Mental Health And Smoking Cessation

The determination to quit smoking and staying a non-smoker is one of the hardest things to do. In order to ensure that people have the best chance of quitting smoking, it is helpful to know what their options are and where to go for help. This very beneficial industry preys on the fragile mental health of smokers. This is however not true. Most of the people are mentally very strong. The industry with majority of the people is the medical profession. Now people cannot blame the doctors and nurses that they have fragile minds. These people make life and death choices on a daily basis. They are actually as strong willed as anyone.

So what can be the reason that when it comes to stopping smoking, most smokers accept that they will have to go through a period of mental anguish and suffering! Because people have been brainwashed into thinking this is the case. When they stop smoking their brain will tell them it wants more nicotine. People now face the withdrawal signs, which is all in the mind. There are no physical symptoms as such; people do actually not start shaking if they can not relieve these symptoms. All they know is that there is a little itch that needs scratching. Tobacco naturally contains nicotine which is in fact as addictive as cocaine or heroin and, through time, the physical and psychological effects of nicotine take its toll on the body. In order to quitting smoking effectively, both the psychological and physical aspects must be overcome.

Nicotine gets rapidly absorbed into the body through cigarette smoke. The blood vessels, heart, the metabolism, the brain and hormonal system are all affected by nicotine. If a woman smokes regularly during pregnancy, traces of nicotine can be found in amniotic fluid, the umbilical cord blood, breast milk and in the cervix mucous secretions. Nicotine actually lingers in the body for 3 to 4 days after stopping smoking. Nicotine affects the people with a pleasant sensation, leading to the desire to smoke more and more. Nicotine also works as a depressant and interferes with synapse responses in nerve cells. The central nervous system adapts to this influx of nicotine, increasing the acceptance of the smoker and subsequently the number of cigarettes smoked. By smoking cigarette regularly, nicotine enters the brain more quickly than any other intravenous drug.

When a person suddenly quits smoking, the body and brain react to the absence of the drug. This is both a physical and mental procedure. Behavior alteration must be executed due to the giving up of the habit of smoking. The body physically reacts through sleep disturbance, dizziness, headache, tiredness and increased appetite. The hormonal levels and brain get affected, altering mood and can exact feelings of frustration, depression, anger, irritability, difficulty concentrating and restlessness. These symptoms may often direct the smokers to reconsider the choice in order to balance their body functions again, resulting in a vicious cycle of quitting over and over again. The mental health after quitting smoking can last from a couple of days to a few weeks.

• Cassandra Bagley
• 09/01/2009, 4:59 AM
• 0 Comments