Are You Gonna Smoke Your Lungs Out?

Quitters’ Diaries

So what really works? These ex-smokers tried and tried again to quit smoking. Here’s what worked, and didn’t, for them.

A Miracle Drug

Mel Edstrom, who works at Minneapolis-based marketing firm MotivAction, LLC, quit her 14-year smoking habit five years ago when she was 29.

››› What Worked: A doctor friend of Edstrom’s gave her a prescription for Zyban, also known as bupropion hydrochloride, a prescription antidepressant from GlaxoSmithKline that suppresses the urge to smoke for some people. “You start taking it and you continue to smoke for a week or something like that,” Edstrom says. “After five days, I woke up and realized I didn’t even really want a cigarette. The next thing I knew, it was a few weeks later.”

››› What Didn’t: Edstrom had quit cold turkey for eight months only to take up the habit again when she started dating a smoker.

Illness

Rob Shellman, a 28-year-old sales rep for The Onion, took advantage of a month-long cold last January to quit.

››› The Readiness Moment: “I’d smoked 12 years straight, a pack a day,” Shellman says. “I figured ‘Now is as good a time as any.’”

››› What Worked: Shellman took a day-by-day approach: “I never really looked back.”

››› What Didn’t: He spent a week wearing a nicotine patch, but decided that only prolonged the agony.

››› Advice: “Don’t tell anybody” for the first couple of weeks, Shellman says. “The more you talk about it, the more you want to smoke, and if you’ve tried to quit before a couple of times, it just adds more pressure.”

A Partner and a Plan

Five years ago, when she was 31, Dana Kassel (then Holstad) quit with her boyfriend, Eric, who is now her husband. Kassel, an administrator at Minneapolis’s Southern Theater, had smoked about a pack a day since she was 14, despite the fact that she was a dancer and has asthma. She’d tried to quit twice before, but this time she had a plan.

››› The Readiness Moment: A bronchitis scare, a planned month-long leave as a waitress at St. Paul’s Turf Club (a smoky live-music club), and buying a house all came together as Kassel’s perfect storm.

››› What Worked: Having someone to share the pain with.

››› Advice: “Isolate yourself from whatever environment you’re used to smoking in.”

Trying to Conceive

Melissa Berggren, marketing manager with the Hazelden Foundation, quit her 13-year habit two and a half years ago when she was 28.

››› The Readiness Moment: “I made a deal with myself that when I wanted to start having a family, I would quit.”

››› What Worked: Berggren logged onto Quitplan.com. Quitplan is a statewide  service funded with 3 percent of the state’s 1998 tobacco-company settlement money that offers call-in and in-person counseling and online resources. Berggren liked the message boards, where she found encouragement from fellow quitters.

››› What Didn’t: Bupropion hydrochloride gave Berggren hives.

››› Advice: If you’re thinking of quitting before getting pregnant, your doctor will likely tell you to quit at least 90 days before you start trying to get pregnant, to rid your body of nicotine. If your spouse smokes, he’ll need to quit, too. “Nicotine can affect his fertility, too, which surprised me,” Berggren says of her doctor’s advice. “And the risk of miscarriage is a lot higher if either you or your partner smoke.”