Hello everyone. This is my first post. So, I have smoked a pipe on and off since I was a freshman in college (2004). By on and off I mean, perhaps a few times a month, if at all. There have been months when I smoked it once or twice a week, and months where I never smoked it at all. There have been many times I bought a bag or tin of tobacco, smoked from it two or three times, and then forgot about it and found it months or even years later, nearly full. So in brief, I'd say I smoke infrequently.
I think I'm somehow immune to nicotine addiction, as I went through sporadic periods of smoking cigarettes - mostly hand-rolled, very occasionally store-bought - during college, never with any consistency at all. There would be weeks where I'd have a cigarette every day, weeks where I'd have one or two cigarettes on the weekend while drinking, and weeks (and months) where I would not have ANY cigarettes whatsoever. Most of the cigarettes in my possession wound up being bummed by friends. In the past five years since college I've smoked maybe eight cigarettes, total. I know it says in the rules no talking about cigarettes, but I only bring this up to emphasize that am not dependent on nicotine.
In any case, I have recently gotten some small sample bags of pipe tobacco and have been sampling them, about once every other day, since Christmas. This is the most frequently I've ever smoked my pipe, and as I have hypochondriac tendencies I am becoming paranoid about health problems. I want to try to smoke the pipe as healthily as possible. So: I always drink cold water while smoking; I never inhale the smoke into my lungs; and I rinse my mouth out afterwards with tea tree oil (diluted with water), which I also use each morning and each night before bed as a daily practice regardless of whether I've been smoking the pipe.
I have searched mightily but can't find any medical studies of whether this kind of infrequent pipe smoking carries any risk. All the studies I have found seem to relate to cigarette smoking, with the occasional "PIPES/CIGARS ARE JUST AS BAD AS CIGARETTES SO NEVER SMOKE THEM EVER" scaremongering. All the medical websites seem to treat pipe smoking as a black-and-white issue with no middle ground i.e. no concept of doing it in moderation. And it'd be damn helpful to know where my pipe habit would fall in the spectrum of health.
I think I'm somehow immune to nicotine addiction, as I went through sporadic periods of smoking cigarettes - mostly hand-rolled, very occasionally store-bought - during college, never with any consistency at all. There would be weeks where I'd have a cigarette every day, weeks where I'd have one or two cigarettes on the weekend while drinking, and weeks (and months) where I would not have ANY cigarettes whatsoever. Most of the cigarettes in my possession wound up being bummed by friends. In the past five years since college I've smoked maybe eight cigarettes, total. I know it says in the rules no talking about cigarettes, but I only bring this up to emphasize that am not dependent on nicotine.
In any case, I have recently gotten some small sample bags of pipe tobacco and have been sampling them, about once every other day, since Christmas. This is the most frequently I've ever smoked my pipe, and as I have hypochondriac tendencies I am becoming paranoid about health problems. I want to try to smoke the pipe as healthily as possible. So: I always drink cold water while smoking; I never inhale the smoke into my lungs; and I rinse my mouth out afterwards with tea tree oil (diluted with water), which I also use each morning and each night before bed as a daily practice regardless of whether I've been smoking the pipe.
I have searched mightily but can't find any medical studies of whether this kind of infrequent pipe smoking carries any risk. All the studies I have found seem to relate to cigarette smoking, with the occasional "PIPES/CIGARS ARE JUST AS BAD AS CIGARETTES SO NEVER SMOKE THEM EVER" scaremongering. All the medical websites seem to treat pipe smoking as a black-and-white issue with no middle ground i.e. no concept of doing it in moderation. And it'd be damn helpful to know where my pipe habit would fall in the spectrum of health.
