[AGDee]

Zyban is Wellbutrin.. same exact medication, repackaged after they discovered that it helps block the neuroreceptors that nicotine binds to, fooling people into thinking they are getting nicotine without actually getting any. All anti-depressants carry a risk of suicide for a couple reasons. First off, people take it because they are depressed so they are at higher risk of suicide to begin with. Sometimes, people are too depressed to have the energy to commit suicide. As the anti-depressant begins to work, they sometimes reach a stage where they are still very depressed, but it's lifted enough that they have the energy and motivation to attempt suicide. If you can help them ride that through, they get better enough to NOT want to kill themselves. This is the big disservice in the extremely short lengths of stay for inpatient adult psych patients. 3-5 days is not enough to pull someone up enough to prevent that phenomena.

I've been on Chantix twice and it was great. I had no side effects at all and it was the only method that actually made me forget that I wanted to smoke. It was awesome. I have a co-worker who got really paranoid on it and had to stop taking it. She tends to have some mental health issues anyway so I think it was affecting her differently.

I'm smoking real cigarettes half the time and electronic cigarettes half the time now. I'm going to move to just electronic soon. They are great.. give you the feeling of holding it, the same feeling in the throat when you inhale (which is what I miss most when I quit) and you can get cartridges for them that deliver varying amounts of nicotine or ones that deliver no nicotine at all. They can be used anywhere that smoking isn't allowed because there is no actual smoke. There is a small steam vapor but it is not smoke. Many stores have disposable ones now so some of you may want to try a disposable. A disposable here is $9.99 and is about 3 packs of cigarettes worth of nicotine/puffs before the battery dies out. The non-disposable come with battery chargers and have to be re-charged. The end even lights up. No smell, no ashes, etc. They are great. My biggest issue with the disposable one is that you don't know when you're done smoking. Like, with a real cigarette, it burns away and is gone so you know you're done. Not true with the disposable. My cousin told me that one of the electronic ones has a "done" indicator to let you know you've smoked the equivalent of one cigarette. I'd like to try that one.