Hello Jessie:

 

I have worked in drugstores, both in the front of the store and in the pharmacy for years and am constantly in contact with people who smoke, people who have quit and people who want to quit and think that they can't.  I sell cigarettes, cigars and NRT and they are all prominantly displayed in the same area behind the checkout paid for by either the cigarette companies or the pharmaceutical comapanies.

 

As far as health insurance companies go, one by one each of them stopped covering the nicotine patches and the nicotine gum when they became an over the counter item and available without prescription.  The lozenge never has been in the pharmacy and at the present, I believe the only nicotine item that one needs a prescription for is the nicotine inhaler.

 

Over the years, both as a smoker and now as a six year ex smoker, I have talked to many, many people I come into contact with at work about smoking and quitting.  I smoked 41 years and thought, like most people, I'd never be able to quit either with NRT or cold turkey.  I was envious of people who had been quit for years and wanted to know what powers they possessed that I didn't.  As I spoke to people and asked questions, I gathered some very interesting facts.  Facts for which there were no detailed studies.  Facts where no drug company or advertising company had paid these people to give me.

 

I asked these people over the years who quit, how long they smoked and how they stopped, and how long they had been quit, and over and over I received the same answer.  They said they just decided one day to stop, or their doctors told them to stop, or maybe they they had a bad cold or flu, and they never smoked again.  Some said it was easy and for some it was difficult, but in the end they were all successful.

 

It is important when asking someone who claims to have quit using NRT how long it's been since they did so.  Almost in every instance you will hear them say.."a week" or "a month" or, "I quit a couple of months but then started smoking again".  You will almost NEVER hear a person say they quit by using NRT and have been completely clean from any and all nicotine for a year or longer.

 

As a matter of fact, it is amazing to see just how many people who quit smoking using NRT but are still coming in on a daily or weekly basis to buy the patches, gum or lozenges years after they quit.  I met a person at one of Joel's clinics who chewed the nicotine gum for twelve years.  I had a customer a couple of weeks ago tell me he has been smoking a pack a day and chewing the nicotine gum at the same time for 6 years.  He said he would be a five pack a day smoker if he didn't.  Can you imagine all the nicotine still being ingested and how these people felt?  They were miserable.  That is a completely different story for another time, because long time use of NRT creates other problems.  Anyone I ask who has used NRT tells me that as soon as they stopped...even if they followed the instructions for use to a T, has gone back to smoking or using NRT in a different form. 

 

There are a lot of studies or so called studies out there that claim that using NRT increases your chances of quitting, but they don't tell you for how long.  Again, ask people you know who used NRT and have been completely free of all nicotine for over a year and you will probably be able to count them on one hand.  Why do these studies make these claims?  Every study that has been conducted on NRT that claims to be successful has usually been paid for by the company that manufactures it and like any advertising ploy, they don't give you all the facts.  Many doctors and health professionals, when asked by their patients how to quit, haven't the faintest clue so they tell them to try the patches or gum.  Ask the doctor if he or she quit smoking and they will tell you they just stopped and used no aids.

 

You will find that almost every person who has been off smoking or chewing for a year or longer did so without any help. Years ago there was no NRT and years ago people quit and a lot more, at that.  Quit smoking rates have declined in recent years and that decline conincides with the availabilty of NRT.  More people are "trying" to quit using NRT, but less are successful because they rely on the very drug they are wanting to quit.  They think this is some sort of magic that will cause them to stop as soon as they begin using it.  Unfortunately, addiction does not work this way and neither does NRT.

 

There is a voiceover that interrupts the overhead piped in music, in our store and all the others in the nation wide chain, which features a prominant golfer who says that quitting smoking is hard because as an ex smoker he knows.  He says using NRT will help.  Those words are not his.  The drug companies have paid him to say this.  Continue to listen, and he will tell you that if you buy this product, then you can enter a contest to win a trip to one of his sponsored tournaments.  How did this golfing personality really quit?  He did so like most successful long term quitters quit.  Cold turkey.

 

Don't use lack of money for NRT as an excuse for not being able to quit.  You don't need it and more than you need the so called quitting aids.   Quitting nicotine is not contingent on using NRT any more that quitting other addictions are contingent on buying a lesser dose of the drug a person wants to quit.  It doesn't cost a penny to be successful. Quitting is as simple as understanding your addiction and as easy as never taking another puff.