Days 4, 5 & 6 - The Conference

Admittedly, the last three days of this experiment have been the toughest.

Running conferences always exhausts me and I keep up my pace with lots of coffee and smoking every free moment I have. I nearly bought a pack of emergency cigarettes strictly for the safety of my co-works and conference attendees, but decided that in a pinch there was a gas station within easy walking distance. I'm glad I made that decision because I might have caved if there'd been a pack in my bag.


I pretty much kept a snus in my mouth at all times but I survived. I've been using the Thunder extra strong mini portion snus mainly in public because it is more easily cloaked. When I'm at home I use the Thunder extra strong regular portion snus. The mini has about 8 mg of nicotine and the regular has a whopping 16 mg of nicotine. There were plenty of moments when I said, “screw the public perception,” and stuffed one of the large ones under my lip. Despite looking as if I'd developed a permanent Elvis snarl, nobody said anything.

Another plus was that nicotine was accessible the whole time, not just when I had a moment to step away. I still kept with the “keep the ritual, ditch the habit” motto and went outside occasionally. Once I got home from the conference (12 hours later) not smoking at home was a breeze.

The confidence I received from surviving the first day made the second and third days of the conference easier, not easy, just not as tough as the first.

I really think that my month or so prep with the e-cigarette helped. Granted, during that month I used the fake cigarette less at conferences and indulged my habit with the real thing more often than not, but the fact that I had reduced my average cigarette intake considerably before attempting this cigarette-free experiment seems to have helped tremendously.

Guess that's it for now. One more day and it'll be a week.