Quitting Smoking: Is it Hard?

Most people find it hard to quit smoking. Quitting can be hard, but it’s not impossible. Counseling, medications, and other supports can help you quit. 

If you’ve tried quitting smoking before but couldn’t do it, try again. Each time you try, it will get easier. You will be one step closer to quitting for good. Now is the best time to quit. It’s never too late.

How should you quit smoking?

1. Pick a quit day

Choose a date within the next two weeks to quit. Don't wait for the "perfect" day – just pick a date and work with it. Put it in your calendar.

If you'd like:

• List your reasons for quitting - health, family, money.
• Write down some new hobbies you can do instead of smoking – exercise, knitting, making model airplanes- something to keep your hands and mind busy. 
• Speak with friends, family, and colleagues and ask for support. Tell them about your plan to quit, so it feels more real to you.
• Start making the changes to push smoking out of your everyday life - stop smoking in the house and in the car. Make your house and car smoke-free, so no one is allowed to smoke inside.
• Learn about nicotine withdrawal symptoms and how to cope with them.

2. Choose two or more proven quit-smoking methods

There are many proven ways to quit smoking. To boost your chances of quitting, choose more than one method. Pick what seems right for you. Each person is different. You'll know what will work best for you.

Proven quit smoking methods:

Join a support group for people trying to quit. Research shows that people in quit-smoking support groups are more likely to quit for good. (Find out about quit smoking support groups in your area).

Get individual counseling in person or by phone. You can get counseling in person or over the phone, through a free smoker’s quitline. Both are proven to help people quit. There are free quitlines across 

Take nicotine replacement therapy (NRT). The nicotine patch, gum, lozenge or inhaler replaces some of the nicotine you usually get from cigarettes. This can make nicotine withdrawal easier to manage.

Ask your doctor about a prescription medicine called bupropion. It’s an antidepressant that can make it easier to quit. It can take away some of your craving to smoke, and make smoking less enjoyable.

If you slip up, don’t give up. Try again, and again... keep trying until you've quit for good.

Ask for support from your family and friends.

Going “cold turkey” – quitting spontaneously, on your own - also works well for some people. Some people just decide to quit smoking one day - maybe it’s the day they find out they have a lung disease, or the day their grandchild is born. Maybe there is something else that motivates them. Many people who have quit smoking for good say they quit “cold turkey”. If you think going cold turkey could work for you, try it.

3. On your quit date, butt out completely.

1. Don’t smoke, not even a little.
2. Toss out your cigarettes, other tobacco, and ashtrays.
3. Avoid people and situations where you will be tempted to smoke. If you usually smoke in a certain chair, don’t sit in that chair. If you usually smoke at a nightclub, avoid that nightclub for a while. Change your usual routine, so your new routine doesn’t include smoking.
4. Go for a walk instead of a smoke.
5. Be positive. Believe in yourself and your plan.
6. Remember that nicotine withdrawal symptoms only last a short time. Follow these tips to cope with withdrawal symptoms.
7. Get help from support groups, counselors and your local quitline
8. Take it one day at a time. Remind yourself that once the withdrawal is over, you’ll feel better than you have in years. You deserve to feel better…. You’re almost there!

Types of Smokers

The are a few types of smokers based on cigarettes consumed per day. The standards for classifying smokers based on consumption are dependent on the society. A standard used in the Philippines is different from the standard used in Taiwan. There is no exact quantity of cigarette consumption a “heavy smoker” smokes on a daily basis, only estimates.
Many studies concerning cigarette smoking and smoking-related outcomes among adolescents use categories such as “casual” or “regular” smoker to define different types of smokers. It is not clear whether adolescents themselves differentiate between different types of smokers. The present study sought to examine whether and how adolescents discriminate between categories of smokers and how these discriminations engender different perceptions of risk attributable to smoking. In the United states, 550 ninth graders (mean age 14) who reported never smoking tobacco completed a self-administered survey concerning smoking attitudes and beliefs.

Adolescents discriminated significantly between nonsmokers, casual smokers, smokers, and addicted smokers, based on both frequency of smoking and the number of cigarettes smoked. Addicted smokers were perceived as having the greatest chance of experiencing negative outcomes, followed by the smoker, the casual smoker, and last, the nonsmoker...

Give up SmoKing... Is it so easy???

How to give up smoking: Ex-smoker’s experience

If you have ever tried to get rid of your smoking habit, you should know for sure what usually happens once you put out your last cigarette.
During several days the physiology is rife and rampant, as you are facing the toughest of nicotine cravings. But you have to overcome that period, it’s severe, but will last several days. Once you feel you managed to prevail, another challenge rises.
It is the psychological part of addiction that will torment you during several months, being easier-to-bear than, but still tough to overcome.
Therefore, exactly during this period you should make sure to replace the so-needed cigarettes with the following things:

Use Fresh Air

In other words, the oxygen, which is the main part of the air, can help you alleviate your nicotine cravings. If you have a an office-job, you know there is always not enough fresh air, and people are eager to get to the street, and smoking is a good reason for that.
Thus, sometimes- a cigarette – is only a psychological reason for having a break.
So, instead of hitting the smoking-room, better take a walk. According to Norwegian researchers from the Bergen University, making 15-20 deep breaths will be enough to reduce nicotine cravings for several hours.

Want to Give Up Smoking? Try these solutions...

You will find that many men and women want to quit smoking but they simply are unable to do it without a little help. Although non-smokers might believe that if a smoker really wants to quit they can just quit, smokers know differently. For some smokers the craving and addictions of smoking make it impossible to quit without some type of help.

You will find that in order to stop many men and women have even had to be hypnotized, and there is still no assurance that they will not go back. Even after men and women quit, the impulse to smoke again can be so formidable that they have become a member of support groups to help. In the following paragraphs we are going to be covering some suggestions that will help you break the addiction.

The cigarette smoking itself is not really what you really are addicted to. Granted your body might be used to your hand bringing a cigarette to your mouth and inhaling but that’s really a habit. What you’re addicted to, is the actual nicotine within the particular cigarettes.

And simply because your brain is aware that it gets this nicotine from cigarettes, men and women just assume that they are addicted to smoking. However there are patches and different gums on the market today that can help your body get the nicotine and decrease the need for cigarettes. This strategy is great for men and women who really want to stop smoking, however if you only half-heart want to stop you will still have the desire for a cigarette.

Useful cigarettes have been created

Despite medics' statements about total harm of cigarettes were presented cigarettes enriched with vitamins that can bring to person's organism certain benefit.

Novelty has been created by Canadian inventor Roger Ouellette who affirms that vitamin set with which new cigarettes have been enriched considerably lowers negative nicotine influence on our organism. Also they practically neutralize bad breath that remains after usual cigarettes.

As author of the idea explained, such cigarettes he has created specially for his love wife who not only cannot quit smoking but also to reduce quantity of cigarettes smoked during a day (nor it is not less than twenty cigarettes).

Earlier Roger has stated that important is to increase vitamin C in cigarettes' content, however, now inventor considers that they should be enriched with several vitamins at once.

Why some people don’t want to quit smoking?

Anyone who has ever given up smoking will know how hard it is and will also know how much better they feel as a result. Yet, despite all the reasons for giving up, many don’t manage it and, for some, it is simply because they don’t want to quit smoking. There are many reasons for this, but some of the more common ones include the following:

Some people simply enjoy smoking. Picking up a cigarette makes them feel better about the world and, provided that they don’t blow smoke all over their friends and family, it isn’t doing anyone else any harm. For some, the social aspect is what they enjoy – the feeling of belonging to a group of people can be incredibly addictive. And some simply enjoy the taste of tobacco and the feeling brought by holding a cigarette in their fingers.

*Health risks are ignored

It’s almost impossible in this day and age to ignore the health risks that are linked with smoking. However, many people choose to ignore them, or to go ahead and smoke regardless because they think it is already too late. Still others are unconvinced of the health risks, thinking that they are over-exaggerated. Ultimately, a smoker has to be convinced of the risks and/or want to give up before a quitting plan can be put into action.

*Giving up is stressful

There is no doubt that giving up smoking is an incredibly stressful thing to do. Smoking is an addiction, so it is rarely possible to just throw away your cigarettes and never smoke them again. Cravings and the shakes are bound to be a result, and, for those whom smoking is used as a crutch to get them through life, they will suddenly be lacking something important. It may simply not be possible for a smoker to cope with the stress that not smoking brings.

*No-one enjoys being told what to do