Hi,

I gave up smoking around 5 years ago by using nicotine replacement chewing gum but have never been able to give up that. I am actually chewing more gum now than I did when I first gave up. I have tried mixing the nicotine gum with sugar free gum but always have unfortunete reactions. Does anyone have any other suggestions?

Dragon, first of all, congrats on quitting smoking! Unfortunately, where you are at now is one of the problems with using nicotine replacements; you may become smoke free, but you are never nicotine free until you give up the replacements as well and you are always 3 days away from being nicotine free no matter how long you use the replacement (it takes 72 hours to clear the nicotine from your system completely).
In other words, you are just as addicted now, 5 years after quitting, as you were when you were still an active smoker; you simply changed your nicotine delivery system.
I'm afraid that the only solution to your situation is to quit the gum cold turkey and just tough it out for the 3 days that it will take to get the nicotine out of your body.
That may sound terrible, but really the symptoms of nicotine withdrawal are not nearly as bad as urban legend would have us believe which is surprising considering how terribly addictive the stuff is. I quit smoking cold turkey 6 1/2 weeks ago and the worst symptom I had was some mild anxiety which never lasted more than a few minutes at a time. To tell you the truth, cold turkey was probably the easiest quit I've ever gone through and I've tried the gum, the patch and the Wellbutrin.
You can do this and think of all the money you will save not buying nicotine gum!
Here's a link that you may find helpful; it really helped me a lot.
www.whyquit.com

This link in particular may be very informative.

Perhaps this is a naive question, but what is the downside of nicotine addiction, as long as you aren't using cigarettes as a delivery source?

Nicotine initially causes a rapid release of adrenaline which causes:
* Rapid heartbeat
* Increased blood pressure
* Rapid, shallow breathing
Adrenaline also tells your body to dump some of its glucose stores into the blood, raising blood sugar. Nicotine also tends to block the release of insulin, which then keeps the blood sugar high, which could explain why smoking reduces the appetite.

I larger amounts than in the gum or patches, nicotine is a poison. It makes a great insecticide.