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Comment by samstave | Hacker News Reader

I used to smoke until I was about 26 or so.

I really wanted to quit, but I couldnt "chose to quit" - so I went a different route that worked well for me, but with an odd cost:

I convinced myself that "smoking will make you nauseous" -- and then, when I attempted to smoke, I would feel sick to my stomach, and I would gag a lot.

This worked for me - and I was able to quit nearly cold turkey.

The cost, is that now, any time I smell cigarette smoke, I begin to gag and I cant control it. Further, now my gag reflex is so strong that brushing my teeth makes me gag heavily....

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Interestingly, I use the same method to stick to my diet. I repeat to myself and others how gross fast food is and just say things like yuck, eww, etc when I think of eating it. It took a short time before I just naturally avoid it and have no desire or cravings anymore. And this is from someone that once consumed at least 1, most times 2, meals a day from fast food places.

My problem with dieting was different, I eat normal food, I just eat a lot of it, even if I'm not hungry. I realized this was because the long-term gain of not eating is just too long-term, so I set up a points system where I reward myself with points any time I eat less than maintenance, and I lose points whenever I eat more. It's been working quite well so far!

Did you follow an established program or just make one up?

I made one up, as I wasn't aware of any like that. I'll write it up at some point though.

Well you basically made up reverse weight watchers. They assign points based on calorie counts (and I think healthiness factors as well but I could be wrong there). You have a set number of points per day.

My system is simpler in that you don't have to count calories or anything, you just ballpark the amount of points you gain/lose based on how you ate. It's not about the points anyway, the points are just there for motivation, so they just need to be accurate enough to keep you from thinking it's a sham.

I've done something in the same vein, but not so detailed. Say I'm out for dinner and they offer desert. I have a sweet tooth, so I look at the menu. If it sounds absolutely great, I'll give in. But if it appears to be just OK, I say to myself "I'll save those calories for something better another day."

Likewise, if potato chips are served with a meal -- if I ate them I'd get some marginal pleasure from it, but I can think of 20 ways to get more pleasure from the same number of calories.

Mentally, I'm not denying myself pleasure; I'm banking it for future pleasure. The overall effect is I have fewer low-yield calories and fewer calories overall.

That's interesting, I'll try to keep that in mind as well! Especially since I just ate a goddamn can of Pringles out of gluttony.

Conditioning oneself to feel shame when purchasing or being seen eating unhealthy food works too. In fact I'm pretty sure it's a key component of the general food culture of most places that are slimmer than the US—which is almost all the places that there are.

I think this self-programming things work a lot better than people expect.

The best way to avoid the temptation to each junk food is just not to buy it, or the best way to avoid defaulting to something is making it impractical.

Or the other way around. Something that helps a long way picking up a good habit is to make it easy to do, by removing all possible obstacles/annoyances to just doing it.

That worked really well for me when I was single. But once you have a family with small children, keeping all snacks and junk foods out of the house is a different challenge.

I really had to drastically up my game because my old strategy of not eating what wasn't there didn't cut it anymore.

So what did you do?

It took about 4 years of "discipline lag" but if you keep trying eventually you can serve the kids cake and pizza at a birthday party, without being distressed you aren't having any.

I don't have a good specific strategy but if you keep focused eventually willpower gets stronger.

You're the adult, just don't buy junk food. It's worse for your kids than it is for you.

I don't know if you have kids but I was shocked how much junk food appears in the house EVEN if you don't buy any, especially as they get older.

It would be helpful if my spouse was as strict as I am but that's not always possible. Not to mention step parents and grandparents who are purposely sabotaging to the healthy food plan.

There is a known method for stopping people from drinking that involves the patient taking a drug which prevents any pleasure-able feelings from alcohol and then letting the person drink as much as they want. After the third or fourth time, the person naturally avoids it.

Antabuse (disulfram) inhibits the acetaldehyde oxidase enzyme which is involved in the metabolism of ethanol to acetic acid.

The result is a build up of acetaldehyde in the body which results in flushing, nausea and vomiting when drinking.

Was discovered when workers in a tire factors would get sick when drinking. The sulfur compound added to tires was being absorbed.

The Hellgramite Method

That's how I stopped drinking liquor! When I was around 20, I drank way, way too much and was in bed for more than 3 days. It's been 30 years since and I still can't smell or drink anything stronger than wine without getting repulsed.

I wish I could do this with other bad foods.

Had a very similar experience unintentionally. A coworker was making mixed drinks with Everclear, which was 190 proof (95% alcohol). I badly misjudged how much I was drinking, and it was one of three times in my life I threw up from drinking (probably saved me from alcohol poisoning). Took me a few days to recover fully. Before that incident, my preferred drink was whiskey neat and I could drink it like water. Ever since, any hard spirits make me nauseous immediately if they aren't mixed and diluted heavily. I figure it's my body's defense mechanism telling me not to drink poison anymore.

My god, you A Clockwork Oranged yourself.

That kind of self-teaching worked for me for junk food (for which I have told myself since childhood would make me nauseous) but not coffee (for which I have mostly been telling myself it would make me warm and happy, which it does). Now I have been low-key trying to, if not quit coffee, at least make myself able to stop after a while.

I've tried telling myself coffee would make my heart hurt/race uncomfortably (as an added bonus, it actually does after a while). But mostly thinking about coffee makes me want more coffee, even if it's negative.

I've tried redirecting my good feelings to something else by telling myself exercise would make me feel warm, good and alert. It works. Now I exercise AND drink too much coffee. OTOH I've never had problems motivating myself to exercise (which I do daily) so I guess... partial win?

To never start smoking during my teens ive convinced myself that im allergic to tabaco smoke.

Anytime i "tried" to smoke i would choke myself to near blackout.

After 20 years im happy i did that. I was not the "cool smoking kid" but at least im addiction free now.

I "stopped" frequently, sometimes for months at a time, and planned to quit "someday". Finally, the first time I tried to actually "quit" I started again in less than 24 hours.

I was so disgusted with myself that I quit in disgust...successfully. Not sure how I tricked my brain this way, and the previous successful "stop but not quit" experience surely helped, but essentially successfully quit within 36 hours of my first attempt.

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