Our Stories
Planet of the Vapes forum members share their success stories of how vaping helped them to quit smoking tobacco. 2/5
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by Dave Cross
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Today’s article is the second in our series looking at our personal vaping/smoking cessation stories. Our tales don’t count for tobacco controllers, they’ve told us so. They’ve said how anecdotal evidence doesn’t mean that vaping works as a tobacco harm reduction tool. Each day we are bringing you a new selection of tales demonstrating vaping’s efficacy and giving hope to smokers thinking about making a quit attempt in the New Year.
Forum member StrawberryRipple quit smoking in January 2012, having been smoking heavily since he was 14: “In fact it was pretty much all the time. I was either smoking one or rolling one and it was taking its toll. I was going through 50g of GV every 4-5 days. I was constantly coughing, out of breath walking up stairs, and even wheezing at times.”
After a bit of research, StrawberryRipple picked up a CE4 pen and some juice from a local vape shop – “and that was that, I became a vaper.”
“There were times early on that I struggled and ended up increasing the nic strength before managing to reduce it gradually over time, but I stayed smoke free from day one. I'll have been vaping for 7yrs in Jan 2019 and so, so glad I'm not smoking anymore.”
Purplefowler was at POTV’s inception in 2012, and has been working diligently since then to help the forum offer support to smokers and new vapers, but had successfully switched before then. “I quit smoking 7.5 years ago after smoking roll ups for 20 years. I’d tried everything to quit but nothing worked and it made me feel even worse that I’d failed. Not only was I failing myself, I was failing my kids who I wanted to see grow up and have children of their own.”
“My mum has COPD due to years of smoking and I’ve lost grandparents to COPD and lung cancer, and I didn’t want to follow them and be another smoking statistic. One of my customers stopped smoking using a basic cigalike and I was intrigued, so I went online and did some research. A few days later my first kit arrived and I charged it up, put some menthol juice in and that was the last time I smoked!”
“I feel better than I have for years, my lungs and heart are healthy and I have loads more energy. My sense of taste and smell is amazing and I appreciate the little things in life that I was missing. Starting vaping was one of the most positive things I’ve ever done, I took back control of my body and I’ve never looked back.”
Speadfreak67 had been a heavy smoker for over 30 years, smoking over 20 unfiltered roll-ups a day since his teenage years. “I had a horrible smokers cough, my home stank and I decided that it was time to make a change. I had tried giving up before, but always went back to tobacco until I discovered vaping. I stopped smoking in December 2016, when I decided to buy a vape starter kit instead of a pouch of tobacco.”
“I am confident I will never go back to smoking now, after 2 years vaping.”
Iqon started smoking at 17, and finally managed to quit a 35-a day habit at 61. “I bought a mouth to lung kit and started to use it and dropped the cigs off one by one. One month later and had cut them out completely. Now I vape because I enjoy the taste. If I can do it, give it a go.”
Chu spent 14 years smoking up to 40 cigarettes a day: “A friend of mine had recently started subsisting cigarettes with a vape and let me try his and it wasn't too bad so he lent me his old Smok Prince and off I went and order some coils of some Frooti Tooti liquid which was recommended by another friend.”
Since August, Chu has purchased a Wisemec Reuleax RX Gen3 Dual with a Gnome King tank, then a Manta RTA before dripping with a Drop Dead atomiser – a succession of “wow” moments that has culminated with daily use of a Hotcig RSQ squonker and a Pulse 22 atomiser.
“POTV has been a massive help along my journey with vaping as it's has a wealth of knowledge and filled with genuine people.”
Accidental quitting is a concept that was recently explored in a research paper, and Quahog5’s story tells how this happens: “I quit the fags on 26 March this year after about 35 years on 20-30 a day. Took up vaping really after being persuaded by the wife and kids to at least give it a try. To be honest I planned on using it to replace the odd cigarette and ‘look as if I was trying’ but, to my surprise, I found I actually preferred it and within 3 days of my first vape I’d quit smoking.”
Rew never planned on stopping smoking either, and was one of those dual-users that some anti-vape campaigners warn everybody about (when claiming vaping while smoking increases the volume of cigarettes smoked).
“I had been smoking roll ups mainly for about 35 years, 20 a day,” write Rew. “I finally quit smoking about 6 months ago, after dual-fuelling for about 2.5 years. I never actually intended to give up the cigs initially, just to cut down.”
“I was starting to get breathless at times and decided that some action was needed. Also having watched someone gradually fade and die from COPD, it scared the crap out of me and I decided I didn't want to go that way.”
“Discovering POTV has definitely helped me on my way to giving up and I don't think I could ever go back to smoking now. I feel part of a community here and I enjoy vaping and all the learning and sharing that goes with it.”
Dave Cross
Journalist at POTVDave is a freelance writer; with articles on music, motorbikes, football, pop-science, vaping and tobacco harm reduction in Sounds, Melody Maker, UBG, AWoL, Bike, When Saturday Comes, Vape News Magazine, and syndicated across the Johnston Press group. He was published in an anthology of “Greatest Football Writing”, but still believes this was a mistake. Dave contributes sketches to comedy shows and used to co-host a radio sketch show. He’s worked with numerous vape companies to develop content for their websites.
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