STILL can’t get that nicotine monkey off your back? I bet it’s getting heavier and heavier. The main reason why smoking is such a difficult habit to kick off is that nicotine is addictive – crave and crave for more.
The human body has natural nicotine transmitters and nicotinic receptors. Nicotine is a stimulant which makes you feel good, keeps you alert, and makes you perform better. Research has proved that the more nicotine you take in, the number of nicotinic receptors also increases. These nicotinic receptors need to be fed or filled up every couple of hours or so. Hungry nicotine receptors tell your body that you need to take in more nicotine thus, in effect, unconsciously reminding you to light another cigarette. This cycle will go on forever, unless you starve those nicotine receptors making them non-functional. Now that’s the difficult part.
Starving those nicotinic receptors have driven people off the cliff! Well, at least for the most part, not literally. The only way to prevent that undesirable effect is to, yes you guessed it, light another cigarette. Believe me, these nicotinic receptors breed like rabbits, and yes, the effect on your smoking habit is proportional to the number of nicotinic receptors present.
Several products are available in the market to help you kick off that nasty habit of smoking, primarily to protect you from the harmful effects, primarily lung cancer, of the contents in cigarette smoke. These products contain nicotine as well, to feed those hungry receptors, and satisfy your craving for cigarettes but not for nicotine.
So, how do you quit? Medical experts would agree that the best cure is prevention. Don’t start, or at least influence people around you, especially your kids, not to start. This takes more effort than losing those excess weight around your belly. Quitting the habit of smoking is not impossible. Taking drugs to help you quit is one option but make sure that you read through the effects and side-effects first before taking it. More importantly, visit your doctor first to see if you are okay to take these medications. You can browse the internet and look for inspirational stories on how millions of people quit and remained sober. Ask family members or friends to help you with your journey towards a healthier life. It is the people around you that matter during the times that you will be thinking of jumping off a cliff, I hope not literally.
