Webster’s defines "cold turkey" as "abrupt complete cessation of the use of an addictive drug."[1]
Cold turkey is how the vast majority of nicotine addicts have arrested their dependency for at least 5,000 consecutive years. It’s fast, safe, productive, effective and free.[2]
Quoting from page 15 of the Surgeon General's 700-page 2020 "Smoking Cessation" report, "[M]ost smokers who quit successfully do so without medications or any type of formal assistance" and "cold-turkey quitters do as well or better than those who use over-the-counter NRTs."[3]
Trust your instincts.
When to start?
Have you ever noticed how taking that first meaningful step is the hardest? So has Philip Morris, the maker of Marlboro, America’s biggest selling brand.
Philip Morris’ website tells smokers that the #1 key to success is to delay quitting, to "plan and prepare," to "choose a specific quit date."[4]
The problem is that we now have two studies, one from the U.S. (Ferguson 2009) and the other from the UK (West 2006), with nearly identical findings to the contrary: that planned attempts are 260% more likely to fail than spontaneous unplanned attempts.[5] But why?
Does waiting and delay show a lack of commitment or does it simply allow time for anticipation and worry to weaken resolve? We’re not sure. Maybe both.
Begin coming home the second you feel moved to do so.
Simply skip that next nicotine feeding and then celebrate. You did it! Baby steps. Now, get ready to do it again.
Success is about building upon a commitment to the next few minutes, to remaining free during that next challenge, if any.
It’s about getting serious and ending quitting games. It's about taking back our mouth, brain, priorities, time, thinking, coins, self-esteem, smile and life.
Your gift to you
We cannot quit for others. It must be our gift to us. Quitting for a child, spouse, parent, friend, doctor or religious leader creates a natural sense of self-deprivation—a deprived feeling—that ultimately ends in relapse.[6]
If quitting for another, how will an addict's junkie-mind respond the first time that person disappoints us? They’re human. It happens.
While you may not yet love or even like yourself, if you want to begin feeling better about who you are, see recovery as your gift to you.
Allow friends and loved ones to inherit the benefits of possibly the most loving decision of your entire life.
Your freedom and health belong to you. No one should stand between you and freedom.
Destroy all nicotine
Keeping any kind of nicotine handy during recovery makes as much sense as someone on suicide-watch carrying a loaded gun, just to prove they can.
Why pretend that you’re stronger than nicotine when it has an I.Q. of zero? It cannot think, plan, plot or conspire. Your greatest weapon has always been your intelligence but only if put to work.
Why make failure convenient?
Triggered cravings almost always peak within the amount of time we needed to ingest a new supply of nicotine. You may be seconds away from a crave beginning to subside.
Seconds count. Allow yourself extra time to navigate challenges by building in delay. Gift yourself seconds.
Search, find, and flush or destroy all nicotine, cigarettes, cigars, replacement nicotine and vaping paraphernalia beyond your ability to salvage them.
Don’t tease yourself with thoughts about or attempts to bring your addiction back to life.
Prepare for the possibility of going the distance and seeing what it's like to awaken to new expectations of nicotine-free days.
Let this time to be for real. Let this be for keeps.
Leave e-cigs, NRT and cigars alone
Nicotine replacement products were accurately named. Like e-cigs, they’re replacements.
During recovery, it’s highly likely that commercials for these products will find and tease you. It’s not a coincidence.
While replacement nicotine may subdue a craving, it feeds the addiction. It makes sure that another will follow.
A 2013 Gallup Poll asked successful U.S. ex-smokers how they quit. By then, Nicorette nicotine gum had been on the market and heavily advertised for 29 years.[7]
Question: What percentage of ex-smokers credited nicotine gum for their success?
Answer: Only 1 in 100, just 1 percent.
In that at least half succeeded by going cold turkey, real-world nicotine weaning isn’t nearly as easy as those selling it want us to believe.
As for e-cig users, nearly two-thirds wish they could quit,[8] while roughly half find themselves smoking cigarettes too (what’s referred to as “dual use”).[9]
The nicotine delivery device transfer industry has perverted the word "quitting." They don't mention nicotine dependency recovery and, for good reason, they never will.
Fear
If only there was a way to let you feel what it’s like after 90 days of freedom from nicotine—to be at or near experiencing your first day without a single thought about wanting to use. Your fears would melt into excitement.
After being trapped for years between need and use, it’s normal to have serious doubts when you start. And it's normal to fear success even more than failure.
Our addiction conditioned us to believe that permanently ending use would suck the joy from life, that we’d lose our edge, possibly our friends, and that we’d no longer be productive.
Thank goodness it’s hogwash.
A 2009 study found that successful ex-smokers were 21 times more likely to report feeling happier than less happy.[10] That’s 2,100 percent odds of feeling better.
Still, if on the captive side of dependency’s bars, thoughts that your next nicotine fix will be your last ever can be terrifying. So, why terrify yourself?
Forget about forever. Simply commit to the next few minutes, the next hour, that next challenge if any.
Before you know it, the little victories will build into an entire day. Then, simply take recovery one day and challenge at a time.
If after 2-3 weeks you’re not beginning to appreciate what you’ve accomplished, it’ll be you in control — not your addiction.
Attitude
A wise man once said, if you have a lousy attitude going in, there’s a really good chance that during withdrawal you’re going to have a super lousy time.[11]
What if you viewed recovery as doing yourself a favor, recovering the calm and quiet mind that returns once addiction’s chatter ends?
What if you were to embrace your healing instead of fearing or fighting it?
You’re not depriving yourself but ridding your body of nature’s most potent natural insecticide.[12] Withdrawing from poison is good not bad. What truer sign of healing could there be than actually feeling it?
Crave episodes triggered by exposure to use cues normally peak within 3 minutes, roughly the time needed for replenishment.[13] Each is an opportunity to extinguish another subconscious use trigger and receive a prize, the return of a time, place, activity, person or emotion, during which you conditioned your mind to expect more nicotine.
A crave can’t cut, bruise, hurt or make you bleed. Why fear and fuel it? Although hard to appreciate at the moment, it reflects the most mindful moments of healing your life may ever know.
Take pride in each hour of freedom and each trigger silenced. Celebrate the full and complete victory each reflects. You did it again, you’re getting the hang of this. At long last, "Yes I can!"
Patience
Years of being able to satisfy urges for more nicotine within seconds conditioned us to be extremely impatient, at least when it comes to our addiction.
Reflect on the importance of patience to successful recovery. Baby steps, just here and now. This hour, that next challenge, this day and then celebrate.
You'll never be asked to endure more than the next few minutes. They’re all that matter and entirely do-able.
Commitment
Commitment is to decide, to pledge, and then do.
It's about creating a loyal memory muscle that continues working when the justifications for ending use are no longer at the center of our mind.
Remain loyal to your original day #1 commitment. Fully commit to staying free today.
And don't be afraid to tell people around you that you're free. Otherwise, any wild emotional swings during early withdrawal could leave them thinking that you’re using drugs, instead of coming off of one.
Their understanding and support could be beneficial. Why fear or fight your healing? Embrace it.
Get as comfortable as possible being temporarily uncomfortable.
We promise, being home again and going entire days without once wanting to use is worth thousands of times more than the price of admission.
Victory
As mentioned, initially, forget about quitting "forever." Like attempting the seemingly impossible task of sitting down to eat an entire cow, it's the biggest psychological bite imaginable.
Why breed needless anxiety by concerning yourself about next year, next month, next week or even tomorrow?
Instead, like eating one hamburger or nice juicy steak a day, why not adopt an entirely do-able victory yardstick such as staying free here and now, just one day at a time.
If we insist on seeing success only in terms of quitting forever, then on which day do we celebrate? Who is coming to that party?
Why not have lots of parties!
Focus on not allowing any nicotine to enter your body from the moment you wake until you fall asleep. Be proud that you’ve stopped using. It’s huge.
Win the moment. Just here and now, these next few minutes, yes you will!
Never Take Another Puff
That being said, about that cow I mentioned. There will come a day—often within 2 to 3 weeks—where you begin to like or even love being free.
Although staying free today must never be abandoned, as things get easier, it’s natural and normal to begin seeing recovery as being for keeps, that you’ll never take another puff, vape, pouch, dip or chew.
Recovery layers
1. Correcting junkie thinking
2. Ending need
3a. Navigating conditioning
3b. Crave coping
4. Breaking emotional ties
5. Allowing memories to fade
6. Relapse prevention
The balance of Smart Turkey is broken down into the six layers above.
Correcting junkie thinking is listed first because you can do it while still using, and doing so may make that first step easier. Notice how the sections reflect all levels of our being — your physical, subconscious, conscious and emotional self.
Our objective is simple: To become far smarter and wiser than nicotine’s grip upon us.
References:
2. Chapman S. Quit Smoking Weapons of Mass Distraction, Sidney University Press, 2022. Also see, Doran CM, et al, Smoking status of Australian general practice patients and their attempts to quit. Addict Behav. 2006 May;31(5):758-66. doi: 10.1016/j.addbeh.2005.05.054. Epub 2005 Aug 31. PMID: 16137834. Also note that up to 7% of nicotine gum quitters end up hooked on the "cure," while vaping e-cigarettes isn't about "quitting" but delivery device transfer.
3. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Smoking Cessation. A Report of the Surgeon General. Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2020.
4. Altria Client Services, Philip Morris USA, Quit Assist, Unlock a life without tobacco: Key 1 Get Ready, https://www.quitassist.com/5-keys-for-quitting.htm Accessed 13 Dec. 2022.
5. West R, et al, "Catastrophic" pathways to smoking cessation: findings from national survey, British Medical Journal, February 2006, Volume 332(7539), Pages 458-460 and Ferguson SG, et al, Unplanned quit attempts--results from a U.S. sample of smokers and ex-smokers, Nicotine & Tobacco Research, July 2009, Volume 11(7), Pages 827-832.
6. Spitzer S. Quitting for others, 1984. https://whyquit.com/joel/Joel_03_17_quit_for_you_II.html Accessed 13 Dec. 2022.
7. Gallup, Most U.S. Smokers Want to Quit, Have Tried Multiple Times, July 31, 2013. https://news.gallup.com/poll/163763/smokers-quit-tried-multiple-times.aspx Accessed 13 Dec. 2022.
8. Rosen RL, Steinberg ML. Interest in Quitting E-cigarettes Among Adults in the United States. Nicotine Tob Res. 2020 Apr 21;22(5):857-858. doi: 10.1093/ntr/ntz062. PMID: 31011747; PMCID: PMC7171275.
9. Piper ME, Baker TB, Benowitz NL, Jorenby DE. Changes in Use Patterns Over 1 Year Among Smokers and Dual Users of Combustible and Electronic Cigarettes. Nicotine Tob Res. 2020 Apr 21;22(5):672-680. doi: 10.1093/ntr/ntz065. Erratum in: Nicotine Tob Res. 2020 Oct 8;22(10):1934. PMID: 31058284; PMCID: PMC7457322.
10. Shahab L, West R. Do ex-smokers report feeling happier following cessation? Evidence from a cross-sectional survey. Nicotine Tob Res. 2009 May;11(5):553-7. doi: 10.1093/ntr/ntp031. Epub 2009 Apr 7. PMID: 19351779.
11. Spitzer J. If you quit smoking with a lousy attitude… May 17, 2014 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=As52iuujt6A
12. Polito JR. Nicotine: "We knowingly addicted you to an insecticide" Feb. 23, 2021 https://whyquit.com/pr/022321-nicotine-addicted-to-an-insecticide.html
13. This assertion is based upon empirical evidence from nearly two decades of inviting quitters to time their cue triggered crave episode. Use a watch or clock as cessation time distortion is a normal early recovery symptom. Note that, unlike cue triggered episodes, conscious thought fixation can last as long as our ability to maintain concentration and focus.
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Publication date: May 4, 2021