How To Quit Smoking For Better Health?

Effects of smoking

Numerous studies have evaluated the adverse health effects smoking has on the body and the economy. The most serious facts on smoking related health and economic risks are listed below.

• Tobacco is the only product, that when used as intended, damages the body and causes numerous life threatening health ailments.

• Smoking related diseases, such as chronic lung disease and coronary heart disease, result in the deaths of over 400,000 Americans every year.

• Tobacco products contain close to 5,000 different chemicals, of those chemicals 69 are known to cause cancers.

How to Quit Smoking?

1. Deep Breathing Perhaps The Single Most Powerful And Important Technique: Every time you want a cigarette, do the following. Do it three times.

Inhale the deepest lung-full of air you can, and then, very slowly, exhale. Purse your lips so that the air must come out slowly. As you exhale, close your eyes, and let your chin gradually sink over onto your chest. Visualize all the tension leaving your body, slowly draining out of your fingers and toes, just flowing on out.

2.Stay Away From Alcohol, Sugar And Coffee

Do your very best to stay away from alcohol, sugar and coffee the first week or longer, as these tend to stimulate the desire for a cigarette. Avoid fatty foods, as your metabolism will slow down a bit without the nicotine, and you may gain weight even if you eat the same amount as before quitting. So discipline about diet is extra important now. No one ever said acquiring new habits would be easy!

3. Develop strong personal reasons in addition to your health and obligations to others. For example, think of all the time you waste taking cigarette breaks, rushing out to buy a pack, hunting for a light, etc.

4. Begin to condition yourself physically: Start a modest exercise program; drink more fluids; get plenty of rest; and avoid fatigue.

5. Set a target date for quitting - perhaps a special day such as your birthday, your anniversary, or the Great American Smokeout. If you smoke heavily at work, quit during your vacation so that you're already committed to quitting when you return. Make the date sacred, and don't let anything change it. This will make it easy for you to keep track of the day you became a nonsmoker and to celebrate that date every year.

Learn New Skills and Behaviors

Try to distract yourself from urges to smoke. Talk to someone, go for a walk, or get busy with a task.
When you first try to quit, change your routine. Use a different route to work. Drink tea instead of coffee. Eat breakfast in a different place.

Do something to reduce your stress. Take a hot bath, exercise, or read a book.

Plan something enjoyable to do every day.

Drink a lot of water and other fluids.

The surgical approach

Surgery is also an effective trigger to quitting, other research shows. In fact, surgery is often one's best chance to quit smoking for good, according to David Warner of the Mayo Clinic.
Doctors have long known that nonsmokers and recent quitters recover better from surgery than smokers.

Warner's review of research also shows that patients who stop smoking prior to surgery have better success withdrawing from cigarettes.