Nicotine is NOT addictive - Your Thoughts?

[CM]

If you posted that for me Roo, you didn't realise I was joking? =E

[Ragnar]

I get what you're saying, Snup -- but nicotine is definitely still addictive. With smoking, its not just the nicotine we get addicted to, but the routines we build around smoking.

I originally started the snus, just out of curiosity and for the offhand chance I'd be able to get more work done (by taking less smoke breaks). It did allow me to cut down on smokes a lot, but I still need to get up out of my chair and take a "smoke break" now and then.

I wish the smoking addiction was all about nicotine. The gum/patches/lozenges would have worked a lot better.

[MrAbstracto]

One other myth that I'd like to dispel is that nicotine is more addictive than heroin. People that go around spreading shit like that obviously have never been addicted to heroin. I believe Dr. Pepper is more addictive than either, cause I would rob little old ladies in the street to afford it. It's soooooo good, I would abandon my family for it and sell my twat to old men in order to afford it.

Dr. Pepper. Don't ever get started with Dr. Pepper- it will ruin your life.

Having been addicted to both heroin and nicotine, i have to mention that FOR ME, heroin was much easier to quit... Although if i could've bought heroin at the corner store like i could with smokes, it might not have been so easy.

[Roo]

No CM, that was for original poster.

[Jason]

if i could've bought heroin at the corner store like i could with smokes, it might not have been so easy.

This is key. It's also why it's so hard to quit smoking when you're surrounded by people who smoke. That's really the only time I ever feel like smoking, whether I have snus in or not...

[artsnus]

well, there are other inconveniences that come with heroin use in addition to the inability to buy it at the corner store .
I have to say that the consequences of shooting(or smoking/snorting) heroin several times a day might possibly outweigh those of having a portion of snus in at all times.
the one's that come to mind (assuming that you could legally buy it and safely use it) are complete destruction of personal/sex/work live, personal safety(driving, walking around), a possibility of fatal overdose, complete disinterest towards anything in life other than heroin. I am not sure what effect heroin has on liver/kidneys. Obviously the street stuff destroys both, but I guess it would be different if we had it FDA-regulated.

Thus the decision to quit heroin might simply be the more pressing one than the decision to quit nicotine, thus the success rates of doing it might be a bit higher.

[iceolate]

Result: I smoked 24 cigarettes, which is within the 20-30 range that I reached virtually every day as a full-time smoker.

I usually need to have a snus as soon as I wake up. Sometimes I get these weird headaches that make me think I'm nic'ing out, but once I have a snus in and ride it out, I feel better.

Also, when I lapse too and buy cigarettes, I pound them. I used to smoke like half a pack to 3/4 pack a day. Rarely a whole pack or more unless I was drinking. Anymore, when I buy a pack, I kill it. Gone in like half a day. Scares me. Wonder why I smoke so much more now when I do. Even more reason to continuing using snus and quit smoking. Nevermind the fact that the cheap cigarettes I buy are garbage (well, not any more garbage than the expensive cigarettes haah)

[tom502]

ice- I think that's like cig binging. Like if you went on a low-carb diet, or any diet, and then slipped off it, you'd eat a whole cake in one sitting, or try to. It's a reaction one has, I'd say, when one is trying to ween off something, that has had such a strong attachment to.

[MasterGuns]

I very well could be addicted to nicotine, though for two years before discovering snus I would smoke cigars/cloves/hookah almost every night. Of course in moderation, a bowl/stogie/two or three cloves a night. I never got hooked, but it's funny, about once every three or four months I have this ridiculous desire to smoke a clove. Now I doubt that's physical addiction. Probably more a mental craving, since I have a lot of fond memories associated with Djarum Blacks.
Now I snus every day, four or five times a day. Hooked...could be, haven't tried to stop for a week yet. Problem??? I don't think so. I don't look down on addiction when it's to a relatively harmless substance that has made me a more agreeable person since I started using it.
Sometime I'll take roo's advice and quit for a week, and we'll see how things go

[MisterSpaghetti]

Nicotine is addictive. I can state this with 100% absolute certainty. But it's more than just nicotine. The addiction is part nicotine, part oral fixation and part plain old habit. If the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning is take a drag on a cigarette, and you do it often enough, you have programmed yourself to do it. Multiply that by days, weeks and years and suddenly you can't function without a cigarette when you wake up. If you try to circumvent it, your brain says "Whoa, don't we usually have a cigarette about now?" and it turns into a craving.

I smoked a pack a day for almost 20 years, then one day I quit cold turkey. Toughest thing I ever had to do.

Then almost 2 years went by and now I'm back on nicotine through snus. And I see the same old habits reforming. It's not so noticeable during the first couple of weeks as you form new brain patterns and habits but, almost a month in, I see it now.

And that's okay by me.

[tom502]

Try going a full week with no flour.

[RobsanX]

Early on in my snusing days there were times that I could not shake the craving for a cig. I would snus until I got dizzy, and I would still want a smoke. It turned out that it was not nicotine (obviously), but I was simply hungry.

When I smoked, if got hungry, I would just step out and have a cig. My body had conditioned itself to crave a cigarette when I got hungry. Weird, I know! After nearly a year of snusing, I still can't drink in a bar without craving a smoke. So my point is it's not just nicotine that your body gets addicted to.

I do think that nicotine is addictive though...

[daruckis]

i sometimes confuse hungry and needing a snus.

[sheilalynn]

Has to be more than just nicotine that's addictive in cigs. When I smoked, I reached for one before I was even fully awake. I still want the nicotine, but it's nowhere's near as bad as the cravings before I started snusing/snuffing/e-cigging. With cigs it was "gimme NOW!", now it's more like "ok, what do I want first". So yeah, I think nicotine is addictive, but it's nothing like the addiction to cigs are. I did feel like "something" was missing when I gave up the butts, but that went away after the first few days or week or so, during which time I pretty much had the e-cig in my mouth constantly. :wink:

[Jason]

Try going a full week with no flour.

Or sugar. It's amazing how quick you'll go insane.