Journal #8796

Something I'm trying to wrap my head around...
7 Months ago, August 20th 2016, I quit smoking by trading it with vaping, after 4 years of smoking.
First few months I noticed I wasn't having the miraculous health & mental improvements that you hear about from ex-smokers and quitting smoking catalogs. The way I understood it at the time was that I would feel like a non-smoker but with the stimulant effect of nicotine.

Fast forward 5-6 months and I'm definitely not feeling all that much better (or even different) than I did while smoking, and through a few quit attempts I'm almost certain the nicotine itself is to blame.

While I don't believe vaping is the horrible devil that certain people seem to try and make it out to be, I'm not entirely certain about the peachy image that people try to make out of it.
Any negative experiences with it (such as mine, more on that later), seem to be argued almost exclusively with anecdotal evidence (you're stupid and don't know how to use a vape, you must have health problems unrelated to vaping, etc), with no consideration that perhaps vaping itself may contribute negative side effects.
The positive experiences are also almost entirely anecdotal: "I feel better"; You've been smoking your entire adult life, so how can I define exactly what "feeling better" means exactly?
Does feeling better means you're just happy to not be hacking up a lung, regardless of how both the nicotine and the delivery system (inhaling vapor particles comprised of pg, vg & nicotine) affect you? Or do you somehow know what it is like to have lived as an adult for any period of time, for some stupid reason took up smoking and then finally took up vaping, before sharing your experience?

Now what's been bouncing around inside my head is this:
Smokers are the most common type of addict. They will lie, blatantly ignore all types of evidence that they are harming themselves, defend their habits to a great degree of irrationality, and change their lifestyles and goals based on the physical and mental limitations imposed by smoking.
I have heard many stories about people's experiences with vaping... I also vividly recall many stories about smoking years ago. Hmph...

Now where this becomes interesting for me is that despite the claims of "feeling like new" I've heard so often from vapers, there is a very distinct disparity between said vapers I've met, vs non-smokers.
I worked in a vape shop for a few months and met quite a selection of vapers, and not a single person I've met has stood out to me in any regard... While the non-smokers (other than the ones who handicap themselves by being greatly unhealthy in other regards) I've met have always stood out to me greatly with their energy and "sharpness", even if they aren't strictly "healthy".

But finally, ask a vaper if they consider themselves an addict.
Many of them will (and I have heard it myself as well) claim that vaping is much healthier than smoking and that they only continue to vape because they enjoy it (which indirectly says they could easily quit if they wanted to, although I've also heard that part said directly many times as well).
Now, tell a vaper about how you left your vape at home and often they will completely reverse over their previous statements and join in with how nervous, anxious and stressed they were in previous situations where they couldn't vape for some reason or another.

So I ask two questions: Have we simply created a more digital addiction that solves none of the problems from before?
And can we say with certainty that vaping can even approach the quality of life of a non-smoker?

And with all that said,
April 14 2017-I quit vaping.
I look forward to the next few days of absolute anxiety hell from nicotine withdrawals... Thanks for reading.