The best time to decide to quit smoking is now!  If you’re questioning your habits, for health reasons or even financial reasons, then seriously consider how you’d like to go about it.  There are support groups out there, stop smoking medications, books, or even hypnotherapists that can help you.  The most important thing is deciding you’re ready to be a non-smoker & moving forward.  Email me with questions or comments – I love to hear about people going through this life change!

If you want to quit smoking and don’t want to spend the money on quit smoking aids (or don’t have the money!) the best way is to simply decide to quit.  Take one day to just stop, and prepare yourself for it mentally.  Visualize yourself healthy, running, walking, swimming.  Picture your lungs healing, turning fresh pink again.  Try to pick a day about one month from now and remind yourself everyday that that’s the day you’ll quit.  You can start to break the habit before by making little changes:  stop smoking in your car and your house, only smoke outside, or set rules that you’re only allowed to have a cigarette every two hours or if you do have a cigarette you have to go for a 30 min walk or drink two glasses of water, something healthy!

When that day finally arrives, try to keep yourself busy and active so you’re not tempted to smoke.  Drink lots of water and chew gum, or even get some suckers or small sugarless candies.

Good luck!

A woman the other day recently quit smoking and is concerned with the little bit of weight she gained.  She was considering taking a pill, as she had used a quit smoking aid to help with her nicotine withdrawals.

My advice was that she should stick with her natural, healthy lifestyle.  Not only will moderate activity help her shed those pounds, but her lungs will begin the process of healing.  She’s off to a great beginning, and putting more chemicals into her body isn’t going to do her any good.  Lasting lifestyle changes are what make the difference in the long run.

Sleep problems are part of the process of getting over the nicotine addiction.   Using a quit smoking aid such as Zyban (also known as Welbutrin)  can have some side-effects that are pretty annoying.  Insomnia is one of Zyban’s most common side effects (it hit me hard when I used it to try to quit.)  You probably don’t want to mix medications, but there are some natural sleep aids out there that can do you a world of good in this situation.  Try a combination of chamomile tea before bedtime, or warm milk is great too, and spraying a lavender mist on your pillow.  Studies have shown that a warm bath will also help relax you.  Reading is a good way to get sleepy.  Valerian root and melatonin can be purchased at any pharmacy (often found in tea form or pill form).  Also try yoga in the evening, cutting out all caffeine and avoiding sweets in the evening.  If you can’t get any rest at all, check with your doctor, but trying these tips and getting into a good sleep ‘routine’ will usually clear up most insomnia.

Reader email:

I have gone 2 weeks without a smoke and am using Nicabate lozenges (similar to gum) and everything is going well. I am starting to worry about how I will survive when it comes time to give these up. Has anybody successfully quit with the aid of any form of NRT and was it difficult to give these up? Is it the same as trying to quit smoking cold turkey? If it is I won’t have much success.

Congratulations on already going for two weeks.  With quitting you have to make a conscious decision to quit or stay quit and you can do it. There is a relatively new drug out there called Chantix. It first came out some time last year. You need a prescription for it. It has no nicotine and takes the craving away. It really works, after a while you don’t want to smoke anymore.
Or set a date and quit cold turkey, it is not as hard as many ex smokers make you believe. The hardest with that is setting the date and then stick to it. The first day is very hard and you feel very vulnerable and only think of smoking, the second day is already better, the third even more. I quit 40 days ago, cold turkey, and feel great and usually don’t think about smokes.

The very best of luck and keep with it:)

I was looking up information about the stop smoking laser the other day, and found these warnings:

“If you have cancer or epilepsy, are pregnant, use a pacemaker or are taking photosensitive medication, laser therapy should not be used for smoking cessation. Not treating these particular clients is a precautionary measure. Freedom Laser Therapy does not diagnose or treat illness or prescribe medication. Laser therapy is not intended to replace medical care. We recommend that you consult your physician for a professional diagnosis of your health.”

All in all, it sounds pretty safe.

Quitting smoking is a great opportunity to learn about ourselves.

Congratulate yourself on having the desire to stop – then you are over the worst, but still need to maintain your resolve. It’s just so easy to start thinking that just one won’t hurt, but it does. Just one achieves nothing except fueling the need for another. Whatever you do, don’t have just one. Beware – alcohol will weaken your resolve.  I have learned some facts that might be useful to you.

You’re not just addicted to nicotine – there are 50+ chemicals in cigarettes.  Also the main problem is habit.
We have been used to having body sensations which we translate as ‘my body needs something’, which we have attempted to satisfy by having a cigarette.  When we try to stop smoking, we still get these ‘my body needs something’ sensations, and we still feel that we want a cigarette. We have to train our body to be more selective. When we feel we need something, we have to work out what it is that we actually need.  A glass of water is an excellent substitute if nothing else comes to mind, as it helps with the clearance of the toxic substances in our body. Another good substitute is a bag of salted peanuts, used in combination with the water.  Another thing to do is to find an activity which occupies the mind or body.  Go swimming – nobody wants to smoke while they are swimming.  Slowly, as our body adjusts and translates the ‘want something’ feelings into something other than cigarettes, then the feelings begin to go away. We know its not a cigarette that the body really needs, because as soon as we’ve had one we still have the feeling, and want another!

There will certainly be a few bouts of feeling or even being short tempered.  Try to bite your lip . Recognize the short temper as being the removal of toxins which are trying to find a way out.  They went in through the mouth, and they try to get out that way to.  Learn to keep our mouth closed, and think about it as forcing the toxins out the other way.

A reader asked me recently how she could get her 17-year-old friend to stop smoking before school starts.  She said flat out that she didn’t want to spend their lunches together sneaking off to smoke cigarettes.   Here’s some of the advice that she got from another reader:

Offend her. The most disgusting thing about smoking cigarettes is the smell. I cannot stand how smokers smell and it’s the easiest way to tell if somebody smokes-THEY’LL STINK TO HIGH HEAVEN! When I’m around somebody who smokes, I literally hold my breath and start gagging.  So, easiest way, tell her she smells horrible and pretty soon she might smell self-conscious and stop.  I don’t know. It worked with one of my friends.  I stopped letting her ride in my car, too, and boy did that do the trick.

This sounds a little harsh, but that girl does have her whole life ahead of her!  Best to stop addiction before it’s too late!

A retaliatory comment from a reader who was told that it should be easy to quit:

I’m a smoker myself.  I tried to quit many times. It’s the withdrawal symptoms that suck.  I get headaches, tremors, mood swings, upset stomachs, anxiety, high stress, and depression.

It’s really hard to quit, especially when you smoke over a pack and a half a day. I’ve tried quitting cold turkey and weaning myself off but it never worked. Three months later I start back up. I think it is also a mental thing too. When I’m really stressed out or tired I tend to smoke more.

I want to quit.  I really do, but I haven’t found anything that really helps. My girlfriend has asthma, and of course the cost of buying cigarettes are just unreal.  I quit once for three months when my then wife was pregnant with our first child, but started back up after she was born.

It’s not a hobby.  It’s not a habit.  It’s an addiction.  Those that say, “just quit smoking” never lit a cigarette before. It’s not that easy.  If you were a smoker, you’d understand.

Someone wrote in the other day telling me that she used the hypnosis technique to try and quit smoking.  She stated that from the moment she walked out she no long felt like lighting up.  Apparently, it has been a year now and she doesn’t smoke.  She stated that as a smoker she couldn’t go without smoking for even a few hours, especially when she was stressed out, which was often.  Now, she will actually have a cigarette with her friends at a party every now and again and still not get addicted.  She said it only took her one session and costs about $150.  This might sound like a lot at first, but imagine how much you spend on cigarettes throughout the course of even just a month.

Has anyone else had such a good experience with this technique to stop smoking cigarettes?