Nomorebutts! VAPING SAVED MY LIFE
TheKiwi helping othersquit
Despite having a childhood filled with the whiff of tobacco and a heavy two-decade cigarette habit, it took just one unexpected encounter for Auckland father QJ Satchell to accidentally quit smoking.
After a night out six years ago, QJ woke to find he’d run out of smokes, the usual morning cravings heavy on his mind. In his haste to fulfil the nicotine urge, the dad-oftwo reached for an unopened package on the dining room table, sent weeks earlier by his Florida-based brother Kayne.
It was an electronic vaping device. The e-cigarette – a smoking substitute that’s used with a nicotine-based flavoured liquid – turned his life around in a moment.
“I was surprised when a whole day went by and I didn’t need a cigarette,” recalls QJ, 38, who has since stopped his pack-a-day habit. “Before then, I’d tried every way of giving up – from patches and gum, to going cold turkey and reading
hypnotist Allen Carr’s book The EasyWaytoStopSmoking.”
But the father of Tyson, 11, and Tilly, eight, always went back. “I’d say, ‘Maybe I can’t give it up and it’s part of my personality.’ I was so proud I found a way to quit.”
When his wife Rachael, 37, also stopped smoking with the use of a vape, he was even more amazed.
Now the determined anti-smoking advocate is encouraging others to start the new year by kicking their unhealthy habit through a pioneering new app he created called Qwit.
“It combines an e-cigarette with a 24/7 support programme, and is having double the success rates of gum and patches,” QJ beams. “We ran an independent trial with Kiwi smokers and helped 69% give up entirely!”
Hoping to help families save money and, more importantly, save lives, Qwit Q it includes i l d support t and d motivational tools, as well as behavioural-change content.
The app hasn’t been the only thing keeping QJ busy. After successfully lobbying the Ministry of Health to legalise the sale of vaping devices – previously only available through online stores overseas – in 2017, the former tyre salesman also set up the New Zealand Vaping Alliance.
Then, with Kayne as a partner, he launched a business selling vaping devices and liquids that has reeled in thousands of customers over the world.
It’s a big feat for someone who grew up in a low socioeconomic area of Tokoroa, where it was inevitable to pick up a cigarette as a pre-teen. But his efforts have reached even his own father.
“Dad was a smoker of 53 years and it took him months to touch an e-cigarette, but he had one puff four years ago and hasn’t smoked again,” QJ smiles. “It’s been a hard success, but you can’t compare making a difference to people’s lives. My brother saved mine, I saved my dad’s and now we’re saving all these other people.”