Current and ex-smokers: Why did you start to smoke?

[WritingIsMyReligion]

(Sorry if "ex-smoker" isn't the appropriate terminology; if there's a term that's preferred, please let me know.)

I'm very curious about this, I must admit. Nowadays smoking is pretty much universally reviled, considering all the health damage it does. Older smokers, I suppose, could have started before all the health detriments were known; that's the case with my grandparents, who quit back when the first inklings of smoking being bad for you came out. But especially with the younger smokers, or people who started smoking even after the health issue was widely publicized, I have to wonder why people started--peer pressure? Rebellion? Those are the things they throw at you in D.A.R.E. and such programs. What's the reality?

**If you're going to be a jugmental asshole towards smokers on this thread, I'd suggest you don't participate. I'm not interested in telling people what awful individuals they are for smoking.

[datasuspect]

1. back when i was a kid, the cultural millieu was very strange

a tobacco industry-funded PSA (now banned and pulled from public schools) from the mid-70s showed the Fonz saying smoking is cool.

that's why i started smoking.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

3. Very strange indeed.

I remember hearing about that PSA.

:crazy: tobacco industry.

[trof]

21. Oh jeez. I call 'Bullshit'.

[jpgray]

2. I smoked for about a year, ending a few weeks ago

It's entertaining for a while, feeling good in some ways and bad in others even as it has no real benefits whatsoever (not unlike alcohol). It goes good with coffee and booze. That's about it. It's not universally reviled as yet, unless you consider this country's views (or the West's in general) universal. But there's no real upside to it that isn't wholly undermined by all the downsides.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

4. It seems like it might be very mildly entertaining.

I'm not interested in it at all; like you said, the downsides sort of take away any logical argument people might have for smoking.

[jpgray]

5. I wasn't interested at all a few years ago. Now I'm back there again

:dunce:

[WritingIsMyReligion]

6. Oh well.

We can all do stupid shit, for sure.

:dunce:

:D

[LostinVA]

You're not old enough to buy cigarettes anyway.

I started doing it when I went to college.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

10. Thank you for stating the obvious.

Not sure, as always, what my age has to do with it, though I think I get what you're saying--once I move out on my own, I might feel like doing it. Perhaps you're right. I hope you're not, simply because I don't want to smoke, no matter how rebellious and independent I might be feeling.

[LostinVA]

43. I said the same thing when I was your age

Then I went to college and spent the next ten years smoking two packs a day. Haruka (who still smokes) started up working at a theatre where everyone else smoked. She used to smoke occasionally, but didn't really start smoking until she was about 21.

I really wasn't snarking about your age, though. I've been there.

[skygazer]

7. I grew up during the 70's when everyone smoked

The health warnings were out there and everyone knew about them but smoking seemed like an "adult" thing to do, a "cool" thing to do and when you're a teenager, your own mortality is not really at the top of things you worry about.

The ironic thing is that my mother died of lung cancer when I was 14 and I started smoking at 15. I honestly think that was my way of thumbing my nose at the gods and pretty much daring them to take me too because I really didn't give a shit at that point if I did live or die.

So while I think a lot of my friends started because of the perceived cachet, I had some darker and more twisted reasons.

I quit when I was 26. Started up again for a couple of years a while back but have not smoked for about 7 or 8 years not and don't think I ever will again.

Good question. :hi:

[jpgray]

8. I think the defining characteristic of human beings is to know the right thing to do

And then do the complete opposite, for almost no reason. :D

[WritingIsMyReligion]

9. That's really twisted.

:D

I admit, the thought of dying seems laughable to me--how would I die? Who would kill me? Why would I die? Oh, sure, intellectually I know not to be a dumb shit, and I have a short list of dumb shit actions in my life anyhow, but yeah, mortality ain't up there on my list of concerns.

:hi:

[malta blue]

11. I started smoking at 13 - I am now 38 and have recenltly quit.

I am not really sure why I started in the first place...probably to be "cool" or something like that. The health risks were known, but at 13 I felt pretty immortal at the time.

Anyhow...I smoked only socially in high school, became a heavy smoker in college. I quit when I was pregnant with little MB (she is 8) but for some stupid reason, picked it back up again after she was born.

I quit 4 months ago. I still wonder what people who don't smoke do in their car....

Everyong in my family smoked. My parents, grandparents, aunts & uncles, cousins. It was very accepted in our family, especially when I travelled to visit relatives who lived in the Dominican Republic, where smoking is still very popular. Most of my aunts & uncles still smoke, even though my grandmother died of lung cancer. My parent have long since quit, my father even before I picked it up (and no, he NEVER accepted my smoking and I never smoked around him, even at 38).

[Inchworm]

12. Started cause grown-ups said "No"

I'd steal dad's Pall Malls in small amounts so he wouldnt notice. And so it began... lol

Today it ends :D

:hi:

[some guy]

13. Well,

it's an addictive poison. So when I started, I would smoke "a" cigarette and get slightly poisoned, or buzzed. Which was kind of fun in a perverse way. In certain situations at work*, several of my co-workers would smoke, so I would occasionally join them for one.

Then the addictive part starts to creep in, and "a" cigarette doesn't have the same buzz effect, so I would have two.

I wouldn't call that peer pressure, but not entirely not peer pressure either.

* I was working in computer operations, and we would have occasional extended down time. A system crash, and we would wait for systems people to arrive on site and get the system up again, as an example. It was the early 1980s.

[Roon]

14. I started smoking when I was 16

quit when I was 38. I guess I started smoking to look cool and rebel. Of course, back in those days, smoking was allowed at my high school, but only outside. So we could smoke in front of the teachers and staff. It was also legal for a 16-year-old to buy cigarettes. Back then, it seemed like EVERYONE smoked.

[Divameow77]

15. I started smoking around 16

I'm now 30 and recently quit... It's been 8 days :-)

I have quit before, when I was pregnant with both my boys, when I got sick of it, etc. This time I hope I can make it stick!

Besides the obvious health reasons it really has gotten to be too much of a hassle. They're expensive, you can't smoke ANYWHERE anymore, and I never smoked in my house so I found I wasn't smoking very often anymore anyway.

[catmandu57]

16. It was the bus stop's fault

We moved in October 1969 when I was 12 and just starting jr, high, where we moved to I had to ride a bus to school. There were two stops I could choose from the wimp stop and the cool kid stop, the first couple of days I went with my next door neighbor "Nards" to the wimp stop because his mommy wouldn't let him go to the cool kids stop.

All the kids at the cool stop smoked like chimmneys, when i went to catch the bus there I had two choices, smoke like all the ither cool kids or get stomped and chased back to the wimp stop. i smoked from 1969 to 1993.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

17. Smoking goes great with a lot of "hurry up and wait" -type activities.

That's what I had a lot of while working on my undergrad degree and that's when I picked up the habit. Quit 5 years ago. It was so hard to do I was too scared to ever cheat.

[gizmo1979]

18. When you are young

you think you are invincable and death seems a forever away.You just smoke because everyone else does.You don't care about the damage until it's too late.Then you have only regret and shame.

[RushIsRot]

19. I started smoking so I could learn to inhale...

so I could smoke pot.

I didn't realize smoking tobacco would be so addicting until I was already addicted. Now I have not smoked for over 21 years.

[zanne]

28. That's exactly what happened to me!

I was 18. I really, really liked the tobacco and started smoking half a pack a day immediately. I finally quit five years ago. I still want a cigarette.

[RushIsRot]

33. I was 26 when I started. I made it through three years in the Army

without starting. Then I got out and continued my college education. That's when I got tempted by the Wacky-Weed. :-)

Yes, you'll continue to have a few cravings for tobacco for a few years to come, or at least I did. Thank goodness they have now ended.

[Ariana Celeste]

20. I was 12 years old, just moved,

and my only friend at the time told me we had to if we wanted to hang out with the Jr. High school kids. (Surprise, it didn't work, and I'm still smoking today.)

[trof]

22. Back then (50s) it was 'cool' and grown up.

[BrotherBuzz]

23. I watched a lot of television

I saw tons of commercials the espoused all the good crap about smoking, and can recite most all of the cigarette jingles I heard, even today. Smoking was cool back then. I became heavenly addicted to tobacco before the commercials were pulled from television. A forty year habit is tough to kick. :shrug:

[Left Is Write]

24. I started smoking because my friends smoked. It really was that simple.

I was very anti-smoking at age 14, but at 16 I had a few cigarettes, and at 17 I bought my first pack.

I quit at 20 when I got pregnant with my oldest, then started again when she was about three months old.

I finally quit for good just after turning 32, and I have been entirely smoke-free for nine years.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

25. as soon as you grow up and get STUPIDER you will start smoking too

:rofl:

i started when i was 22. not my brightest moment.

[Maine-ah]

26. my brother gave me one to try, so I did. I was 15.

Been smoke free for over a year now, I am now 33 years old. Though I think of it as any alcoholic or drug adict (nic is a drug imho) would. It's an adiction that I am going to have to fight for the rest of my life. I still have cravings daily. My FIL has been smoke free for over 20 years and he still has cravings.

You know how they say pot is the "gateway drug"? Well, it isn't. It's cigs. Everyone I know that smokes pot, smoked a cig first.

I quit because I was pregnant. I still think that my daughter saved my life. If I didn't get pregnant, I'd still be smoking.

[fizzgig]

27. to be honest

i have no idea why i started.

my parents smoke (not blaming them here), so i was around it. i had my first cigarette in gym class when i was 14...smoked pretty heavily my sophomore year of high school, cut down and eventually quit by the time i was 19 (my bf at the time hated it), picked back up when i was 21, quit again for a bit and started again not long after i graduated college.

i like to smoke and my doc doesn't even bother telling me to quit anymore because she knows it's how i deal with stress at work.

i know i should quit but i'm not ready yet

[applegrove]

29. I started at 16 with a few friends. I got hooked early on. Now I try and

quit again and again and again.

[northzax]

30. chicks dig it?

hey, they used to.


Actually, I started at summer camp, rolling our own, at 12. not a big thing at all, didn't smoke again until I was 17 and studying in Japan. Smoking actually gives you a good thing to do when you are trying to follow a conversation, and come up with something to say. instead of saying 'um, er. gee..." you take a drag and think for a second before replying...

[jpgray]

32. Its time-passing and contemplative properties are neat

One bad catch in your throat tends to devalue those, however.

[Lyric]

31. I started because the adults in my life told me I wasn't allowed to do it.

I despised authority as a teen (and still do) so the easiest way to make sure I did something as often as possible was to expressly forbid it. Story of my life, there. ;)

[Norwood]

34. I've been a light on and off smoker

I started when I was around 17, most of my friends smoked and I guess I just kinda fell into it. I dont smoke a lot and I've had periods of a year or more where I didnt smoke at all. I started smoking again a couple of months back because of the stress from my job...

[lost-in-nj]

35. I also started in the 70's

everyone smoked
and it was suppossed to be cool.....

:hi:
oh yeah we used to smoke outside of school to....
lost

[camero]

36. I started at 22

Before just how addictive it was became known. Did it to impress a girl I liked and one led to another, then another. You get the drift. 18 years now. Then since I had tried pot and beer and didn't get addicted to either one, I thought cigs were the same. A couple of years alter the articles started coming out where it was found that they were more addictive than cocaine and the companies manipulated the addictive qualities of the product. I'm gonna try again but I'm probably going to try to quit via Zyban this time.

[RetroLounge]

37. I had my firsy cigarette at 29...

Everything else I was doing was killing me, so I figured WTF, why not? :shrug:

18 years later, and I am still smoking. Hate the shit, but it is some strong JuJu...

RL

[mike_c]

38. I started when I was a teenager in the 60's when popular culture...

...still endowed smoking with a definite coolness factor. I stopped when I was about 25 for a variety of reasons, mostly health related.

[China_cat]

39. If you didn't smoke when I started, you were considered

a total freak and you ended up on the outside of everything.

Hell, even the 'good' girls with the sweater twin sets and the circle pins smoked.

[anarch]

40. as far as I can tell, it was because I am an idiot

[kwassa]

41. all the cool people smoked ....

It went with the rebellion thing, the desire to be in, to be with it.

I would walk into classrooms in art school, and there would be a cloud of smoke floating about five feet off the floor. That was normal. Students and teachers all smoked.

the very cool wore all black, too. That hasn't changed in 30 years, either.

[Oeditpus Rex]

42. Marvin said it was cool

:shrug:

[SeattleGirl]

44. I started smoking at 16; I think there were a couple of reasons for me.

First reason was my dad smoked. I was curious about it, and started sneaking some of his (Raleigh's -- pretty strong smokes). And, even though the information about the dangers of smoking was really starting to come out (this was in 1970), it was still socially acceptable and "cool" to smoke.

Worst decision I ever made was to start smoking.

[Joe Fields]

45. smoking goes well with all of my other bad habits

[bigwillq]

46. Started smoking right before college

because I thought it was the cool thing to do. Going away to college, I'm an adult, adults smoke, blah, blah...

I quit for a year and a half and then I turned 21 and started going to the bars and I've been smoking ever since.

[lizerdbits]

47. Picked it up from a friend at 14

Parents didn't like it so it was like rebellion. I quit last Tuesday (I'm 33) after my last doc appointment for something unrelated because she could really tell by listening to my lungs that it was starting to really affect me. Kind of stupid, like no doc would ever be able to tell because I was somehow magically resistant to its effects and would never have a massively higher likelihood of lung cancer, etc? I guess it's the immortality of youth- I'll quit by 30 I always said. I'll try again next week, next month, next year. I was told from kindergarten on how bad it is for you, I have one grandmother on constant oxygen and the other with emphysema and they smoked for most of their lives so it's not like I didn't know better. I've tried various things over the last 7 or 8 years to quit so I hope I can do it this time. Welbutrin, patches, gums didn't do much but they were mostly half assed attempts since every time I went to the doc I got "lungs sound fine" which was actually surprising. It was more of a "I know I should quit but I feel fine" kind of thing. I'm taking Chantix now. I'm not sure if I'm doing better because of the meds or because I'm more determined.

I have an ex who said once "Why don't you just not do it anymore?" when I talked about struggling to quit. I said "Why don't you just never have sex or masturbate for the rest of your life?" I really hope I don't forget how hard it is to quit and become a smoker harasser. My dad smoked a lot in the 60's and now he can smell it a mile away upwind, but at least he doesn't harass.

[sarge43]

48. Basic training, Jun 62. I was 19.

On those rare occasions when we 'ladies' would get some break time from the no neck monsters, we'd all pile into the common or break room. About half the flight (o/a 25) would light up; the rest of us would breathe second hand smoke. So I figured I might as well have the total experience and that's one of my more stupid decisions.

I wouldn't call it peer pressure. In those days we could smoke just about everywhere and it did relieve some of the stress.

[PoconoPragmatist]

49. Got Started In My Early Teens

Back then....if you were cool...you smoked. If you didn't...you were weird, and a nerd...etc, etc. So, basically, peer pressure.

Nowadays, I still smoke, though I do not find I am much addicted to it, really...I do it more because I enjoy the taste (I smoke Menthol) and because I want something to do with my hands. I know, it probably sounds dumb. But, that's what it is for me, anymore.

Used to be, I smoked about a pack a day. These days, I smoke less than 1/2 a pack a day...usually 5-7 cigarettes...and never in the house.

I've been on some antidepressants, and I don't seem to have the craving for cigarettes I once did before I started the antidepressants. So, like I said, for me, it is mostly because I enjoy the taste, and need something to do with my hands...as silly as that might sound.

[swag]

50. Pure boredom was why I started.

Glad I quit.

[Adsos Letter]

51. My best friend and I started smoking when we were about 15...

...it kind of went with hanging out at the local pool hall. I started smoking regularly in the Army; seems like lots of guys did and it provided "something to do" during long periods of boredom, nervousness or lack of sleep.

After 3 years of that I was physically and psychologically addicted; it was another 10 years before I became concerned enough about the health risks to quit.

That was 21 years ago and I don't miss 'em one bit...in fact, I would hate to see my health now had I continued. The difference in my breathing and overall energy, etc., was greatly improved after about 1 year of not smoking.

It did take a bit longer for the psychological draw to go completely away, though...

[reyd reid reed]

52. When I was in junior high

and high school, all of my friends spent their free time hanging out in the smoking area. It grew from there.

[dpbrown]

53. Started at about 12, quit at 24.

I'm glad I quit.

[asthmaticeog]

54. I picked it up from my friends.

Fast-forward 21 or 22 years, and I finally just kicked the things a month ago. Insidious motherfucking things, taking up smoking is one of the biggest regrets of my life.