In point of fact, smoking is orders of magnitude more dangerous to your health than any form of smokeless tobacco commonly available in the US. Health officials have sometimes stated that the risks of smoking and dipping are similar, but they are either misinformed or intentionally misleading the public. And that’s not a conspiracy theory: There are a huge number of independent researchers around the world, including dozens in the United States, Canada, and major research hospitals in Europe, that do not take any money at all from tobacco interests, who all agree that oral tobacco use poses far less risk to health than smoking does. Even for light smokers, cigarette smoking is still many, many times more dangerous than if they were heavy users of, say, Copenhagen, Skoal, Grizzly, or any other brand of American smokeless tobacco. (NB: Real Swedish snus–not the fake stuff made in the US, but actual SWEDISH snus–has been shown to be far less dangerous than even American smokeless, with decades of research unable to make a single solid link between snus use and illness.)

So: If you are quitting tobacco to avoid health risks, you’d be far, far better off going back to dipping, and then trying nicotine replacement therapy or one of the prescription anti-smoking drugs like Zyban or Chantix. Even if you aren’t quitting tobacco due to health risks, switching to cigarettes first is a bad idea, as cigarettes have actually been shown to reinforce addiction much faster than smokeless tobacco (likely because they deliver their nicotine much more quickly than smokeless, which is a critical factor in a substance’s addictiveness).

Best of luck to you!!

Looks like you really don’t want to quit that bad.

Chew the gum for three months…and just be DONE with it. Never think of another smoke AGAIN!