Have you ever gone cold turkey?

Soda, one night driving home from a movie set I stopped and got two of the largest vats of Mountain Dew for the 90 minute drive. As I was getting into my truck I questioned my decision and dumped them both. I switched to La croix (and later other brands).

Close to it with cigarettes. I took a week off from work and locked myself in the basement with a single pack of smokes (I was smoking 2-3 packs a day at that point). At the end of the week I had cigs left over and have never smoked since (20 years ago).

In high school I opened my locker one day and I had more empty bottles of vodka than I did books. I had one last bender and quit. Very similar with recreational drugs.

Yeah, when quitting cigarettes 12 years ago.

Yep. Alcohol. It was the only way for me to quit. I had the shakes for a day, but that was about it.

I have the temptation from time to time, but I am stronger than it.

Quit caffeine that way. Brutal. Felt like shit for a good solid two weeks. Didn't feel normal for another month.

But I did it and now I'm caffeine-free. :)

You must've been drinking a lot
- Well from the literature I read, it affects people differently. I drank a lot, but probably not as much as coffee drinkers.
  
  My caffeine was mainly Mountain Dew. Couple of 20 oz bottles a day, every day for several years. Not much compared to most gamers and shit.
  
  But for me, it was very very painful and uncomfortable to quit.
  
  I also know someone who drank coffee every day all day, way more caffeine than I did, and she quit cold turkey. One day headache, then she was good.

Stopped biting my nails after about 35 years of tearing them to the quick. It wasn't my first attempt, but when I successfully stopped, it was cold turkey. It's been over four years now. I buy a new nail tool periodically to keep them looking good. I'm proud of them despite how trivial. The novelty of tapping on things and peeling stickers hasn't worn off.

I also came to say biting my nails! Quit through sheer willpower, every time I noticed I recognized it, let myself finish, then set my hand on the desk or my lap. Stopped not long after.

Quit meth that way, fucking brutal. Worst experience of my life, and there's a fair few shitty times to compare it to.

What was it like
- Physically painful, mentally crushing. I didn't speak to anyone for a week and a half, just couldn't bring myself to do it. Everything ached, my skin felt like it was on fire in random patches that kept moving around, and I was more depressed than I had ever been in my life to that point.

Snoozing my alarm clock. Went cold turkey about 10 years ago, 0 tolerance. Now my alarm goes off, I turn my lamp on immediately at full brightness, and get up and out of bed within seconds. Used to be really challenging, but now I do it without thinking.

Ever since I was a kid, my family had this electric bathroom warmer which has been my best friend for a lot of time. For 15 years, it has been the main reason for me to quickly wake up during school and work days. I needed the warmth and the white noise, even during summer. A few years ago I decided to "quit", because it started too feel a little like an addiction, and not being able to spend at least 10 minutes in front of this thing would mean ruin the entire morning. Quitting wasn't that hard, of course, but ever since I quit I have a severe problem with snoozing alarms. I need at least 30 minutes to wake up, rested or not rested it doesn't matter, I just cannot help myself to step off off the bed as soon as the alarm rings. Tbh I do not see this as a serious problem, cause lukily it doesn't fuck with my usual daily scehdule, but I will soon try to roll up my sleeves and see if I can improve my alarm2bathroom time
Did you know that there's smart alarms, like apps, that track your sleep and will wake you at the right time? There's also alarm lamps that slowly go on so you'll wake up naturally.
- I’m aware of them. I’ve never been comfortable with sleep tracking apps or wearables. I refuse to rely on technology for something that my body is perfectly capable of doing on its own. After decades of life, I’ve figured out what works best for me. I don’t oversleep, because I get up the moment my alarm goes off.
I should try this. Cuz, I love that snooze button!

Quitting nicotine a couple April's ago. I took a week off to stay home for it

Vaping. Drank energy drinks for a week and then coffee for a few more weeks before the cravings got manageable.

How does that work?
- Caffeine and nicotine function very similarly. Nicotine via baking just works way faster. So by doing caffeine, i can stay focused and alert without vaping, and it takes the edge off.

Pot.

Cold Turkey is the only way I can quit. It fucked with my appetite to the point that I lost 25 lbs, and I was cranky, and had fucked up sleep for like 3 weeks.

I can't slowly tapper off. The hardest time to resist getting stoned is the day after I got stoned.

caffeine. I was so wired from drinking like 5 redbulls every day that I wasn't sleeping anymore, maybe a few hours here and there. I was starting to go insane. so I remember at one point on my work lunch break, February 27th 2024, I told myself I won't ever drink these again unless it's a situation where I need to be awake (like if I'm on an overnight layover with an early flight for example, which is rare enough). I sleep until about noon now on my days off, it's fucking awesome.

How was your experience? When I quit caffeine cold turkey, I was miserable. Crazy ass dreams. Headache that wouldn't go away. Two weeks of just total shitty symptoms. Month before I felt totally ok.

Now I'm caffeine free, but holy fuck, that was tough.
- at first for about a week I had a horrible headache. it didn't feel like a normal headache either, it felt like a mix between the sinus pressure type of headache and a fever headache. I also was sleeping 3 times as much during this phase, like I'm talking sleep before work, get home the next day and sleep 5 more hours. wake up eat dinner sleep again. but eventually I got passed it after that week or so. felt better ever since. saves a lot of money too.
I'm impressed that you wrote such a long response without any caffeine.

Quit cigarettes cold turkey.

Wellll, almost dying from a bleeding ulcer (partly caused by cigarettes), 2 week stay in a hospital, and 4 more weeks of recovery kinda helped.

Videogames 10 years ago. I was spending time on videogames basically every day. I didn't see it as something harmful, but during one christmas break I dared myself not to play videogames during the 10 days school break. Lost all interest in gaming in a matter of days, never picked it up since then. I sold my PS4 six months later. A few years ago I built myself a gaming PC with the intention to use it for gaming but I've actually never bought or downloaded any game

I still play local multiplayer games every once in a while with I'm over at some friends' place (eg. party games as Stickbold, Smash Bros, Mario Kart, Fifa), or online tabletop games such as hangman, gartic phone, geoguesser or boardgamesarena.com

Tobacco. Started by delaying the first smoke of the day as long ad I could. Eventually I got through a whole day.

Not to diminish your achievement at all but that is not going cold turkey.

I gave up Diet Coke once upon a time. But to supplement my caffeine dependency, I started drinking the "energy" Crystal Light and Mio drink mixes. I enjoyed those but I noticed I had more heartburn with them. So I went back to Diet Coke. I guess this anecdote isn't a true cold turkey example. I only switched to the nicotine patch of soft drinks.

Did you try the powder or the liquid?

I have much better results with the liquid additives, and have managed to stay off sugary drinks outside of the occasional treat. Also have gotten a better value out of store brand than Mio. Normally a bit cheaper for a bigger bottle.
- Both. And yeah, I like the store brand liquid flavors better too. Like the pomegranate or dragonfruit.

I once quit one of my antidepressants (venlafaxine) cold turkey and got to feel my brain throb nonstop for a month straight.

It's the only way I can quit anything. Recently quit vaping (nicotine) that way

Cigarettes when I got some long pain and it actually started to hurt when I breathed in the smoke. Stopped alcohol completely at the same time.

I kept it up for almost a month.

Eating. But failed after just 9 days. Cured a bunch of digestive stuff though, which is nice.

From alcohol but with medication to reduce withdrawal symptoms. Three times.

From soda. I drank a ton of water.

From cigarettes after I’d worked my way down from a pack a day to three per day. I’d gone back up to four and then five and stopped completely before it got back on top of me. Starting again (after seven years) was the worst decision of my life. I moved to vaping six years ago.

COVID kinda forced me to do it with weed after I developed a THC allergy. Even edibles trigger it.

I know this is pretty light weight but soda is my back monkey. Cold turkey has worked but the headaches. Granted it was really a caffeine drop because I don't like coffee and am not super wild about tea. I have done better with gradual, however its easier to relapse I think and I have never kicked it permanently.

What about mate or kumbucha? Have you ever tried good quality tea?
- yeah I have used mate and another thing like it which I can't recall its name but its sorta nicer. Pricier though and honestly not as much nicer as it is priceier since mate is so cheap. so mate won on that front but I still pick up the other stuff or have a mind to as its nice. I mean I say more expensive but again mate is cheap so its no more expensive than standard tea. kumbucha I can't really handle doing and the store bought stuff is waaaayyyy to expesive.

Weed Like 45 days ago, I still see myself going back to it but not for a while, and ideally not as a habit. Everything else sorta fades in and out pretty easily so far.

Yes. Have you?

Oh sure, a lot of things actually. I tried to stop biting my nails throughout my life but it was only possible a couple of years ago. I think it's because I was taking good care of my body and was spending a lot of time with people. Whenever I did bite them I would spit it out immediately. I also learned how to take proper care of them.

Stopped smoking 7 years ago. I tried it two times before without success. This time was easy. Mindset is everything.

What made it work the third time?
- By that time I really wanted to stop because I realized how every inhale put another layer of tar on my lungs and that thought alone made me feel bad about it. I believe the disgusting images they had to put on cigarette packs at some point in Germany made an impact on me.
  
  It also helped a lot that less and less friends were smoking and that I had a significant change in my life due to me getting a dog at the same time, so I kinda went with the flow.

Went cold turkey for smoking about 15 years ago. I still get a crazy urge to smoke if i walk past a smoking pad or a designated smoking area. It only lasts for about 10 seconds but its not enough for me to take it back up.

I did it for smoking. Decided to do it over Christmas years ago and my smoker friends supported me by not offering fags. It was alright.

I always go cold turkey cuz my stash runs out.

last year I went cold turkey on video games for about a whole year. This year I started playing video games again, but started making better choices on video games not designed to addict me into playing repeatedly for days, weeks and months online.

Yes.