One of the most challenging things you will ever do in life is quit smoking. It can be a long process, with some people stopping straight away and others having to do it over a process of a year. There may be symptoms to deal with when you first quit, as outlined in this article below.
Cravings
The most common symptom associated with quitting smoking is the craving feeling you will experience. This is where you feel the need to smoke no matter the cost. This cost could be financially affecting you, or even emotionally. In some cases, you may put yourself in danger to get the next drag of a cigarette, which you should be looking to avoid where possible.
You can combat these cravings by taking certain medications or using distractions. These distractions can come in a few different forms, and it is likely to be something you have an interest in. However, it can only be something as simple as chewing gum or holding something in your hand throughout the day.
Anxiety And Anger
Once you have stopped smoking, it is likely you will see some sort of increase in your anxiety levels. This is because your cravings will make you act out, and can partially affect your mental health in a negative way. This could lead to anger, which would lead to hate and hate could lead to suffering. All in all, this could affect the people in your life and ruin potential relationships.
Increase In Appetite
A common experience that happens to those who stop smoking is an increase in appetite. That’s because your body will have gotten used to ingesting smoking substances and your body will act out in demand of having something like that go inside your mouth. Your stomach will be one of the first organs to out on, increasing your appetite.
Fortunately, this is likely to only be for a small amount of time, before your body gets used to it and your appetite dies down. It will be possible to purchase some medication or supplements to handle your appetite in the short term and bring it to average levels.
Cold Symptoms
With your body acting up craving nicotine, it’s possible to give off symptoms like the flu or the common cold. In fact, it’s possible that your body will give off feelings much like other illnesses you’ve had in your life. This can come in two different forms, from tricking your brain into thinking you actually have these symptoms to your body recreating them in some form.
Nicotine Addiction
Something that will be a major symptom to deal with once you’ve stopped smoking is feeling attached to nicotine still. That’s because your body will have cravings for the substance and can cause your body to react negatively to get what it wants. This could lead to you sweating and generally feeling unwell. In some rare cases, it may alter your mood and make you less desirable to be around.
Quitting the physical act of smoking is difficult mainly for nicotine reasons. This is why there are a range of nicotine products available for purchase and they come in different forms. For example, you will have patches that contain nicotine that can go onto your arms. These help to slowly release nicotine into your bloodstream over time, helping sustain your need. What some people do with these, is use them to slowly kick the cravings by decreasing the amount of nicotine they require each time, until they have fully managed to get away from the cravings.
Nicotine products for this reason are more popular, but there are alternatives to help you kick the habit. For example, you could look to take up vaping.
Vape devices are helpful for those looking to quit or manage after quitting, as they can offer a similar experience to smoking but they don’t contain tar.
Tar is produced when tobacco is burned and contains several harmful and cancer-causing chemicals – this is the main drawback of cigarettes.
This tar, when ignited, will be consumed and placed within your lungs, which causes blockages due to the sticky substance that it is. This causes a range of problems and can lead to cancer eventually forming.
Although vape devices don’t contain tar, they, however, come with their own side effects so long term use is not recommended.
Vape devices can still have nicotine inside them, but it will be through various e-liquids. These liquids can vary in the quantity of nicotine, with some even having none. This means you can start off with high nicotine levels and slowly draw them down until you no longer need it.
The liquids themselves can pack a few different flavours. If you were so inclined, you could go for tobacco flavoured liquids, so that you can get a more authentic cigarette taste. Otherwise, some of the most popular types of liquids are fruit flavours. This means you can vape flavours such as banana, strawberry or cherry, as popular examples. If you’re someone with a sweet tooth, then you can look towards dessert flavours such as custard and vanilla ice cream.
If you’re worried about the legality of vapes, then you shouldn’t be. As long as you’re using authentic devices that pass safety regulations, you are good to go. Thankfully, the vaping industry is regulated worldwide, meaning that certain countries have rules to follow in regard to how you can vape. The UK is rather relaxed in this regard, whereas the US needs to follow FDA vaping regulations.
Remember, vaping should only be used to help you stop smoking and not long-term due to potential side effects. If you struggle quitting then it may be worth speaking to a doctor or a nicotine specialist who can help.
Restlessness
Another symptom that could plague your life and annoy you once you’ve quit is restlessness. Due to the cravings, it’s likely that you will be on the edge at all times, waiting for the next hit of nicotine you can get. This can cause you to not be able to sit still and make you feel like you should always be doing something, even when you’re trying to relax.
To try and deal with this issue, you should try to find a healthy way to relax. Once you’ve found that place, you will need to find ways to distract yourself. This means listening to music, podcasts reading books or playing games. However you decide to do it, it will help you focus on something and prevent you from becoming restless.
Trouble Sleeping
For similar reasons, you may find that you have trouble sleeping at night. Nicotine addiction has a direct correlation to your sleeping behaviour, as it will keep you awake and disrupt the amount of time you actually sleep. As sleep is important, it directly affects your quality of life. You can speak to healthcare professionals and sleep experts to try and get ahead of your sleep issues.
There are also a range of apps available that you could download that can track your sleeping patterns. Not only can they analyse your sleeping patterns, but they could inform you of when you keep waking up and how to sleep in a better position for your body. Each body is unique and they may require different positions for optimum sleeping levels.
If you struggle to sleep in general, it is likely that quitting smoking will make this worse, but again, everyone is different. Consider how your sleeping was beforehand, to work out if there is anything you can do to compare to and make effective change happen.
Constipation
Constipation can be an uncomfortable position to be in, as it can affect you at all times of the day and make you feel anxious. There are different types of constipation that you can be in, so it’s good to speak to a doctor to find out what the actual type you have is and the potential underlying reason for it.
Again, due to a reduction in smoking and a major change to your diet/body, you may experience an increase in constipation. This may lead to your body feeling all filled up, without being able to comfortably relieve yourself. In some extreme situations, you may require medical procedures to treat you and deal with the problem, but it’s likely to only be a short-term issue.
Dizziness And Headaches
As with kicking off any habit, you may experience your body getting upset at you making changes and acting out. This commonly affects your head and brain, leading to headaches and spouts of dizziness. To deal with this, you may need to take medication available from supermarkets such as paracetamol or aspirin in general. Otherwise, it may just take you a short time to get used to it, as your body will have cravings as mentioned above.
Struggling At First
Overall, and to sum up, everything that has been mentioned above. It is likely that you will struggle at first with getting used to a post smoking life. That will be because your body expects nicotine and will get uncomfortable without it at first, but after time has passed and you’ve managed to resist or lower consumption amounts, you will be able to move on with peace.
Author’s Bio
Ella Woodward is an experienced writer who is dedicated to creating well-researched, informative articles. Throughout her long and illustrious career, she has written articles on a wide range of healthcare and lifestyle topics. She’s also written about many business and financial topics and earned an extensive understanding of honing her writing and catering it to her audience. As such, she has the skills and knowledge to explain complex topics and share valuable insight with her readers. In her personal life, Ella loves working hard to stay healthy and achieve her fitness targets. That means she has first-hand experience to offer when discussing everything from stopping smoking to improving your fitness regime.
