Just wondering what other people think about the statement 'you have to want to quit?'
People keep saying to me 'Oh you will never succeed unless you really want to quit'. I'm not so sure about this, do any addicted smokers ever 'want' to quit? Personally I'm sure that if cigarettes did you no harm and were free I wouldn't ever consider quitting :rolleyes:
Interested to get others opinion on this.
Yes I've had that conversation many times, but can only speak for my self, for me it was many factors not just wanting to after all it's a addiction like any other.
My list!
To expensive
Sick of smelling of smoke
Did not want my grand son seeing me smoke
My mum passed away, to some extent from smoking.
My dad has smoking related illness.
My oh does not smoke.
My clothes use to smell of smoke
Just to many reasons to quit, and as yet have not found a reason to smoke again.
It haunts me, last year my sister had a very nasty accident, resulting in her loosing part of her skull, now although I was with her in intensive care 24/7 I still went out side for a smoke how selfish of me. Could not imagine doing that again.
Interesting post... I guess there has to be some desire to quit or we would never attempt it... For me it's fear... You can only play Russian roulette with fags for so long, I'm getting older now and starting to get breathless etc never had any ailments through smoking until the last year or so, so even though I don't WANT to quit I NEED to so that's why I'm doing it, like you though if they were free and did you no harm I'd be chuffing away like a train and wouldn't of attempted numerous times to quit the damned things! 
Donna you sound just like me, have tried half heartedly to stop before but it is only recently that I have started to get the breathlessness, coughing etc and as someone said to me, 'you've had a good innings maybe now's the time to quit!' Russian roulette indeed, gotta do it now hopefully before it's too late.
Tracey, I share a lot of your reasons, not least a 2 year old granddaughter 'smoking' a pen and saying 'I'm being Nanny' :eek:
Just seen your replies Max and Jenny and I am glad it's not just me! I think it is perfectly possible to give up because you need to rather than actually wanting to, well I hope it is anyway otherwise I'm on a hiding to nothing as they say
Donna you sound just like me, have tried half heartedly to stop before but it is only recently that I have started to get the breathlessness, coughing etc and as someone said to me, 'you've had a good innings maybe now's the time to quit!' Russian roulette indeed, gotta do it now hopefully before it's too late.
Tracey, I share a lot of your reasons, not least a 2 year old granddaughter 'smoking' a pen and saying 'I'm being Nanny' :eek:
Well we are all in the right place for support with others who have gone or are going through it 
I'm 38 and I've just had a gutsful of it now.... Did a really strong 11 week quit up until 22nd March and then caved under stress... Got back "on the wagon" straight away after a few cigs but the demon woke up and I smoked for another month! :eek: it absolutely has to be NOPE at all times no matter what I really do know this now, no matter what stress I get I cannot just have 1, it's a slippery slope it really is....I should be on 16 weeks now....still c'est la vie.... We will get there 
Oh Donna, well done for getting back into it again so quickly! I gave up for 20 months 20 years ago and for 3 months 11 years ago, but this time I feel like it's my last chance - now or never! I would love to be someone who could smoke now and then but I know I am like you - one fag and I will be on 20 a day again in no time 
Better go to bed now for yet another night with no sleep, will be very pleased when this stage is over with! Goodnight all.
Want or Need?
There's not a lot of difference IMO. None of us would never have to even address this question if we hadn't got ADDICTED in the first place. The human body does not need to smoke. The human body needs to smoke when addicted. The human (intelligent) brain tells us not to smoke. It's BAD for your health etc etc. We all know that. The addicted human says 'Oh well, we all gonna die of something'. UNTIL the the day comes when we're actually faced with that reality - that we're esculatating our own death.
THAT'S the killer - in more ways than one. Luckily, for the the weak ones among us, a miricle has come to save us in the form of e-cigs. At least for me. Yes, if you can kick nic without a backward glance then bravo, you go and god bless for your strength. Kudos. But for the likes of pathetic addicts such as me, the e-cig is a godsend. I truly am no longer a smoker even though I be a vaper. I'm happy.
I use to keep thinking I'll give up soon, or I'll give up when I get pregnant.
In the end, I gave up because I was bored of smoking, ther ewas no enjoyment in it for me anymore, I couldn't remember why I had started in the firstplace, but I remember when I started.
I wont miss the bad hangovers, the cloggedness dullness of my skin.
My two children are part of the reason I quit. They are 10 and 8 years old. I didn't want them to see me smoke anymore and worry about what it was doing to me. Nor did I want them to fall into the trap that I did and start smoking themselves a few short years from now.
There were other things as well. I stopped enjoying smoking. I would lie awake late at night and would start fretting about the damage I was doing to myself...to the point of getting so scared that a panic attack was triggered on more than one occasion.
I have no intention of letting that happen again. I know that now not having smoked for 48 days I will not smoke ever again. How do I know this? I can't give an answer that would explain my conviction about this, call it intuition..call it whatever, I just know in my heart and soul that my days as a tobacco addict are over.
Perhaps it is that feeling, that belief that has made my quit so smooth and stress free. It's the knowing that I'm going to win. And that nothing on this earth will stop that.
I didn't want to quit smoking.....quitting is hard. I didn't want to give up smoking either......I loved my fags. "Quitting" and "giving up" are very negative words and for me they implied that sacrifice and struggle would be the order of the day from that point onwards. Given that I could no longer afford to smoke, I had to find a positive way forward, so I decided that what I wanted was to be a non-smoker. This, to me, is a lovely positive way to look at this journey that we are all on; it has meant that I can welcome and embrace the whole process, learning valuable lessons along the way, rather than having it drag me fighting and screaming along, punishing me all the way!
More power to all of us on this journey!
Val
Very interesting thread this.
I think for me it really was very close to being a 'road to Damascus' moment. I had been getting less and less enchanted with the whole smoking thing and in playing Russian Roulette for some time and felt increasingly that I didn't want to still be smoking when I hit 50 but then one day, in December, when I had a bad cold and felt too rough to smoke anyway, I suddenly knew I was never going to smoke again. It really was as dramatic as that (and in spite of a few ropey moments I still know that).
I had tried before but never seriously believed I could (or really wanted to) so none of the previous quits lasted more than 48 hours if that. This time it truly was one of those lightbulb moments. Now, I have no problem with anyone who does smoke (I haven't turned into a 'born again' anti-smoker). I just don't have any desire to join them.
Funny thing really..
Firstly, I would said that like many others, if smoking was relatively cheap and did no harm whatsoever, I would still enjoy smoking today. Sadly, it is expensive and very destructive, and therefore it's not an option.
To answer the original question about 'you have to want to quit?', I have had this debate many a time, and it is very true that you have to want to quit. However, I think that most people on this forum are here for precisely that reason. Why would you join a quit smoking forum if you didn't want to quit???!!!
I look at this question in a different way, and that is that "you have to want to put in the effort to quit, and not just want to have quit." Quitting is a long and drawn out process. It doesn't happen overnight, and it requires great focus, especially in the beginning. At what point you can say you have truly quit is going to depend on the individual. Some people will put down their last cigarette and after a few weeks feel completely oblivious to smoking any more. For others it may take years, or several attempts to quit.
I have a feeling too many people go from wanting to quit to wanting the quitting process to have finished, and to be able to feel that they have quit, all in a matter of a few days (perhaps hours for some). Therein lies the crux of the matter.
In reality, when people say 'you have to want to quit', they really mean that you have to have the motivation to persevere until such time as you are comfortable with not smoking any more.
Alex.
