Could you go out with a smoker if you were a non-smoker yourself?

[Blowmeonelastkiss]

I have started seeing a guy who said he smoked occasionally when out socialising or drinking. However six weeks on I find he is a regular smoker and I am finding it unpleasant.

When we went to a restaurant recently he left the table twice during the meal to go outside to smoke and when he called at my home he kept making excuses to go in the kitchen eg get water and then went outside to smoke. I didn't think I would mind if he smoked outside occasionally but the smell on him and in my home in the morning was awful. After a cigarette, if he holds my hand or kisses me it reeks. I can smell it on my hair and my clothes.

As much as the smell, the other thing that bothers me is that he seems agitated and restless as if he is constantly itching for the next smoke so it's not particularly relaxing to be in his company.

In all other ways, he is great but I am thinking is this a non-starter? I am also worried about telling him it bothers me but feel I should tell the truth.

(I also think he drinks too much for me/my lifestyle but it's the smoking that's the real bugbear.)

[DrSethHazlittMD]

I think you have answered your own question

[QuillPen]

I could never go out with a smoker. The smell of their breath makes me want to be sick. It would be a non starter for me.

[Flangeshrub]

Absolutely not. For all the reasons you've said. That 'nicotine hunger' that smokers have is so tiresome, always looking for their next fix, twitchy, organising your life around their next fag. Yuck.

Even friends annoy me with their smoking, but a partner - NO WAY.

[carlsonrichards]

No way. End it.

[NoelleHawthorne]

no the smell is SO SO vile. PLus all that standing outside business in pubs

[Elliptic5]

Sorry, you know the answer.

[futterwacken]

Not a chance, and it sounds like you’ve answered your own question, you don’t like being around this man.

[CogitoErgoSometimes]

No. Had a bad experience once by going out with an allegedly ex smoker. Found out later that he'd only quit to win me over. Every time there was a minor disagreement, out would come the cigarettes and accusations of 'look what you're making me do'.

If you don't like it, don't start down the path. It doesn't get more likeable.

[futterwacken]

Leaving during a meal would have been the point where I told him to sod off tbh. Just RUDE smoker or no smoker.

[BiancaDelRio]

No way in hell.

Not even if the man in question was Idris Elba.

Bleurggggh

[Blowmeonelastkiss]

Oh really? I feel better to hear you all feel the same. Shame though.

[CogitoErgoSometimes]

Leaving the table twice during a meal plus the twitchiness sounds like he's got a real problem.

[MumofWombat]

Nope. Wouldn't have touched DH with a barge pole when I first met him - and I fancied the pants off him when I saw him for the first time - if he'd been a smoker.

[BertieBotts]

Yes but I don't mind smoking and will have one when I'm out. DH has changed to e-cigs now though. (I always want to call it an electronic pipe as that's what it looks more like to me).

It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks, it's about what you can live with. If you don't like smoking, don't go out with someone who thinks it's fine.

[campingfilth]

No not at all and he is a heavy smoker if he had to leave the table twice during a meal! How rude and I take it it is early days and he isn't even showing you any respect there now is he?

Plus the lying about it would have put me right off, let alone the smell and the future consequences of being with a smoker.

No chance at all, same as if they were a big drinker and I like vino. If you think he drinks too much now I bet the real depth of his drinking is being hidden from you. I think his twitching is down to be addicted massively to both.

Get rid.

[Flexibilityisaghost]

I don't think I could. It is something I have considered as DH used to smoke, but had luckily given up before he met me. If he started again I'd have real issues with it. I think you need to be straight with him.

[throckenholt]

personally I couldn't. I find the smell revolting and it is so pervasive that it hangs on clothes and furniture, as well as breath and skin.

[Joysmum]

I couldn't, but only because as an ex smoker (gave up over 18 years ago, maybe even 19) I still need to be careful on occasion as I do to want to start again.

[ItsGotBellsOn]

I'm a hypocrite, as DH married me as a smoker and he has always been a non smoker.

But as an ex-smoker, NO WAY. Couldnt bear to be around smoking again. The smell makes me retch.

[Joysmum]

*don't, not do!

[kentishgirl]

I smoke, DP smokes. Leaving a meal to go and have a cigarette is rude, and it shows that he is a very heavy smoker indeed.

[DirtyOldTown]

I'll tell you something about smokers (I've been one) - we lie about how many cigarettes we smoke. A doctor once told me that when asks how many cigarettes a patient smokes he doubles their answer. I've only ever known one 'occasional smoker' - about 5 cigarettes a week, the rest of us are in double (or worse) figures every single day. Tell him to quit or he's out.

[NoMarymary]

Ditch! He doesn't sound up to much anyway!

I married a smoker and spent years stinking of cigarette smoke as I didn't like to ask him to go outside

It caused me endless worry about his health and it took a health scare to make him give up.

[Dumpylump]

Dp smokes. We argue about it al lot. He's always promising to give up, makes appointments with the smoking cessation nurse, gets patches, gives me loads of flannel about how he's stopping, on Monday, when this packet is finished, when his duty free is all gone....etc.
I hate it. The smell, the "just going for a fag" that leaves me on my own at tables in restaurants, in shops, and in my home (because I won't let anyone smoke in my house). We don't live together and have separate finances, but the ridiculous waste of money irritates me too.
He stopped for nearly 2 years a while back, and I think that's what annoys me most of all.....the nicotine dependence would have been gone, his physical addiction overcome, the damage to his health being repaired......and he wilfully, went and bought cigarettes and started again. I cannot fathom why you would do that.

[carlsonrichards]

A person has to want to quit, very badly. You are only six weeks in. He smokes a lot (twice in one meal?), he drinks too much. Move on.