How to Quit Smoking – It’s Very Difficult to Quit
Nicotine is a powerful drug that is contained in tobacco. When you smoke, your body builds up a nicotine tolerance level. When your nicotine level drops below your tolerance level, you will want to smoke because your body starts to crave nicotine.
Nicotine fulfills many needs. It stimulates and energizes, and it also relaxes. While these are opposite reactions, you learn how to achieve either effect by the way you drag on the cigarette. You may find that if you are hungry, smoking fills your need for food. If you are angry, sad, frustrated, or lonely it soothes you. Smoking a cigarette has relieved physical pain.
You might have also experienced that you can concentrate harder and for longer amounts of time after smoking. Some people smoke because they are bored. All of these effects can be achieved through nicotine. However, there are many negative affects to smoking.
The reason why nicotine works so well is because of how fast it travels to your brain through your blood stream. With one drag of your cigarette, the smoke fills your lungs and is absorbed into your blood stream. The nicotine travels to your brain and will fulfill the feeling that you seek. However, when you smoke your heart start working faster and your arteries constrict.
Nicotine cravings are so powerful that it might control your life. Have you been on vacation and have decided to go somewhere else because smoking was not allowed? How about the time you went out into a snowstorm to buy a pack of cigarettes. Your cravings can start to control your life even if you don’t know it.
Once you know how powerful nicotine is, your resolve to quit smoking can be just as powerful. If you decide to quit “cold turkey”, you may experience nicotine withdrawal. Research has shown that if you quit smoking completely and do not use nicotine replacement therapy, the nicotine will be excreted from your body within 72 hours. Many people deal with the nicotine withdrawal by keeping themselves busy, taking a drink of water, doing deep breathing – finding healthy alternatives to smoking.