I’ve documented my previous attempts to quit smoking in varying degrees on this blog. Coming from a country where cigarettes are ludicrously expensive to a country where they are 10 times cheaper means that cost is not much of a deterrent for any smoker in Thailand.

I’m three weeks into my latest attempt to quit, which is the longest I’ve gone without smoking for some time.

The difference this time is that I have attempted to replace my craving for nicotine with cravings for other substances – namely Pepsi Max and fruit juice. The idea to drink lots of Pepsi Max came from a comment that Roger left some time ago in which he said that Pepsi Max was, at some point in history, highly addictive. Regardless of whether it is as addictive now, this was enough to inspire me to drink Pepsi Max every time I felt like smoking – which was a lot.

As a result, I was on a sugar high most of the day, a side effect of which was that I sometimes started shaking if I hadn’t had my fix. For some reason I was under the impression that Pepsi Max is sugar free. It isn’t, of course, and so I began worrying that my teeth were suffering, at which point I replaced my Pepsi Max habit with fruit juice.

I now drink at least one large carton of juice a day, which I’m sure is better for me than drinking Pepsi Max. The whole process seems to have lessened my desire to smoke, but I fear I may never be able to stop drinking fruit juice.

It’s a strange time, quitting smoking, because you always think to yourself that once you have quit, you will reward yourself by smoking. There’s no logic to this.

My real test will come in two weeks when I travel to Bangkok for a party session. I’m not bothered about relapsing in Bangkok so long as the relapse doesn’t carry over to my return to Phuket.

Anyone else in the process of quitting anything? Tried Pepsi Max?

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