A gift for yourself and your family

A famous author/humorist once pointed out that the only two things in life that are certain are death and taxes. He was almost right. There are three things: Death, taxes, and the fact that cigarettes are bad for you. That is the bottom line. We all know people that smoke their whole lives and seem to have no problems. They are in the small minority. The simple fact is that smoking causes emphysema, cancer, heart disease, and blood vessel disease, just to name a few. It is your family that suffers the consequences of lost years and lost companionship as well as having to watch your health decline from a habit that is beatable.

What greater gift could you give to yourself and the ones that you love than to quit smoking? By doing that you are telling them “I love you and you are important to me and I want to be around for many more Christmases.”

That being said, it is a hard thing to quit. There are several reasons why it is so hard.

First, nicotine is addictive. Just like heroin and cocaine and others, it is an addiction.

Addiction occurs when your body becomes adjusted to having a drug in its system. Your body has receptors for that drug. The more drug that you supply, the more receptors you will make. After a while you reach a state where a certain amount of nicotine must be present in your system or you will experience something very uncomfortable called “withdrawal.” These symptoms range from minor discomfort all the way to physical illness. They make it hard to stop when you know that the cure is only a puff away.

Second, you must break the harder and more ingrained habit of the hand-to-mouth response and the habits of smoking at particular times of the day and in certain circumstances.

All smokers have times when the desire to smoke hits and they are not in a position to smoke. All smokers know that the desire will pass and they can go on about their business until time when they can smoke. You can use this to your advantage.

All smokers who have quit are very smug and rightly so. They have broken a very hard habit to beat. However they all have one thing in common. They finally made their desire not to smoke stronger than their desire to smoke.
It is not all bad news. Nicotine is out of your system in about 48-72 hours. That is how long the withdrawal lasts. After that it is all willpower and retraining yourself not to smoke. There are medications to help, gums to chew, patches to wear, lozenges and other aids to stop smoking. Your health care provider can give you a prescription for meds that will help and get you in touch with the right programs to increase your chances for success.

Wrap up an empty pack of cigarettes and give it to your family and yourself this Christmas and vow to kick the habit once and for all.

So now that you all have decided to quit smoking and made that vow to your families for Christmas, how are you going to do it?

These steps are helpful.

1. Make a list of all the reasons why you want to quit. Keep it where you can see it and refer to it often.

2. Set a quit date. Make it soon enough that you can build your resolve and not let it die away but not so quick that you are unprepared.

3. Make a list of the triggers that make you smoke. For example, with your coffee, when you are driving, after a meal, when you are on the phone. Make plans to deal with those triggers.

4. Let people know your quit date. Enlist their help and encouragement.

5. The night before your quit date smoke your last cigarette. Clean out all of the ashtrays. Throw them away. Make your house and car smoke-free zones.

6. When you wake up on the morning of your quit day begin telling yourself you are a non-smoker. Practice saying “No thanks, I don’t smoke.” Get used to being a non-smoker. Put on clean fresh clothes because by the end of the day you will notice how clean and fresh they are. You will not be carrying the stench of cigarette smoke with you.

7. When the urge strikes to smoke, take a few deep cleansing breaths. Remind yourself that you are choosing not to smoke. Remind yourself why. After a few moments the urge will pass. Do not give in. Do not cheat. You cannot smoke just one (and you know that).

8. Use a prop of some sort if you need to. Chew on a toothpick, a straw, find something to do with your hands and your mind.

9. The first few days it will seem like the urge to smoke hits you about every five minutes. That may be true but it will pass whether you smoke or not! After those first two days they will begin to be less and less. They will still occur but you are learning new ways to cope and new things to do so you can be a non-smoker. During this time the nicotine receptors in your body are beginning to shut down. As long as they remain unsaturated they will continue to become dormant. This is where many people fail.

10. At the end of the third or fourth day your body is completely clear of nicotine (if you are not using a replacement such as gum or patches) and you are on the way to breaking the habit. It takes about 12 weeks to break an ingrained habit. This does not mean that you will suffer for 12 weeks. The physical discomfort is over. It is truly a mind over matter issue now. The urge to cheat will be strong. Never reward yourself with a cigarette or even a puff. You are and for many years after will be one puff away from a pack a day. Believe it or not many people fail eight to 12 weeks into quitting because they decide they can handle it and take “just one.” You are an addict and you cannot have just one. You are in “recovery.”

The reason for the above is that you have a heightened number of receptors and a heightened sensitivity to nicotine. While they are dormant they will not bother you. You will not suffer withdrawal of discomfort from not smoking. But if you light up and flood them with nicotine you will turn them all back on full blast and you have to start the whole process over again.

Your health care provider will be thrilled to give you all the information and all the help you need to quit smoking. If you are a do-it-yourselfer then you can go to 1-800-QUITNOW (1-800-784-8669) or online at www.smokefree.gov to get some help and programs to help you. Don’t forget to pray as well before, during and after your quit.

Good health, CNMI!

John L. Doyle, MD, is the Medical Affairs director of the Commonwealth Health Center. This column is an unsolicited and unpaid contribution by the author.