So I’ve been doing the dumb on and off for about five years now. That’s quite a lot of my life. Never been rendered dysfunctional by it completely, I can go weeks without and never top more than 2 or 3 a day (save at parties where I’ll burn half a pack) but it’s been persistently that way for a while.

Thing is, I truly think I’ve gotten nothing but shitty advice on dropping this thing. I don’t think the sensation really matters at all to me, I find nicotine pouches way more enjoyable sense wise but it doesn’t seem to matter in the long run. I think it’s more of an image/activity thing for me. I don’t know if it’s an anxiety thing (perpetuated by nicotine use I know, I know) but I just feel like I basically don’t know how to be with most people without it. I feel like I’m not allowed to just sit there doing nothing, at a bar or outside a cafe, whatever.

Just the act of rolling or ashing feels like it gives me permission to be wherever it is I am, and I don’t know how any healthier behaviour is supposed to substitute that really. I’m not a genius conversationalist, nor am I happy poking at my phone screen during silences. I want to sit in a chair, and actually look at the people I’m with. But I don’t want it to be called staring.

Idk if that makes sense as a situation. If you haven’t had the habit, maybe it feels too small to matter, but it’s huge for me. It really does seem to me like basically everyone my age is either hooked on tiktok, terse in the extreme, or smokes. Did anyone ever find a way out of this?