I began smoking regularly at age 13 (30 yrs ago). At first, I would stop only I didn’t think I had any choice (i.e. hospitalization) but that was only temporary and I’d begin again afterward. I was once hospitalized and smoke free for that reason more than a year and yet still when I was discharged (at age 15), I returned to smoking. I didn’t really try to quit smoking until I was pregnant with my first child (early 20’s). That was over 20 yrs ago. I tried nicotine patches but they didn’t work. I continued to smoke while I was wearing the patches without any reduction in my smoking at all. I just got really strung out on nicotine overload, so I stopped using them within a few weeks. Fortunately, my daughter was born healthy. I continued to smoke. When I was pregnant with my second child (early 30’s, not long after I was diagnosed with type II diabetes – a little more than 10 yrs ago), I was prescribed Wellbutrin to help quit smoking. It did seem to lessen the physical urge to smoke (as well as the urge to do anything else, even eating) but not enough to make a significant difference in my smoking habit. I might have gone from a pack and a half a day to a pack a day but that was temporary too because my body seemed to get used to the medication, making it less effective after just a couple of months, and my smoking increased. That son was stillborn at 21 wks gestation due to an unexplained premature rupture of the membranes. The doctors had no answers for me – only that not every pregnancy has a perfect result, some aren’t meant to be and they don’t always know why. I started smoking even more due to the stress and grief. With my next pregnancy (a healthy son born in 2006 – 7 yrs ago), I simply tried to cut back as much as possible using sheer willpower. I probably got down from 2 packs per day to a pack and a half but wasn’t able to go any lower than that. I snuck cigarettes in the hospital bathroom while I was there for 5 days after the c-section delivery. I wanted to quit smoking after that (my husband, now 52, who also smokes and has had 3 heart attacks) and I asked my doctor about Chantix but he said that would be a very bad idea for me since I already have anxiety and depression issues. My husband says he’d like to quit smoking too but he can’t do it (and won’t even try) if I don’t quit too. In 2010, we were struggling to make ends meet because cigarettes cost so much and we simply weren’t able to prioritize other things above them. My mother had been trying to quit smoking because she had lung, heart and COPD issues (as well as a history of breast cancer) and she gave me a BlueCig kit, which is a small electronic cigarette that looks a lot like a real cigarette. I tried it and I was amazed. I thought this could actually work if I could find a better system (that I didn’t have to charge every hour). I went online and found a lot of information about e-cigarettes and personal vaporizers for nicotine liquid (which are not the same in my opinion, the former being smaller systems that look like cigarettes but don’t perform as well and the latter being larger systems that don’t look like cigarettes but perform very well). Just as I was starting to find a combination of hardware and liquid that seemed like it was helping me reduce smoking (after about 2 months of experimenting), I learned that I was pregnant yet again. I chose to continue vaping but change to liquid that had no nicotine in it at all, hoping this would satisfy my psychological need to smoke while being harmless to the developing baby. Unfortunately, that didn’t work and the easiest answer was to just keep smoking. My daughter was born healthy in 2011. I’ve never forgotten the cardiac surgeon who saved my husband’s life after his first heart attach in 2004 telling me that first of all, the heart attack was 100% caused by smoking, no doubt about it, no other factors and that second of all, as a diabetic, I was even more at risk of a heart attack than he was for a second (even 8 yrs younger, in my 30’s) and worse, I might not even feel the symptoms due to diabetic neuropathy. So, with that, and as we have two young children running around the house (our oldest is 21 yrs old now) and I can actually see the smoke in the air, I decided it was time to try to switch from smoking cigarettes to vaping liquid with nicotine in it again. Having already done a couple months’ worth of leg work (learning which battery works best for me, which nicotine level, etc.), I already had a head start. In addition to that, technology has improved quite a bit over the 2 yrs since I last tried. At this point, I have been vaping regularly with a 12mg nicotine liquid (considered low) for about 3 weeks. Within days, my smoking (of Marlboro Red 100’s – avg 2PPD for the past 20-30 yrs) dropped to about a pack a day. Now, I’m down to 1/2 to maybe 3/4 of a pack of cigarettes a day. I’m very confident that at this rate, I will be able to completely quit smoking by switching to vaping instead, within 4-6 weeks total and I’m very excited about it. My husband said that he will quit smoking when I have completely stopped. Since I reduced my own smoking 3 wks ago, he has reduced his as well, from 2-2.5PPD to now about 1.5PPD without any assistance other than my being a role model. I already feel more energetic and it’s easier to breathe. The house doesn’t smell (and look) like smoke all the time and the kids aren’t breathing it constantly. I hope for both myself and my husband to live much longer for them and for each other and I just know none of this would be possible without vaping because vaping addresses something extremely important that none of the other lower risk alternatives made available to me have and that is that it’s not just about the nicotine addiction (though that’s certainly a major part of the difficulty in quitting smoking), it’s just as much about the psychological and/or habitual aspects. I liked smoking. I really did – despite how bad it was for me. Now I can have all the things I enjoyed about smoking plus some (the habit, the social aspects, the plumes of vapor, far superior taste that doesn’t even compare to cigarettes, far lower cost – all of which definitely causes me to choose the vaporizor over a cigarette almost every time – hopefully every time soon) without all the bad (yucky ashtrays especially when they spill, ugly cigarette butts, horrible smoke breath, bad smell on clothes & hair, tar buildup on the walls, curtains, clothes, teeth, skin, etc., no burns in fabric or on people and most importantly of all – far better health and longevity of life). Nothing else worked for me but this is already saving my life. Without it, I’m afraid I’ll be back to cigarettes forever (as long as that lasts).