go ?

For me, it was the immediate dismissal of a pretty thoughtful reply, and sharing of Roly's & DC2's extensive information, education, experience and research into all things nicotine.


http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/fo...t-you-still-hooked-nicotine.html#post13895896

I am sorry, but links you provided lead to complete bullmanure; their content is on the level of conspiracy theories. I do not want to discuss them.

I dunno about others, but I find it hard to believe anyone has the ability to read, absorb & integrate the extensive knowledge that Rolygate & DC2 shared in less than 50 minutes, and then summarily dismiss it as bullmanure.

But then again, maybe it's just me ...

I have no patience with that kind of ... lack of manners & intellectual engagement in a conversation

 

[Player 1]

Hi there, I'm new here but not new to vaping, I started out wanting to eventually quit nic, but it have around 2 yrs supply and I'm a tight asz lol
Nice to meet you sll

 

[Anjaffm]

@classwife:

the OP may not be the one whom Scott and I put on "ignore" and who is quite easy to sniff out.
see posting No 66.

I have no patience with that kind of ... lack of manners & intellectual engagement in a conversation

Ditto.

 

[Bob Chill]

This study was done in 1996 by NIH and it gets zero air time compared to the completely flawed study from the CDC in 2009.

Long-term effects of inhaled nicotine. [Life Sci. 1996] - PubMed - NCBI

Abstract
Tobacco smoking has been reported to be associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer, particularly of the lungs. In spite of extensive research on the health effects of tobacco smoking, the substances in tobacco smoke exerting these negative health effects are not completely known. Nicotine is the substance giving the subjective pleasure of smoking as well as inducing addiction. For the first time we report the effect on the rat of long-term (two years) inhalation of nicotine. The rats breathed in a chamber with nicotine at a concentration giving twice the plasma concentration found in heavy smokers. Nicotine was given for 20 h a day, five days a week during a two-year period. We could not find any increase in mortality, in atherosclerosis or frequency of tumors in these rats compared with controls. Particularly, there was no microscopic or macroscopic lung tumors nor any increase in pulmonary neuroendocrine cells. Throughout the study, however, the body weight of the nicotine exposed rats was reduced as compared with controls. In conclusion, our study does not indicate any harmful effect of nicotine when given in its pure form by inhalation.

 

[Alien Traveler]

Interesting thread. Forums are interesting not only because they can give us some needed information, but also because we can observe other people.

OK. It looks most of us agree in:

1. E-cigs help us to get rid of harmful cigarette addiction
2. E-cigs are much less harmful than real ones.
3. Dangers of nicotine are greatly exaggerated. Possibly it is not harmful at all (but still not enough hard data).
4. It is possible that nicotine is somewhat beneficial for our health (but again not enough data).

And finally the last one:

5. Nicotine in vaping form is less addictive that cigarettes.

And this last point got really harsh response from some of the forum members – hard core nicotine addiction deniers, up to threats to use “ignore” button. I am OK with this. It’s still interesting for me. If somebody wishes to keep his/her head in the sand keeping… hm… other body parts vulnerable, who am I to object?

There are different people on this forum, with different goals and different ways. Let’s respect these goals and ways. Let’s hear each other, or at least use “ignore” button quietly.

For many people the goal is just to enjoy vaping, with all its mech mods, RBAs, RDAs, etc. OK with me.

My goal right now is to fight cigarette addiction. In the process I’d like to get rid of nicotine addiction, not to increase it. Any dependence limits my freedom. I do not want to be forced by my addiction to carry my vaping gear with me, to carry spares, spares to spares… And still enjoy vaping when I want to. But it’s goal for the future. For now I am fighting cigarette addiction

 

[Bob Chill]

Cognitive effects of nicotine in humans: an fMRI ... [Neuroimage. 2003] - PubMed - NCBI

To elucidate the neural correlates of cognitive effects of nicotine, we examined behavioral performance and blood oxygenation level-dependent regional brain activity, using functional magnetic resonance imaging, during a parametric "n-back" task in healthy nonsmoking males after the administration of nicotine (12 microg/kg body weight) or saline. Nicotine, compared to placebo, improved accuracy (P = 0.008) in all active conditions (2%-11%), and had a load-specific effect on latency (P = 0.004; 43.78% decrease at the highest memory load). Within a network of parietal and frontal areas activated by the task (P < 0.05, corrected at the voxel level), nicotine produced an increased response (P < 0.05; uncorrected within the regions of interest) in the anterior cingulate, superior frontal cortex, and superior parietal cortex. It also produced an increased response in the midbrain tectum in all active conditions and in the parahippocampal gyrus, cerebellum, and medial occipital lobe during rest (P = 0.05; uncorrected). The present observations point to altered neuronal activity in a distributed neural network associated with on-line task monitoring and attention and arousal systems as underlying nicotine-related enhancement of attention and working memory in human subjects.

 

[jaeboult]

Hi, I'm an ex smoking cessation specialist researcher. It's a really long answer. Essentially the addictive potential of nicotine directly relates to the speed of absorption. The nicotine from a cigarette takes about 7 secs to reach the brain, whereas normally Nicotine Replacement Therapy takes anything from 1-30mins. Whilst I can't find any accurate data i'm assuming that E-Cigs must deliver nicotine to the brain in anywhere between 15-30 secs. It's certainly slower from smoking and therefore doesn't have such a grip on the user. So yes its addictive, but nicotine from cigarettes or E-Cigs has killed anyone, its the Tar, CO and toxins in analogues that are the problem.
In Scandinavia they predominately use snus as opposed to smoking and whilst the rate of throat cancer is high the rate of lung cancer (the biggest smoking related killer) is minimal as a result tens of thousands of lives are being saved in comparison to the UK and USA. If all smokers used E-Cigs about 5 million lives would be saved worldwide per year! This represents one of the biggest developments in health in the 100 years!! Although it's better not to be addicted to anything, I wouldn't worry too much about nicotine.

 

[Alien Traveler]

Cognitive effects of nicotine in humans: an fMRI ... [Neuroimage. 2003] - PubMed - NCBI

It’s an old news. There were a lot of papers on cognitive effects of nicotine, for example this one from Nature
Neuropsychopharmacology - Smoking History and Nicotine Effects on Cognitive Performance

It’s even older news for me, as a long-term nicotine user: of course nicotine helps me in my mental tasks.
But this tread not about different effects of nicotine, it’s about nicotine addiction. Why have you posted this link here?

 

[classwife]

I haven't disappeared... I just don't LIVE on forums. I have a busy job and a family and other things to do. I'm so sick of people in forum communities who like to call people trolls just because they don't reply within 5 minutes or have an opinion that doesn't jive with their own.

I'm not all that interested in arguing with people over whether Nicotine is "healthy" or not. I've read a lot of the studies and yes, there are some interesting thoughts out there, particularly in relation to alzheimers and parkinsons. There's also a lot of science that backs up the fact that Nicotine is physically addictive (like heroine or alcohol). Whether you are okay being addicted to it yourself or not, that's up to you. Hell, I've been addicted to it via tobacco cigarettes for over 20 years... and myself have argued with people that it is NOT exactly the same as being addicted to heroine... with regards to how it effects our behavior and ability to function. I think you'd be hard pressed to find an example of someone whose emotional life spun out of control -- lost their job, their marriage, their house -- due only to cigarette smoking.

And as I said right at the beginning, I'm not adverse to the idea of adding a little nicotine to my ejuice... I just don't want to vape MORE than is in my tobacco cigarettes.

Quoting internet articles and trying to prove nicotine (or even PG) is "good"... the problem is that at this point, it's hard to find a truly neutral, objective source of the information. Even us here, we have a BAD HABIT of justifying and convincing ourselves that what we are doing is okay. Lets face it, we wouldn't have been addicted to and smoking tobacco for so long if that wasn't at least partially true. There's a lot of big business and big industry behind tobacco, and now e-cigarettes, and a whole lot of misinformation, or at the least, misleading information out there. Come on folks, learn your tobacco history. There was a whole lot of time when people didn't know the dangers of smoking, and to the contrary, were even promoting it was good for us.

I'm honestly not trying to be inflammatory or argumentative. The thing that bugs me is that I was reading the post about quitting smoking and if vaping helped... and a lot of people were saying how easy it was. But then I'm also reading how people are chain vaping and spending tons of money on vaporizer upgrades, and I don't know that it's the complete picture to just be like "yeah, I quit and it was SOOOOOO easy". I agree with all of you that it's the lesser of two evils (as far as we know right now)... but ended up addicted to more nicotine than before? I'm not sure that's a good goal.

Thanks to those of you that chimed in to share how you're cutting your nicotine down. I'm going to go in to my local vapors shop and see what strengths they offer. I may buy a couple of empty bottles so I can mix and experiment myself with trying to get the minimum amount of nicotine that I'll be comfortable with, to help me get off tobacco. With my tobacco cigarettes I'm getting between 2-4mg of nicotine in a whole day, so I don't want my ejuice to give me higher than that. Can anyone recommend how exactly to mix it down?

Back to the topic please - helping the OP

Thank you

 

[rolygate]

Don't forget that in calculating nicotine delivery via an ecig, a constant of 0.5 must be applied to the calculation unless you have specific data for your hardware. That is to say, the average nicotine delivery efficiency has been determined as 50% of the liquid content: on average, about 50% of the nicotine in the liquid is transferred into the vapor. (The efficiency range is 10% to 80%.)

So if you consume 3ml of 12mg refill per day, that is a total of 36mg of nicotine in the liquid, and you can assume (without specific data to the contrary) that you will be receiving 18mg of nicotine (though it could be a great deal less, or more, depending on numerous factors). This factor has been reliably confirmed by multiple tests ever since the pro chemists on ECF determined it in 2009; the latest confirmation is by Goniewicz (see refs page on ecigarette-politics.com).

Laugesen's basic measurement is still unchallenged today although we have reason to believe it needs updating: ecig vapor contains one-tenth the amount of nicotine as cigarette smoke (10mcg vs 103mcg per puff). It is possible that modern hardware can multiply this by 5 - but that still leaves only half the delivery per puff compared to cigarette smoke.

 

[jaeboult]

SmokinRabbit,
Rick makes a valid point. Nicotine is comparatively harmless compared to the other chemicals in tobacco smoke. You won't vaping in the same way as smoking (read my reply to your original post). But you're right better not to be addicted to anything. At current levels in E-liquids, Nicotine has more in common with caffeine than anything else. Most people aren't too concerned with caffeine, in fact they both have recognised medical benefits. At the strength your currently using i'd be surprised your still vaping in a year if you'd rather quit. Most seem to reduce the strength naturally over time.

 

[rolygate]

Please note that there is a vast amount of both facts and data that confirms long-term consumer nicotine consumption has no clinical significance, which is why this is the official position of NICE etc.

This is of course an average metric - a population-level and cohort-level determination; it is not and cannot be a subject-specific recommendation. Average means just that - and those with a genetic predisposition to specific morbidities are not average. People with a family history of early death from stroke or CVD are not average and need to adjust their lifestyle accordingly.

This means: if your parents and/or grandparents and other close relatives show a history of early death from stroke, heart disease or similar then all aspects of lifestyle need to be adjusted to take account of this, including food / drink consumption such as, in all probability, nicotine intake. On the other hand if you appear to have a genetic risk for certain auto-immune diseases, or Parkinsons or Alzheimers, then the opposite might apply - nicotine may have a protective effect (also vitamin B3 perhaps, as it's closely related). Consult a specialist.

Life's so complicated

 

[Spazmelda]

I have a google doc for calculating how much nicotine to add to get to x mg/ml, so that would be an option for you. I.e. Buy 0 mg/ml juice and some nicotine base (example, Wizard Labs) to get it to the level you want. This would dilute the flavors a bit, but if you are not adding much nicotine, that would be minimal. Here is the document, I think you will have to click to ask me for permission to access the document. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...dEpVRzZpNE55V1NHc25HaXlUdVlpeXc&usp=drive_web

The other option, as someone mentioned, would be to buy 0 mg and 3 mg, and mix them together. In equal amounts that would give you 1.5 mg/ml.

As a few others have said... I would probably recommend going with a higher level of nicotine until your cigarette cravings have subsided somewhat. Sometimes people do step down too quickly and I think this can cause a return to smoking. It's your decision though.

 

[rhean]

So it's a slightly different question...

I was reading the thread about vaping helping people to quit smoking. That's great of course, but I want to know if you're all still hooked on Nicotine. How much? If not, how long did it take you to get off the nicotine completely?

I ask because vaping has helped me cut way down, but I still crave smokes... and it's probably because I'm using zero-nicotine juice. Reason? Because the cigarettes I smoke are SO light in nicotine, it's impossible to find juice with a low enough amount. I've actually considered buying two bottles of the same flavor, one with nicotine and one without, and mixing them myself to try to get lower nicotine.

I don't want to end up addicted to MORE nicotine.

So what's the deal folks... How much nicotine are you still sucking on?

I'm still addicted to nicotine.

I have, however, been cutting down on my nicotine. I used to be a 1.5 packs a day smoker, so I started with 18% nicotine in Protanks. Soon after that, I started to make my own juice. Five months later, switched to mech mods and rdas, but those were too harsh with that much nicotine. I lowered my nicotine intake to 10%, then 8%, and now, to 6%.

tbh, I'm not trying to quit nicotine. IMO so long as the thing I am addicted to is not harming me, addiction is not a vice. I don't believe that nicotine is harming me.

btw, yes, you can buy juice with 8% nicotine, and combine that with juice with no nicotine. Other option is to simply make your own juice. The initial investment is expensive, in that nicotine is expensive. I had to pay something like $120/kiloliter. After that, though, it's cheap. That kl will last me years. I choose how much nicotine/flavor to use. I choose my own PG/VG level.

Re using smokes with low nicotine: The main danger of analogs is cancer-causing incendiary smoke. Even the purest zero nicotine analogs will raise the odds of developing mouth/throat/esophagal/lung cancer to unacceptable levels. My advice would be to up your dose of nicotine if it helps keep off the analogs.

 

[Bob Chill]

It’s an old news. There were a lot of papers on cognitive effects of nicotine, for example this one from Nature
Neuropsychopharmacology - Smoking History and Nicotine Effects on Cognitive Performance

It’s even older news for me, as a long-term nicotine user: of course nicotine helps me in my mental tasks.
But this tread not about different effects of nicotine, it’s about nicotine addiction. Why have you posted this link here?

I'm posting old studies on purpose. There is plentiful scientific data going back many years prior to the onslaught of flat out lies and misinformation that started since ecigs became popular. None of it ever gets any mention. It's been a known and documented fact that nicotine alone is not nearly as harmful (if harmful at all) as it's made out to be so "nicotine addiction" isn't something that I view as a sickness, disease, or detriment to ones health.

Fast forward to today and science still has yet to find any real negative health effects from ingesting nicotine. Lately the benefits of the chemical are getting more airtime unless the comparison is made between vaping and smoking. It looks like a duck so something has to make it a duck and all they can find is old flawed studies, nicotine = cigarettes, save the children. Apparently being addicted to nicotine causes cancer and ruins your life.

I would like to see hard evidence that being addicted to nicotine is actually bad for human health. I personally view it as no different than being addicted to coffee. I drink the same amount every day (2 cups) and I vape the same amount every day (2mls). I personally believe that being addicted to nicotine is a benefit to my health and day to day life.

Is quitting nicotine going to make me live longer and be healthier?


ETA: I've gotten way off topic. The OP's question is a good one. There have been plenty of good answers already. One thing about vaping is it's easy to move down the nic ladder. The first and foremost goal is to get off of cigs completely and not overthink the nicotine part. If vaping zero nic doesn't keep you off cigs then you have to move up. Once you find the # that keeps you off them indefinitely you can easily move down. Part of cig cravings aren't nicotine related. It takes some time to move past those. Once you do you can easily control weening off.