The summer before high school, my girlfriends and I got one of our older siblings to buy us a pack of pink Camels. Why? We thought they were pretty; and, in the interest of full transparency, we probably thought they made us look cool (shocker). We huddled in a circle, shoulders touching behind a bush, and sparked what we didn’t know at the time would be the first of countless “bogies.” There started my decade-long love affair with nicotine. Cut to nine years later. It was winter break, and I tore myself away from the warmth of my den to go on a run. After one mile, as I sat clutching the curb and wheezing as if I’d just completed an Ironman, I decided it was time to quit cigarettes. Cue the vape. It seemed like the lesser of two evils, or at least that’s what I told myself. That tiny, USB-flash-drive-shaped stick swept me off my feet. Because it was smaller than a pencil and virtually odorless, I could smoke it wherever and whenever I wanted. Instead of the Juul weaning me off smoking as planned, I became more addicted to nicotine than before. Wherever I went, my Juul went. If I couldn’t feel the hard outline of it in my pocket, full-on panic set in. Instead of having to go outside for a cigarette every few hours, I could now smoke constantly. Never had I been able to consume so much nicotine so conveniently. I had smoked cigarettes for the entirety of my young adult life. Even at my most addicted, when I was nearing a pack a day, I could make it until my morning coffee before lighting up. Not anymore. Now vapor filled my lungs before I managed to fully open my eyes. At this point I was an adult with nobody to hide my habit from. But for an entire generation of teens and preteens, the game had been changed. In all honesty, until the headlines started breaking about mysterious vape-related lung illnesses that caused symptoms like nausea, vomiting, chest pain, and even death — I hadn’t taken the idea of quitting seriously at all. But with the consistently growing number of cases and the fact that even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has been unable to determine the exact culprit, I decided I wasn’t interested in waiting any longer to take action to quit. RELATED: CDC Finds a ‘Toxin of Concern’ as Vaping-Related Lung Illnesses Continue to Rise Sitting at work one day, I googled “how to quit vaping.” Up popped the usual collection of jargon, phone numbers, resources, and statistics on why smoking is bad. What I was searching for was something to relate to, but instead I found everything I’d been hearing since middle school health class. That’s why I decided to write this guide, based on my own personal journey to quitting. After searching online time and time again for answers and conversations with fellow smokers, I decided to put something out there that can serve as more than just a checklist. There are a lot of factors to take into consideration while quitting an addictive substance, including your lifestyle, personality, and environment. The steps in this guide worked for me, and may not be exactly right for you. But as someone who loved a good smoke more than anything, I truly believe that if I can do it, anyone can. I still struggle and I still have cravings. I’m not sure that will ever completely end, but where I am now compared with where I was even a month ago is surreal. Quitting the vape is emotionally and physically taxing. Rewiring your brain and body not to need nicotine is a marathon and not a sprint. I am lucky to have an amazing support system to keep me on track, encourage me, and tolerate me when my mood swings become unbearable. Ultimately, however, quitting is something only you can do, which makes it both lonely and empowering. I’ve learned a lot about myself along the way, and I’m sure I will continue to as time goes on. These are the top eight guidelines I credit for helping me get this far.
1. Set a Date, Mark Your Calendar, and Plan Ahead
This is a tip that countless online resources, such as the American Heart Association, recommend, and I found it very effective. Giving up an addictive substance is not something to do spontaneously. Pick a quit date, even if it’s a month away, and stick to it. Check your calendar and make sure you don’t have anything seriously major going on at work that week — nothing that will require you to be at the top of your game, like a big presentation or a test if you’re still in school. Don’t make any social commitments, and try to keep your calendar as empty as possible, at least for the first couple of days. You’ll thank me later.
2. Create Accountability by Telling Family, Friends, and Coworkers
Once you have a quit date, share it with the people around you. To my surprise, this one little detail helped me immensely. In the past, I would keep it to myself every time I tried to quit. I thought that if I failed, at the very least my family wouldn’t be disappointed. This posed two problems: The first was that the only person to hold me accountable was me; and the second was that I had pretty much given up before I began. The only reason not to tell your loved ones is that you don’t truly believe you can do it. This time around, I told my boyfriend, my friends, my parents, and my coworkers. Just having people around me know what I was going through helped to hold me accountable. RELATED: E-Cigarette Use Linked to Heart Attack, Depression
3. Prep Your Environment by Getting Rid of All Paraphernalia
This is an obvious but often overlooked step that I’ve learned through previous failed attempts at quitting. If you are quitting the vape, you need to make sure that all juice, pods, devices, and chargers are gone from your living space. Putting paraphernalia in the back of the drawer is pretty much the equivalent of saving it for later. I went as far as having my boyfriend dispose of everything because I didn’t trust myself to do it. That’s another thing: It’s okay not to trust yourself in the beginning. That is why it’s important to have other people hold you accountable. Soon enough your body is going to physically crave nicotine, and it’s a lot easier to say no if temptation isn’t staring you in the face.
4. Give Yourself Time to Rest by Taking a Few Sick Days
This is something I didn’t do, but I wish I had. Now that you have a date and people to hold you accountable, it’s time to prep. I didn’t know what withdrawal would be like until I was in the thick of it. You can read about it and try to prepare yourself, but everyone handles symptoms differently. For me, it was bad. I quit on a Sunday and by Tuesday afternoon I was at work with a raging headache, sweating, shaking, fatigued, and nauseated. I was using the little energy I had just to keep my head up. Luckily, I had told my boss what was going on (again, accountability) and he let me go home early to rest. I’ve read that it takes about three days for nicotine to leave your system, but I wanted to understand more about what withdrawal would be like, so I reached out to the American Lung Association. “From a traditional cigarette, most nicotine is metabolized after about two to four hours, [and] can then begin to cause cravings in an individual, followed then by withdrawal,” says national spokesperson Panagis Galiatsatos, MD, an assistant professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the codirector of the Baltimore Breathe Center. Dr. Galiatsatos explained that it varies by person, depending on how nicotine enters the body, how much enters the body, and how the liver processes it. If I had known how horrible I was going to feel during that window of time, I would have arranged in advance to take two or more sick days. Withdrawal is never going to be easy, so whatever you can do to make it more bearable is worth it.
5. Find Creative Ways to Occupy Your Hands and Mouth
RELATED: 10 Best and Worst Foods for People Trying to Quit Cigarettes
6. Learn What Your Triggers Are and Don’t Avoid Them
This actually goes against everything I read online advising people to avoid smoking triggers. The problem is, triggers are everywhere, and to avoid them altogether is unrealistic. I do agree that it’s important to identify your triggers, but I chose to face them head on. Seven days into my nicotine-free life, I went out for margaritas with my boyfriend. I made the conscious decision to drink, knowing that I was testing myself and my willpower. Two margaritas later, I was fiending bad. I was irritable, fidgety, distracted, and an overall horrible date. Although it was torture, I woke up the next day knowing that if I could do it once I could do it again, and that felt damn good. I’ve learned that this goes for all triggers: social gatherings, sex, and anything else that made me itch for a hit. Once the worst of your withdrawal is over, get back out there and live your life. Again, this was a personal choice, and only you can decide what’s best.
7. Track Your Health and the Money You Save in an App
There are a ton of smoking cessation apps out there. I chose Quit Smoking which is designed to help people quit cigarettes, but it had two very helpful features. One was a health tracker. In addition to tracking how long you’ve been smoke-free, the app calculates various health impacts, depending on how long it’s been since your last smoke. For example, at 1 month 28 days and 2 hours smoke-free, my blood circulation was back to 64.6 percent. Even if the numbers aren’t completely accurate, it’s still a nice reminder that the damage is reversible. The other was a money tracker. Money is a huge motivating factor when it comes to helping me stay on track. When you download the app, it asks you around how many packs you buy per week and calculates over time how much money you’ve saved by not smoking. I was spending between $20 and $40 a week on Juul pods. As a millennial living and working in New York City, that’s pretty much financial suicide. At times, I had to decide between feeding myself or feeding my addiction. Nicotine won every time. Two months in, I’ve already saved several hundred dollars. Now, not only am I done sacrificing meals, but I can afford things I thought were out of budget, like a hot yoga class or midweek drinks. Other apps have features such as community chat rooms and support groups, journaling, and even prizes. RELATED: Smoking Increases Risk for Depression and Schizophrenia, Study Suggests
8. Reward Yourself and Celebrate (Even Small) Milestones
When you’re an addict, an hour without nicotine can feel like a day, and a day can feel like a year. That’s why it’s important to try not to look too far into the future. It’s also why it’s important to reward yourself. Three days vape-free, I bought dinner from my favorite Thai restaurant. One month vape-free, I bought myself a vacation to Miami. No matter how little or how large the reward, treat yourself! You are doing something difficult and deserve to be rewarded. Jamie Putman is a health producer for the Everyday Health video team. For more information on how to kick the habit, visit our guide to quitting vaping.
