Why So Many Women Are Still Vaping in Secret

That watermelonmint scent in the air? Don't know where it's coming from. Certainly not me!

- JILLIAN ANTHONY

In the winter of 2021, I was 32, unemployed, and living with my parents in Las Vegas, where I knew no one. And as this unfortunate COVID-era situation dragged on, my mood grew darker. As a treat, I bought a vape at a local shop. I'd only occasionally smoked before, but now I desperately needed an escape.

I'd close my eyes and inhale, getting a rush of pleasure and a fleeting reprieve from my grim reality. Vaping became my way of holding off an emotional tsunami with a boogie board. So I kept buying $12 electronic tubes of watermelon-mint-flavored nicotine to suck down in my bedroom, away from my parents' prying eyes and aging lungs. Sometimes they'd knock on my door and I'd yell "One second!" while flapping my hands in the air. I was a millennial who'd developed a habit that felt markedly teenaged. And it had me in a choke hold.

For the uninitiated, vapes, or e-cigarettes, work by electronically heating a liquid solution, usually containing nicotine, into vapor. That makes its way through your lungs and into your bloodstream, prompting your body to release adrenaline. And because vapes can have higher nicotine concentrations than cigarettes do-one Juul pod, which seasoned vapers can puff through in a day, contains roughly the same amount as 20 cigs that's a lot of adrenaline. It's also worth noting that some brands sell even stronger pods.