Positive And Negative Side Effects Of Quitting Smoking

For the first few days after you have said goodbye to cigarettes, the most conspicuous change in the system appears in the form of a dipping blood sugar level. The ostensible symptoms come to happen basically due to the lessening of the total blood sugar amount. Dizziness, concentration lapse and other behavioral changes have been attributed to the sugar related phenomenon. Also, you may experience a sudden hankering for sweet food. The symptoms associated with the going down of blood sugar resemble the lack of oxygen in the system of any and every living being. This means that you have to encounter with a situation where you lack enough oxygen. This prevents the brain from working at its maximum capacity. This is where the symptoms like light-headedness and nausea originate.

The relation between nicotine and the maintenance of blood sugar may present itself as an anomaly to the uninitiated. Nicotine does not supply the system with sugar, as some people may come to think. It simply excites some specific organs as a result of which the amount of sugar stored in our body is released. This compensates for the low level of oxygen. Consequently, the system can keep functioning normally despite the lessening in the amount of oxygen.

When you quit smoking, your body has to adjust itself with the changed situation. You will usually tend to have more food to maintain the balance of the dipping blood sugar level. It may eventually lead to weight gain. Lack of sugar is the main reason as to why most of us develop a yen for sugary eatables. The body finds itself at a loss due to low sugar, so it automatically prods us to provide it with some form of supplements or the other. This can be a very irritating symptom. The best thing to do is to ensure the intake of several glasses of juice during the span of the first couple of days. It fulfills this need of your body for the time being, in the process acclimatizing yourself for the normal functions of the future days.

Woman and Smoking

God created women to represent beauty, love and purity on earth, give birth to human progeny and mother the human race. Woman, with her power of will, have reached the pinnacle of social and professional success today. Her intellectual genius and worth do not require any testimony but physically she remains as delicate and requires purity for her healthy survival. She is always supposed to be immaculate in every aspect that is why smoking cessation is all the more necessary for her as nicotine has worst consequences on women. Many researches have discovered that women are more susceptible to nicotine and have a slower metabolic cleaning system of nicotine from their body than men.

Nicotine is a vasoconstrictor that tightens blood vessels and restricts blood causing permanent damage to arteries. We have already read about the affects of smoking on human body and mind. The women, who smoke, suffer all the corollaries of tobacco use, like the way men do, as for example, increased risk of various cancers like lung, larynx, pharynx, mouth, kidney, esophagus, pancreas, kidney, and bladder and respiratory diseases. But to add on to the list of jeopardy women smokers are 12 times more prone to die from lung cancer than women who do not smoke. Also,- women smokers are ten times more likely to die from bronchitis and emphysema. Post-menopausal women and women on birth-control pills are at the top of the ‘risk chart' because smoking-related diseases can cause them death. Medications like Chantix are available; to help in quit smoking by overcoming the withdrawal effects like cravings for a smoke.

There is accurate awareness on many health risks of tobacco or cigarette smoke that are solely related to women. Let us know the affects of smoking which are unique to women and realize why smoking cessation is necessary;

Smoking affects on Menstruation, Menopause

• Smoking women experience unusual vaginal discharge or bleeding in most of the cases.
• The components of nicotine in the female body increase the frequency of secondary amenorrhea or absence of menstruation as well as irregularity of periods.
• Smoking women reach natural menopause at least two years earlier than non-smokers or those who quitted smoking.

Smoking affects and oral contraceptives

• Women who are smoking and using oral contraceptives are ten times more at risk of heart attack and stroke compared to those who are smoking but not taking contraceptives.
• They are more at risk of developing cardiovascular diseases such as blood clots.
• As the risk increases with age, the use of oral contraceptive is not recommended to a woman who is smoking and is over 35.

Smoking affects on Hormones

• The benefits of Estrogen replacement therapy are many times negated by the increased cardiovascular and other health risks associated with cigarette smoking
• Smoking women are at more risk of developing cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack and stroke during the use of estrogens
• Please let your doctor know about your tobacco before beginning hormone replacement therapy.

Smoking affects and Infertility

• Many studies proved that smoking women have reduced fertility.
• Smoking women were found to take more than one year to conceive.
• Recent researches have represented the fact that the fertility of smoking women was 72% then that of non-smokers.

Smoking & Libido

• During sexual arousal, the labia, clitoris, and vagina also swell up with blood enhancing sensation and arousal. As nicotine restricts blood flow that have a negative effect on sensation and arousal.

Smoking affects on Pregnancy

• Tobacco chemicals passed to fetus from the blood stream of pregnant mothers.
• Smoking during pregnancy results in preterm delivery, premature rupture of membranes, placenta previa, miscarriage, neonatal death.
• The birth weight reduction depends on the quality of cigarettes a woman smokes during pregnancy; the more she smokes during pregnancy, lower the birth weight.
• Recent studies refer to the reduction of the flow of blood in the placenta due to nicotine, which limits the amount of nutrients that reach the fetus.

Smoking affects on Infant health

• Cigarette smoking increases the chances of sudden infant death syndrome including infant and prenatal deaths.
• Babies born to smoking mothers suffer from learning disorders, attention deficit disorder and disruptive behavior.
• Infants, whose mothers smoked during the time of pregnancy, have the same nicotine levels in their bloodstream as smoking adults. They go through nicotine withdrawal syndrome during their initial days of life.
• Babies born to smoking mothers are on average 200 grams (8 ozs) lighter than babies born to non-smoking mothers.
• Toddlers born to smoking mothers experience more ear aches, respiratory problems, colds, and illnesses requiring pediatrician visits compared to children born to nonsmoking mothers.

Not only a woman is victimized by tobacco use and cigarette smoking, the well-being of her baby is also endangered. If you understand the reasons behind the unquestionable necessity of quit smoking , there are many anti-smoking medications available, and Chantix is one of those medications that can be a boon, to the woman as well as her child.

Passive Smoking Effects

How secondhand smoking affects your family and environment!

Passive smoking means the smoke in the ambience exhaled from the lungs of the smoker or the smoke that comes from a person’s burning end of cigarette, cigar or pipe and that inhaled by others. This is also known as involuntary smoking, secondhand smoking and Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS).

There are 4000 chemicals in tobacco having 100 identified poisons and 63 components that cause cancer. When the smokers are directly taking these poisons in, they are, at the same time, polluting the environment with the dangerous chemicals. Environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) causes death of an estimated 3,000 nonsmoking Americans per year due to lung cancer and 300,000 children undergo lower respiratory tract infections.

Worldwide research institutes have established the facts of short term and long term effects of environmental tobacco smoke. Let us understand these one by one;

Short Term Effects: It depends upon the susceptibility of a person to nicotine. Some can stay in a room with smokers for quite a long time apparently without being effected. Others may feel ill within a few minutes or an hour of exposure to environmental smoke.

• Asthma patients may experience attacks due to ETS exposure.
• Allergy patients experience all types of allergic symptoms like stuffy nose, watery eyes, runny nose, sneezing, wheezing etc.
• Coughing
• Headache
• Nausea
• Lethargy
• People who are trying to quit feel cravings for a smoke

Long Term Effects: There are quite a number of dangerous long term effects of environmental smoke depending upon the frequency of exposure to involuntery smoking. The likelihood of below mentioned diseases are increased by frequent exposure to passive smoking.

• Risk of lung cancer
• Risk of heart disease
• Risk of miscarriages and birth defects
• Risk of developing asthma in children and adults
• Risk of ear infections
• Aggravated asthma, allergies, and other conditions
• Learning difficulty in children
• Risk of lung infection

California Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and a review by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) identify the consequences of passive smoking which are displayed in the table below;

CHILDBIRTH & CHILDHOOD	DISEASES IN CHILDREN	DISEASES IN ADULTS	OTHERS
# Low Birth Weight # Cot death (SIDS)	Induction & Exacerbation of # Asthama; # Pneumonia; # Bronchitis;	# Lung Cancer; # Heart disease Stroke; # Nasal Cancer;	# Spontaneous abortion; # Meningococcal infections in children; # Undesirable impact on learning and behavioural development in children; # Cancers and leukaemia in children; #Exacerbation of cystic fibrosis; #Asthma exacerbation in adults; #Decreased lung function; #Cervical cancer;

Smoking Statistics

• Being responsible for more than 118,000 deaths, COPD was the fourth most important cause of death in the United States in the year 2001.



• Due to Tobacco induced lung cancer, 124, 0000 deaths were recorded from 1995 to 1999.



• Smoking or other form of tobacco use killed 440,000 people which make it about 20% of total deaths in the U.S. from 1995 to 1999.



• Each year passive smoking causes 3,000 cancer deaths and 300,000 sufferers from respiratory tract infections.



• Medical cost on tobacco induced diseases exceeds $75,000,000,000 per year.



• Any type of tobacco use during pregnancy is responsible for lower birth weight, a major reason behind sudden infant death syndrome.



• Tobacco is responsible for productivity loss greater than $80,000,000,000 per year.

Effects Of Stop Smoking - Enrich Your Life In More Ways Than One

Even if you are a chain smoker, who cannot live for fifteen minutes together without smoking a cigarette, you will be knowing full well how this habit of yours is wreaking havoc with your health. There is enough literature present everywhere and you would have to be living on another planet to miss it, and indeed a statutory warning of smoking being injurious to health is plastered on the very cigarette packet you use.

But just to start the record, let me reiterate what all diseases your smoking habit may cause. The smoke you take in directly enters the respiratory system, so that is where your health depreciation will begin. Emphysema, bronchitis and a general difficulty in breathing are the most common ones. If you have asthma, then your smoking habit could greatly aggravate it.

If you have diabetes, the nicotine in the cigarette can make your blood sugar levels go up, and you know very well what kind of complications diabetes mellitus can cause on its own. And, of course, we should not forget the cancers. Smoking increases the risk of several types of cancers, most notably oral cancer and lung cancer.

Hence, one of the most major effects of stop smoking will be that you will be able to live a healthier life. But that is certainly not all. There are many things you will get that you might not even have thought about. Here are some of these hidden effects of stop smoking that you will be able to enjoy:

An Improved Family Life - The first positive effect of your smoking cessation will be evident in the way your own family reacts with you. Your partner might appreciate you better too, and so will your children. If you have mainly nonsmokers in your family, then you might have also been an object of ridicule when you were a smoker. As soon as you give up smoking, though, they will appreciate you for your determination and coming out of the vice.

An Improved Social Life - Your friends will appreciate you better too. Remember that there are always more nonsmokers than smokers. So, there is all chance you are among the few smokers - if there are any at all - in your social circle. That could have also been the reason for you to miss out on invitations and being generally left out from the group. Welcome yourself back in your social circle again by giving up the damaging smoking habit.

An Improved Career - The nicotine in the cigarette can interfere with your brain receptors. That would lead you to lose focus from your work, and could take a heavy toll on your professional life. When you are able to get yourself rid of the habit, you will find a marked improvement in the way you work, and your earnings will certainly go up.

Enjoy Life Better - Finally, you will be doing yourself the best service by giving up your smoking habit. You will breathe easier, appreciate nature better and be able to do the things you always wanted - like participate in sports. Smokers do not realize how much they are shunting themselves out from the world; but it is a fact that nonsmokers live better lives in several ways than smokers do.

What Are Some Rewards of Quit Smoking!

Within a few days you will probably begin to notice some remarkable changes in your body. Your sense of smell and taste may improve. You will breathe easier, and your smoker's hack will begin to disappear, although you may notice that you will continue to cough for a while. And you will be free from the mess, smell, inconvenience, expense, and dependence of cigarette smoking.

It is important to understand that the long range after-effects of quitting are only temporary and signal the beginning of a healthier life. Now that you've quit, you've added a number of healthy productive days to each year of your life. Most important, you've greatly improved your chances for a longer life. You have significantly reduced your risk of death from heart disease, stroke, chronic bronchitis, emphysema, and several kinds of cancer­p;not just lung cancer. (Cigarette smoking is responsible every year for approximately 130,000 deaths from cancer, 170,000 deaths from heart disease, and 50,000 deaths from lung disease.)

Relapse: If You Do Smoke Again

If you slip and smoke, don't be discouraged. Many former smokers tried to stop several times before they finally succeeded.

What to Do

• Recognize that you have had a slip. A slip means that you have had a small setback and smoked a cigarette or two. But your first cigarette did not make you a smoker to start with, and a small setback does not make you a smoker again.

• Don't be too hard on yourself. One slip doesn't mean you're a failure or that you can't be a nonsmoker, but it is important to get yourself back on the nonsmoking track immediately.

• Identify the trigger. Exactly what was it that prompted you to smoke? Be aware of the trigger and decide now how you will cope with it when it comes up again.

• Know and use the coping skills described above. People who know at least one coping skill are more likely to remain nonsmokers than those who do not know any.

• Sign a contract with yourself to remain a nonsmoker.

• If you think you need professional help, see your healthcare provider for extra motivation to stop smoking. You may want to ask about nicotine gum or a nicotine patch as an alternative source of nicotine while you break the smoking habit.

Quitting is not easy

One of the most vicious diseases in today’s times is smoking. It makes a person baffle for air 3 times more than a non-smoker. It has very many repercussions on the life of the smoker and those around him. It leads to lung cancer and various heart diseases like asthma and emphysema. We should thus abhor this deadly disease and quit smoking.

Quitting is not easy

But to actually quit smoking is not easy, because it is an addiction. However there are very many ways and methods that help us to quit smoking for instance we can opt for acupuncture therapy or aromatherapy. We can also opt for non-nicotine cigarettes or go for precise prescription by a doctor.

But first and foremost we need to decide in our heart to stop smoking and should also fix a day for the same. Inform your family about your decision and seek for their help and assistance. Throw away all the cigarette packets, ashtrays and lighters. Stop buying any more cigarettes. Rather think of the more useful and better things that you can buy with the money thus saved. Ask the other family members also, who smoke, to stop smoking. Keep yourself busy. Exercise regularly and meditate occasionally. Eat healthy food.

After doing all this you may still feel severe urges to smoke. You may also actually retort back to it, but that’s no problem, just be persistent and bring back your decision on to the right track after this break, because most of the people are successful only after 2-3 attempts.

Be prepared for withdrawal symptoms

About 80% people retort back to smoking after once leaving it and only 20% successfully accomplish the task. People retort back due to many reasons. Some say they feel agitated. Others say that the aroma when someone lights up is irresistible. But most of them do so due to the fear of symptoms that appears after that last puff viz. weight gain, aggressive thinking, dry throat, fatigue, muscle cramps, constipation, dizziness, hypersensitivity to stimuli, etc. but these are all just temporary symptoms and disappear in a few days. In fact after the initial bout is over the blood pressure, heart rate, pulse arte all get back to normal. You thus need to keep your will power strong and stick to your decision for a few more days.

Some people are not able to continue with the smoke cessation programs because they say that they are costly. But this is a wrong perception because they are not costlier than the price spent for buying cigarettes. And then isn’t it more logical to spend on your health rather on a disease.

The Pros And Cons Of Smoking

Though the smokers are aware of the dangers of smoking, they are not able to kick the bad habit. They have their own reasons for smoking. Let's have a look at the various pros and cons of smoking.

The pros of smoking are as below:
1) Most of the smokers believe that they feel a very strong bonding with other smokers.
2) Smokers enjoy a sense of gratification by smoking.
3) Smoking cigarettes give smokers the feeling of creating a ritual.
4) Nicotine gives a feeling of pleasure to the smokers.
5) Watching the smoke swirl and the cigarette burn is a fun for most of the smokers.

But the cons of smoking cigarette are numerous. They are:
1) Cigarette smoke leaves an after smell on everything: your clothes, car and home.
2) You may not be able to breathe properly.

3) You may have a nagging cough all day and night.
4) You may suffer from severe headaches, and occasional migraines.
5) You may feel dizzy after smoking cigarettes too fast or after having too many of them.
6) You may have yellow skin, tooth and fingernails.
7) You may have lot of phlegm, which may force you to clear your voice continuously and may even make you lose your voice mid sentence.
8) You may suffer from increased rate of hypertension.
9) You may have a feeling of inadequacy and substance dependence.
10) You may suffer from nausea after too much of smoking.
11) You may feel anxiety and no relaxation throughout the day.
12) You may experience limited motivation and energy to do anything.
13) The sense of smell and taste may diminish.
14) You may accidentally burn holes in you clothes or your upholstery.
15) You are wasting your hard earned money and ruining your health as well.
16) You may also suffer from lingering colds and bronchitis.

Surely, the cons outnumber the pros and give you reason enough to quit this bad habit, right now!

Develop a scare for smoking

There has been a constant research throughout the world to find an easy and perfect way to quit smoking. Medical science is still conducting a thorough research to discover some perfect ways to help people quit smoking.

Smokers are often confused when it comes to kicking out the habit of smoking. If you are a smoker, and do not have commitment, it will become extremely difficult for you to quit smoking. You will, in fact, be neck deep in this trouble. It won’t be easy to quit smoking in such a circumstance.

But, you will become disgusted with the habit of smoking, with the passage of time. So, what to do in such a scenario? Develop a scare for smoking. Scare develops a sense of fear in your mind about lung cancer and cardiac arrest. In fact, this scare or fear will lead you on the path of victory where you will find yourself in the non-smoking zone one day.

Besides, if there is someone in your family who has had such an experience, you will really have to draw lessons from his life. You will need to act accordingly and take preventive measures to quit smoking. It is very unfortunate though that the smoker takes such steps once the tide has passed over the head.

The true story of Bryan Lee Curtis

Bryan Lee Curtis, then 33, holds son Bryan Jr., 2, in this March 29 photo.
Curtis would die about two months later.

On the day of Bryan's death, June 3,
wife Bobbie and son Bryan keep a bedside vigil.

He wanted you to know

ST. PETERSBURG -- Cigarette smoke hangs in the air in the room where Bryan Lee Curtis lies dying of lung cancer.

His head, bald from chemotherapy, lolls on a pillow. The bones of his cheeks and shoulders protrude under taut skin. His eyes are open, but he can no longer respond to his mother or his wife, Bobbie, who married him in a makeshift ceremony in this room three weeks ago after doctors said there was no hope.

In Bryan's emaciated hands, Bobbie has propped a photograph taken just two months ago. It shows a muscular and seemingly healthy Bryan holding his 2-year-old son, Bryan Jr. In the picture, he is 33. He turned 34 on May 10.

A pack of cigarettes and a lighter sit on a table near Bryan's bed in his mother's living room. Even though tobacco caused the cancer now eating through his lungs and liver, Bryan smoked until a week ago, when it became impossible.

Across the room, a 20-year-old nephew crushes out a cigarette in a large glass ashtray where the butt joins a dozen others. Bobbie Curtis says she'll try to stop after the funeral, but right now, it's just too difficult. Same for Bryan's mother, Louise Curtis.

"I just can't do it now," she says, although she hopes maybe she can after the funeral.

Bryan knew how hard it is to quit. But when he learned he would die because of his habit, he thought maybe he could persuade at least a few kids not to pick up that first cigarette. Maybe if they could see his sunken cheeks, how hard it was becoming to breathe, his shriveled body, it might scare them enough.

So a man whose life was otherwise unremarkable set out in the last few weeks of his life with a mission.

* * *

Bryan started when he was just 13, building up to more than two packs a day. He talked about quitting from time to time, but never seriously tried.

Plenty of time for that, he figured. Older people got cancer. Not people in their 30s, not people who worked in construction, as a roofer, as a mechanic.

He had no health insurance. But he was more worried about his mother, 57, who had smoked since she was 25.

"He would say, "Mom, don't worry about me. Worry about yourself. I'm healthy,' " Louise Curtis remembers. "You think this would happen later, when you're 60 or 70 years old, not when you're his age."

He knew, only a few days after he went to the hospital on April 2 with severe abdominal pain, how wrong he had been. He had oat cell lung cancer that had spread to his liver. He probably had not had it long. Also called small cell lung cancer, it's an aggressive killer that usually claims the lives of its victims within a few months.

While it seems unusual to the Curtis family, Dr. Jeffrey Paonessa, Bryan's oncologist, said he is seeing more lung cancer in young adults.

"We've seen lung cancer earlier and earlier because people are starting to smoke earlier and earlier," Paonessa said. Chemotherapy sometimes slows the process, but had little effect in Bryan's case, he said.

Bryan also knew, a few days after the diagnosis, that he wanted somehow to try to save at least one kid from the same fate. He sat down and talked with Bryan Jr. and his 9-year-old daughter, Amber, who already had been caught once with a cigarette. But he wanted to do more. Somehow, he had to get his story out.

When he still had some strength to leave the house, kids would stare.

"They'd come up and look at him because he looked so strange," Louise Curtis said. "He'd look at them and say, "This is what happens to you when you smoke.'

"The kids would say, "Oh, man. I can't believe it,' " Louise Curtis said.

In the last few weeks, Bryan's mother has been the agent for his mission to accomplish some good with the tragedy. She has called newspapers and radio and television stations, seeking someone willing to tell her son's story, willing to help give him the one thing he wanted before he died. Bryan never got to tell his story to the public. He spoke for the last time an hour before a visit from a Times reporter and photographer.

"I'm too skinny. I can't fight anymore," he whispered to his mother at 9 a.m. June 3. He died that day at 11:56 a.m., just nine weeks after the diagnosis.

Bryan Lee Curtis Sr. was buried at Memorial Park Cemetery in St. Petersburg on June 8, a rare cloudy day that threatened rain.

At the funeral service at nearby Blount, Curry and Roel Funeral Home, Bryan's casket was open and 50 friends and relatives could see the devastating effects of the cancer.

Addiction is more powerful.

As the graveside ritual ended, a handful of relatives backed away from the gathering, pulled out packs of cigarettes and lit up.

Why people smoke?

Why people smoke when they know how dangerous is it? In fact, most of the smokers start smoking in their teen ages.

Let’s see why young people smoke:

1. Young people smoke to look mature - when teens see older people all around them smoking, especially their parents and relatives, they start smoking because they want to look like them.

2. To be like their friend - if their friends or peers smoke, they feel pressured into doing the same to be accepted.

3. To experiment - some teens start smoking because they want to experiment with something new or because of curiosity.

Adults smoke for other reasons:

1. Because of the stess and pressures

2. Because of economic and personal problems

They may be unemployed or working but not making enough money to take care of themselves and their families. They may be homeless, or they may be dealing with alcohol or cocaine/heroin addictions. All these people may smoke to feel relaxed or to give them energy while going through a hard time.

Finally, there are people who say they love to smoke. Smoking gives them pleasure and makes them feel good.

Number one cause of death in America

Have you ever realized that the smoking is number one killer in America although it is the most preventable? Do you know that smoking is the major cause of heart attack? The statistic shows that it’s responsible for 40 percent of all heart attacks in people under sixty-five.

Smoking contributes to reduced bone marrow which causes bone and hip fractures. It also has an bad effect on your skin. It causes wrinkles around the eyes and mouth and gives skin a leathery appearance in some people.

Smoking is also associated with cervical cancer, stomach ulcers and cancer, kidney and bladder cancers, coronary heart disease, and lung cancer. It can also contribute to cancer of your voice box and throat. Add erectile dysfunction to the list. It is said that one in every five deaths in the United States is smoking related.

According to the 1990 report of the US Surgeon General, ‘Smoking is probably the most important modifiable cause of poor pregnancy outcome among women in the United States.‘

The Surgeon General’s Report on Smoking and Health, 1964 stated that ‘the habitual use of tobacco is related to psychological and social drives reinforced and perpetuated by pharmacological actions on the central nervous system, the latter being interpreted subjectively as a stimulant or a tranquilizer depending on the individual response‘.

All you must know is that smoking really harms your health seriously!