mad_dr

Lots of people start smoking when they are young. Peer Pressure etc.

However as an adult, I feel that I am SO aware of the risks and costs etc associated with smoking, that I would never take it up. I cannot think of a single good reason to smoke, but lots of reasons not to. However, I can understand that once you are addicted, it's very tough to give up.

For the smokers on here, what caused you to start and how old were you? Do you regret your decision to start?

I want to find out who started smoking at the highest age (IE someone above peer pressure and someone well aware of the risks).

Not trying to start a 'smokers v non-smokers war' - just trying to understand what makes people make what I can only think of as a very bad decision.

Brendan Hughes

Can remember a mate of mine starting to smoke when he was about 18-19, we were all quite taken aback. Not brainy but very sharp and switched on, so he knew all he needed by that time (most start at 12-15). He'd just joined the RAF, dunno if it was some kind of peer pressure. Very odd.

I'd certainly like to know if there's anyone in existence who took their first draw on a cigarette and said "oh, that's nice, think I'll carry on". Everyone I ever saw turned blue and started coughing. This is my reason for thinking that it's always peer pressure - no-one in their right mind would want to continue of their own accord, surely?

ProperCharlie

the only time i feel like smoking is when i have given up drinking. after a few days of not drinking, i start to feel like having something else to occupy myself with - a little event to break up the evening. i smoked between the ages of 16 to about 23, and didn't miss it at all when i stopped.

Faire D'Income

I started when I was 14 despite being viruently anti-smoking I used to accompany my mates to the smoking alley and indulge in some fresh air whilst they polluted their lungs.

About a month later I started smoking (not inhaling) and within three months I was hooked too but being fairly fit throughout my life I didn't suffer from the usual smokers symptoms like coughing and shortness of breath - not that it didn't do any damage.

I stopped twenty two weeks and two and half days ago and have always regretted starting in the first place - peer pressure or just wanting to be hard was the thinking behind the decision.

TelBoy

Anyone got a link to yesterday's report claiming 10 years as the average amount that a person's life is shortened from smoking?

fast bloke

I started at about 19 - when I went to university - It is really difficult to scrounge food, but relatively easy to scrounge a smoke, (which kills the appetite) so leaving all the little pennies for beer

(I didn't think about it that way at that time though)

Stopped about 3 years ago. Can't say I ever noticed any difference to health etc when I was or wasn't smoking, but I now wonder what I did with the 6k that I didnt spend of cigs for the past three years

dogboy1

Hello All,


Whenever i used to get home (when i lived with my parents) i always used to smell the smoke in the lounge from as soon as i walked in the front door......i said to myself im never going to smoke. its such a disgusting habit etc.

Anyway time went on and when i was 24 i got a really serious blood dissorder , in and out of hospital etc for 18 mths and my health just deteriated on a downward spiral. I got very disspondant and bored as most of my time was being spent in hospital waiting rooms whilst more and more tests were carried out.

It was only at this time that i thought...damm i ganna have a *** coz if im going to die then i might as well try some stuff before i do , (stupid i know but thats how i felt). It was also a way for me to socialise because when you're in hospital it gets kinda lonely and i just used it as an excuse to talk and meet people.

To cut a story short, im now 28 and yep i wish i never started smoking. The doctors eventually found out what was wrong with me and i got the correct drugs and am now well ...touch wood. I gave up smoking 15 weeks ago ...its not easy but im determined to give it up.

Steve vRS

Started at 20 at Universtiy. It started with just one or two **** whilst out at the pub but deteriorated to 20 a day. I want to give up and gave up for 18 months a couple of years ago but a stressful episode led to me starting again

Steve

Reffro

I first tried cigarettes when I was 16 whilst doing my exams, but gave up immediately afterwards. When I got to uni I started to smoke full time as it were, no peer pressure involved, and yes I was concious of the risks involved.

I will from time to time get bored with smoking and give up for periods of upto 1 year, but I have in the end always started smoking again, because I enjoy smoking. I am well aware of the risks, and on balance have decided that as long as I continue to enjoy smoking I will carry on. Fear of the known/unknown won't stop me smoking.

I am also the only person I know who's New Year resolution one year was to start smoking again. I had given up 7 months earlier because I was in a bored of cigarettes phase. Then as I had given up, everyone was nagging at me about how well I had/was doing, when after about 5 months I felt like starting again. I fought with my concience, and eventually decided to stop making myself miserable and start smoking again, so on New Years day, I rocked up at the newsagents at 10am and bought some cigarettes........

OllyK

I think parents smoking has an effect as well for a number of reasons:
1) Easier availability of cigarettes in the first place
2) Mum & Dad do it so it can't be that bad
3) Exposure to smoky air from an early age means that they are potentially part used to it / addicted and so have less of the "ill" effects with the first drag than those brought up in a non-smoking house/

The hero / hard man image that has been portrayed in the past associted with smoking still persists to an extent.

Also I think kids think that because they have to be 16 to smoke, smoking at a younger age makes them "look" older.

Finally there is the old chestnut that if something is taboo, people will do it to be rebels, children are no different.

Combine all that with peer pressure and kids are going to smoke.

Brendan Hughes

I don't know how much parents are an influence.

Some of my mates had smoking parents, thought it was disgusting, and refused to copy it.

Others had non-smoking parents, and started to rebel.

Not sure how much it's really a factor.

OllyK

Like many things - I don't think there is ever 1 factor that is the sole reason, it is usually a combination. I was just suggesting that it is a factor.

A survey done a long time ago (don't think it was desparately scientifc) asked smokers and non-smokers if 1 or both parents smoked. It seemed in general that if 1 parent smoked, you were more likely to, and if both smoked, you were even more likely to.

Obviously there are exceptions and the "yuk factor" will obviously come in to play as well. It is more the fact that if kids that have been exposed to smoke, and do try it due to other factors, they are already reasonably used to smoke due to their home environment and may find they are less likey to feel nausious as a result and may find it easier to slip in to smoking as a result.

A lot of if's I know, but I suspect it is a factor

Dream Weaver

Mum & Dad smoked all their life, I was completely anti-smoking when I was a kid, used to moan at them to give up all the time.

Went off to university at 18 and couldnt believe the freedom I had - started enjoying a few ciggies on nights out, then that led to more and more and finally started smoking throughout the day time. Smoked ever since

Have always enjoyed it, and have smoked rollies for the last 6 years. I dont smoke a lot now, maybe 10-15 a day, but I DO want to give up now, life is just too important to me.

Going away soon, then want to give up when I come back.

SomeDude

13, and yup, peer pressure indeed (of course I didn't see it that way at the time).

A solid 29 years of smoking, hum.

Brendan, most people don't like beer either the first time they try it IMHO. I certainly didn't like my first few **** but then you get hooked. Image, forbidden fruits, playing "tough", I suppose it gets you through the first few ****.

I am thinking about quitting, but it's gonna be a bloody tough one and I'm not sure I'm up to it.

10 years ... I guess like with all averages, some people may die very young because of smoking, some become very old. My granddad at 93 still smoked ...

But when waking up in the morning, I can see that it's not going to exactly prolong my life

deanimus

I only ever smoke after have a few beers, never seem to smoke when sobre

MattW

I was such an anti-smokert as a kid. i remember being so disappointed finding out one of my heroes smoked.

I started when i was about 13-14, hanging round with your mates managing to buy a few tins of beer for the school disco. A cigarette got you drunk quicker.

Gave up cigarettes when I was 24\25 and smoked cigars with a beer till about 2 years ago(30). Don't touch anything now.

I don't believe I was ever addicted to nocotine, no withdrawel etc although the habit, i.e. a pint, cup of coffee, after dinner etc was difficult to break.

jjones

started smoking weed with friends. this led to smoking cigarettes. smoked 20 red marlboro a day for about 4 years.

went out one night on the lash. smoked packets of **** and downed way to much beer. was so ill the next day i couldn't smoke as i felt so sick. day after i as feeling a lot better but decided that as i had done 24 hours without smoking i would do another 24 hours. after 48 hours i figured i would be a prat to start again.

not smoked a single cigarette since then (7 years ago).

never felt any healthier for giving up and my sense of taste never improved either.

fast bloke

When you give up, having a few beers is the hardest time to stay off them - I decided at one stage only to smoke when I was drinking - I ended up pished for 18 months

stevencotton

I've managed to give up smoking when out drinking, it's easy when you have the mindset - none of my friends smoke so when we're out, I'm the only person making their clothes and local environment stink of roll-ups which I was very conscious of, so I just stopped.

I still smoke when at work though, most of my colleagues do and it's good to get out of the office once an hour or so, but I can't see myself being a smoker for very long.

philc

cigarettes used to be shared between mates, same way as buying a round of drinks - so most young people smoked as most young people drank alcohol.

And being supercool, the cigarettes of choice were Benny Hedges or Gauloise.

Of course, I don't smoke any more (stopped 10 years ago) - and the main reason for staying off the weed is the thought of having to quit all over again - still occasionally have vivid dreams where I'm smoking ...

Suresh

I guess I started around the age of 16 or so and yes, peer group pressure was the major factor at the beginning. Later on the 'feel good' factor of nicotine addiction just kept me going.

Quit at the age of 35 and have saved almost FOUR THOUSAND Euros since!

Leslie

I started because of a combination of peer pressure and sheer boredom on a 3 day train trip across Canada. Partly curiosity as well I suppose because all my friends enjoyed it in spite of the coughing fits it caused me to have when I tried it at first. There was no indication that it was a dangerous thing then either.

I finally managed to stop 8 years ago but too late to avoid the Quad bypass operation that it caused me to require! The money I have saved too is amazing.

The obvious answer is to learn from our mistakes and just don't start it.

Les

Jamo

iTrader: (23)

i started at 17, and i started because i was sick of kissing my girlfriend of that time and it tasting like an ashtray, so was like **** it. gave up 11 months ago, no patches no nothing, just needed to so i did, im stubborn like that.

drumsterphil

iTrader: (1)

Started when I was 21 and finally gave them up 17months ago aged 30.

Trying to remember why I started but it was a case of being constantly pi55sed at university, all my mates smoked and so did my girlfriend at the time - a *** here and there led to 5 then 10 a day etc. Smoked about 20/day at most but now wonder why I wasted soooo much money and let my health deteriorate as a consequence of smoking.

Ciaran

iTrader: (16)

know what u mean by pier pressure!
i tried it never realy got into it.

Jerome

I started when I was about 13. I'd just started at a large new school in Norf London, which was rather intimidating to say the least. To try and ingratiate myself with what I thought was the in crowd, I started hanging around the burger van where all these "in" guys hung around at break times to smoke. It didn't take long for them to notice I didn't smoke, so I started buying ciggies and handing them out. Then smoking them, then inhaling. All this to fit in with guys that I probably wouldn't give the time of day to now.

I gave up when I was 19, by which time I was on 20 a day - if I didn't go out in the evening. In those days I could smoke at work - how things have changed!

Here's where I reveal how stupid I really am. I started again when I was 30. I was fairly hammered one night and liked the smell of a roll-up this girl from work was smoking. I scrounged one off her. I subsequently started scrounging the odd ciggie here and there during social events. Eventually everyone got naffed off with my poncing and I ended up buying my own packet. All this in the space of a couple of weeks. Within 2 months of buying my own packet I was on 20 a day again. Stupid, stupid tw&t.

6 years later I'm still smoking. But, now Toronto has banned smoking in all bars, I intend to give up soon. Wish me luck.

For the record, during the 11 years of giving up, I missed smoking all the time. I would deliberately sit next to smokers when out to get a whiff (also smokers are more fun, in case you didn't know ). I must be a bit weird in that respect.

Leslie

You did well to stop J4mou, I wish you luck Jerome, it is hard but well worth it once you have kicked it into touch of course.

Les

Herts T555 Bird

This is going to sound stupid to the rest of you and alot ot me, i was with a girl for a few years, who smoked in secret, she was 23 parents didnt know and everytime someone asked me if she did i had to lie for her, as she didnt want anyone knowing fair enough!

I was a non smoker then and decided if she wanted to be a non smoker that much i would start to frighten her, well it turns out that we broke up after 5 years, and now i hate the b!tch cause i am out of pocket with her biftime and also addicted to ****!!

crazy **** isnt it!

Faire D'Income

I don't really think you do mate. You're referring to the type of thing that has led to Brighton Pier collapsing into the Channel.

foamy

I've never smoked myself but one of my ex's gave into the cravings and stopped smoking just to go out with me as she knew I didn't like it.

Shame the relationship didn't last long!