HISTORY ============================== I had been a smoker for 35 years, starting at the age of 9. Yes, 9 years old, this is absurd when I think about it today. By the age of 16, I was consistently smoking 1 1/2 pack per day. My world basically revolved around looking for that next cigarette or where is the nearest gas station that I could buy another pack. From the age of 9, I continued to smoke for about 15 years without flinching. I was raised around smokers. My entire family smokes or has smoked at one point in their lives. It was somewhat of a way of life in my childhood. In fact, to this day I still am somewhat soothed by the brief light scent of a fresh cigarette smoke in the air. It makes me think of my dad and that is comforting. But, you can’t blame your past for your present, so don’t go there. In my mid-20’s, I had children and knew the research about second hand smoke and all of the adverse effects that it could cause for my children. I began making efforts to smoke outside or away from my children. I also made several attempts in that time to quit smoking cold turkey, and failed miserably. Then I began trying some of the Nicotine Replacement Therapy products, first with The Patch… EPIC Fail! I ended up making myself sick because I’d be smoking at the same time. After that, remembering how sick I felt while smoking on the nicotine patch, I tried just chain smoking myself to sickness again to see if that feeling would give me the willpower to quit (stupid, I know but a few of my friends suggested it). Fail! In my early 30ƒ??s my father passed away from Bladder Cancer. Yeah, itƒ??s directly linked to cigarette smoking. He was a pack and a half to two packs a day smoker. I have very few memories of him without a cigarette in his hand or hanging out of the side of his mouth. There are even fewer pictures as well. On his last day of life, on a ventilator so he couldn’t talk, with my sister (smoker) on his one side and me (smoker) on the other, he looked at each of us with tears in his eyes and took our hands in his. He held our hands to his mouth (beside the tube down his throat) as if he were taking a puff of a cigarette. Then he held our hands in the air over his chest and made several snapping motions as if he were breaking a pencil with his hands. Yeahƒ?? Thatƒ??s pretty much not the international symbol for ƒ??break the habitƒ?. So my father, on his death bed, from smoking, tells my smoking sister and me to quit smoking. He died that night and there my sister and I were, standing outside the hospital crying and hugging each other, OH, and smoking. Even after that, we just couldn’t quit. There were numerous other failed Cold Turkey and Cut Back to Quit attempts over the next several years and my wife (who also smoked) and I decided to try Hypnosis. This had no effect on my wife but surprisingly, appeared to have worked for me. I did not smoke or even have a desire to smoke a cigarette for more than a day. But ultimately, FAIL! I eventually lit up again that next evening after dinner. Another couple of years of failed efforts to cut down or quit on my own and my wife and I decided to try the latest and most effective drug, Chantix. This sorta worked in that my wife and I were able to cut down but the headaches, stomach pain and overall feeling horrible got the best of me and I stopped taking it. A year later, again I tried the improved Chantix… Same poop, different pile. My guts couldn’t take it and I felt like I was a walking zombie. I WAS DONE! I had officially quit quitting about 5 years ago. I had concluded that I was going to die a smoker and probably be inhaling a drag off my cigarette with my last dying breath. ============================== THE TRANSITION ============================== A little more than 2 years ago (Spring 2011) my wife attended a house party of some sort with a bunch of her friends. She noticed that someone was sucking on a pen size thing and blowing something out of her mouth that looked like smoke. Thinking she was smoking, she obviously asked. She was using a small cigarette-like (510) style electronic cigarette that she purchased from someone in Winnipeg for around $200.00. My wife tried it and said that she choked. She was obviously intrigued, came home and told me about it. I said, Whatever… My wife did quite a bit of online research on what Electronic Cigarettes where, how they worked, what was in them, etc… I, on the other hand wanted nothing to do with the device, assuming it was just another gimmick. She found and purchased an 808 couples kit for $350.00 with a bunch of pre-filled 18mg cartomizers (disregarding my obvious protests) online in the US and had it shipped to Canada. When it arrived, she started using it without even offering or suggestion the second set of batteries was for me. Sheƒ??s a smart lady… 😉 My wife did not work outside of the home and I telecommute with occasional trips out of town so we get to spend quite a bit of time together. She was not coming outside with me as often to smoke and when she did come out, she would just puff on her e-cig. Ultimately she actually began declining my invitations to go outside for a smoke. It was as if she had turned a switch and no longer smoked. Electronic Cigarettes were destroying my marriage! HA! So, after a couple days of her not smoking, I went ahead and tried it myself. I choked horribly for about 5 minutes but when I regained my composure I said, ƒ??I think this could work!ƒ? I started using the second e-cig that came with the couples kit, on and off for the day, still going outside for the occasional smoke. By the end of the first full day of using it, I noticed that I had only smoked a half-pack of cigarettes. Normally, I would have gone through a pack and a half, just like every other day. But I didnƒ??t! I wasn’t even trying not to smoke cigarettes but I just didn’t get the urge to go have one. Over the next couple of weeks, still not trying not to smoke, I was down to just one cigarette per day. The dreaded morning cigarette! My morning ritual was to have my feet hit the floor, go make coffee, get dressed, get coffee and stand on the deck with a cigarette. One day I changed it by grabbing my e-cig AS my feet hit the floor and puffed on it until I got to the deck. By the time I got there, the urge was gone and I just stood there puffing my e-cig on the deck. ============================== THE JOURNEY ============================== That was it! It was over! After a couple of weeks of not quitting for over 35 years, I wasn’t smoking anymore. That was roughly two years ago now. Don’t get me wrong, I cheated a couple of times and had a cigarette, but just out of curiosity. I quickly came to realize that cigarettes were pretty disgusting. My most eye opening experience to just how disgusting was on a road trip to a customer site. I was getting on an elevator and a guy ran in just after I did. The STENCH of the smoke was UNBELIEVABLE!! Smoking was not permitted in the hotel so he obviously just came inside from having a cigarette, hitting those last couple puffs extra hard and fast as he walked in the door of the hotel. Wow! That USED to be me! I used to subject other patrons to that stench without even thinking twice. He probably had no idea either. Did I say WOW? Just a few months after I started using my e-cigarette, I was carrying a Window Air Conditioner up the stairs from the basement, just as I do every summer (short as they may be). When I brought it up the stairs and set it down in the room where it was to be installed, it occurred to me that I wasn’t out of breath. First I thought I must be in unbelievably good shapeƒ?? Yeahƒ?? Thatƒ??s not itƒ?? 😉 Coincidence? I think notƒ?? The one thing about the kits that was a bit of a hassle was the battery life. We (my wife) did some more digging and found some eGo style kits from another company in the US and ordered those for us to replace the 808 kits. She also brought in some different 24mg ƒ??flavouredƒ? E-Liquid (whatever that was) for us to try as well. The eGo Kits and the different flavours were a HUGE success! Over the next couple of months, my wife and I were extremely excited with what she had found. Yeah, I finally came around. We were introducing our other ƒ??smokerƒ? friends and family to the e-cig and they were intrigued as well, seeing how it worked for us. We were ƒ??preaching the gospelƒ? as it wereƒ?? They wanted to try it as well, so my wife ordered in some kits for them. Soon, THEIR friends and family started asking and we were bringing kits and E-Liquid in 3 and 4 at a time. The sudden appearance of former smokers now ƒ??vapersƒ? in our area is phenomenal and the numbers are growing. I have since cut back from 24mg E-Liquid and have settled on 12mg as my standard. My wife has since gone down to 4mg and seems quite happy at that point. I have tried and still use many different devices (clearomizers, cartomizers, atomizers, rebuildables, mods, etc.) but am always just quite happy with any olƒ?? eGo battery and whatever sits on top. I have a couple of standard tobacco flavours that I stick to but always have 10-15 various flavours of E-Liquid on my desk at any given time. I can breathe better, I can smell, I can taste and I donƒ??t stink. I am no longer a smoker! It doesn’t get much better than this!