My 2024 Wishlist included Botox, a taser, and a government-issued vape. This week, nearing the end of my 13th “my last vape I will ever purchase”, I decided to conquer the easiest and cheapest of my wishes. By government-issued vape I mean a prescription vape and by easiest and cheapest I mean apparently all you have to do is tell your doctor you’ve tried it all and are simply at your wits end. And I am. Vaping is stupid as fuck but unfortunately I am addicted. The government vapes are apparently flavourless and colourless, and extremely expensive. It is for these three factors I have long believed them to be my golden ticket to saying farewell to smoking forever.
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You can be prescribed one by your doctor, or, you can wait until October when they become available over the counter at pharmacies, as was announced earlier this week in an unruly softening of the government’s Great Big Vape Ban, which managed to shock everyone including the poor, horrified, and likely overworked pharmacists. I couldn’t wait til October. I wanted my government-issued vape now.When I pulled up to the doctor‘s office I hesitated, staring at the four dead vapes in my cup holder. They mostly tasted like burnt batteries but every few hours would give up a puff of remnant vapour. But I wouldn’t be needing them any more. From my handbag I removed a pack of Marlboro Reds, a half-smoked pack of Esses, and “my last vape I will ever purchase”. It felt somehow wrong to bring them in.My doctor was cool and asked me my pronouns and swore occasionally and honestly it gagged me a bit. Upon entry, I told her I was at my wits end with quitting and wanted to explore my options. I said I was interested in the prescription vapes, and, seized by an inadvertent desire to let her know I’m literate, that I’d read on the news they’d be available from pharmacies in October.I can’t wait til October, I told her.“I need to act now.”I gave her my spiel. I began smoking when I was 15 and I was 28 now, I’d started vaping to help me quit smoking but now I was horrifically addicted to vaping. When times are bad, it’s the first thing I do in the morning and the last thing I do before going to bed. Every time I quit vaping I just start smoking. It starts with one or two and then suddenly I’m out for a wine and I’ve chain smoked half my pack in between huffs of my friend’s mango ice. Mental health likely has something to do with it, every time I try quitting the sentence “I can’t quit now, my life is bad enough” bumps around my mind, bruising me up. I try living without nicotine and the first thought that bores into my brain in the morning like a sinister maggot bent on fucking me up is “my life is terrible''. I’ve tried lozenges, yes, and the patches, and cold turkey, oh so many cold turkeys.
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My doctor was cool about it. She said “you poor thing” to the cold turkeys. She said it’s ok. She explained how addiction works and she explained how it wasn’t just behavioural, it was social and it was neurological. My big three. She said even though it usually only takes three days for your body to adapt to quitting, the social and behavioural factors suck people back in. She praised big tobacco’s cunning. And I guess I said something wrong because she prescribed me a 3 month script of 25mg nicotine patches and suggested I come back in a month to discuss further options if necessary, like acupuncture or hypnosis.Doctor: Now, you can keep a vape on you, but every time you want to hit it, just do a little activity first, like a star jump, then see if you still want it.Me: [floating above my body, watching myself nodding, smiling, fucking it all up] ok :)Doctor: You wouldn’t need the overnight patches would you? You don’t wake up in the middle of the night to vape do you?Me: Well, I usually sleep through the night but if I did wake up I would hit my vape. Thank you!What are you doing??? We’re supposed to be getting a prescription vape? PATCHES??I knew the prescription vapes were a last-resort option. But wasn’t I at my last resort? Did my doctor not believe me? Was it something I said? Does she just not like to prescribe the vapes? Or was I just radiating “I don’t really want to quit and frankly haven’t really tried.”I left the doctors office $35 poorer, prescription unfilled, follow-up appointment unbooked and returned to my car, my dead vapes, my cigarettes and my regret.October isn’t that far away.Arielle Richards is the multimedia reporter at VICE Australia, follow her on Instagram and TikTok.