What DOES work to quit smoking….
Welcome to our health & self help blog.
Focus on Your Health:
In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.
Today's post: Tuesday, 1-16-2007
What DOES work to quit smoking….
I recently read an article on three doable ways to make effective New Year’s resolutions that would actually improve your health in the online publication, ‘Early To Rise.”
(You can subscribe at www.earlytorise.com . It has very good health & money articles & information.)
The first two “how-to-achieve” suggestions were great.
1. Setting a weekly & clearly doable exercise goal; picking a time to schedule it in your week; & "sticking to it like glue"; & always restarting it if something prevents you from doing it temporarily is extremely effective & sound advice.
2. Making small changes by adding or substituting health-enhancing foods for health-harmful foods is also sound advice & effective. Your health will improve; & if you keep adding to it, you’re likely to lose some excess fat & keep it off.
3. The third part was NOT so good.
It started out OK by saying how huge the benefit is to your health if you smoke now & quit. And, although this section then UNDERstates how huge this benefit is compared to the research done on it, overall, the first part of the third section is OK.
Unfortunately, the HOW TO advice in it was NOT good.
The author recommended cutting the amount of daily cigarettes you smoke, if you smoke, by ten percent each month for ten months or reducing it by 1/12th each month for a year.
The idea being that you only make a small change each month & in 10 months or a year you would no longer smoke.
I once ran a smoker's withdrawal class based on this exact method.
It didn't work very well at all.
Here's what happened instead:
At first it was pretty good. Almost everyone could cut out about 30 or 40 percent of the smoking they normally had been doing. They just gave up the cigarettes they wanted or needed least.
So, that part is a good idea for some people as it lessens the physical addiction somewhat. And, it might then help them quit more easily with a better quitting method.
(Also, doing that; ONLY lighting cigarettes with matches & NEVER with a lighter; & taking at least 1,000 mg a day of C is slightly health-protective for people who continue to smoke.
Unfortunately smoking is horribly bad for your health it doesn’t do anywhere as much for you as quitting & staying away from second hand smoke.)
However, once people tried to cut out the cigarettes they smoked when they were most relaxed & happy, such as right after dinner or when with good friends, they seemed to find smoking less effective in fighting stress. And, hardly anyone could do it.
And, when they tried to quit the cigarettes they smoked when they were stressed or needed them for more energy or better concentration, hardly anyone could do it.
So, almost everyone dropped out when they got to that point.
Listing what reasons most motivate you to quit & why they are important to you can help.
But even better is to see a doctor who prescribes the medications that have proven effective to help people quit and who uses the best current medications.
A combination of the antidepressant, known both as Welbutrin & Zyban, and some kind of temporary nicotine replacement has a decent track record in helping people quit -- better than quitting cold turkey only & MUCH more effective than gradual withdrawal.
And, the preliminary reports I read of recently suggests that the single drug Varenicline may be about twice that effective. Apparently it does what the Zyban does but enough more effectively that the nicotine replacement is no longer needed. So, not only does it work better, it avoids leaving some people addicted to the nicotine replacement.
So, here's my suggestion as a substitute.
If you smoke, get your homocysteine level checked with a simple blood test. If it's 9.0 or higher, smoking is already harming your heart & impairing your circulation as well as accelerating your rate of aging.
(Some people who smoke don’t get lung or other cancers it’s true. But EVERYONE who smokes hurts their heart & circulation. So, take this test so you know it’s already happening to you.)
If you smoke, it's virtually certain to be far higher than 9.0. Then you'll know for a fact with no guessing that smoking is already killing you.
Then list what reasons most motivate you to quit & why they are important to you.
Then make an appointment within the next 10 days to see a doctor experienced in helping people quit with drugs & then quit entirely as soon as you have been taking the drugs long enough. The doctor can advise you how long that is.
That works for many people. There are very sophisticated studies that prove it has a much better track record than quitting cold turkey.
And it takes less than a month to do.
It definitely works FAR more often than a gradual withdrawal method.
The only two people I saw succeed with the gradual withdrawal method were so highly motivated I think they could have easily quit cold turkey & done it much faster than the withdrawal method.
Focus on Your Health:
In it we post health commentary & reviews of books, eBooks, & other things that improve or protect your health or which enable you to live longer, to be more prosperous, & to be more effective.
Today's post: Tuesday, 1-16-2007
What DOES work to quit smoking….
I recently read an article on three doable ways to make effective New Year’s resolutions that would actually improve your health in the online publication, ‘Early To Rise.”
(You can subscribe at www.earlytorise.com . It has very good health & money articles & information.)
The first two “how-to-achieve” suggestions were great.
1. Setting a weekly & clearly doable exercise goal; picking a time to schedule it in your week; & "sticking to it like glue"; & always restarting it if something prevents you from doing it temporarily is extremely effective & sound advice.
2. Making small changes by adding or substituting health-enhancing foods for health-harmful foods is also sound advice & effective. Your health will improve; & if you keep adding to it, you’re likely to lose some excess fat & keep it off.
3. The third part was NOT so good.
It started out OK by saying how huge the benefit is to your health if you smoke now & quit. And, although this section then UNDERstates how huge this benefit is compared to the research done on it, overall, the first part of the third section is OK.
Unfortunately, the HOW TO advice in it was NOT good.
The author recommended cutting the amount of daily cigarettes you smoke, if you smoke, by ten percent each month for ten months or reducing it by 1/12th each month for a year.
The idea being that you only make a small change each month & in 10 months or a year you would no longer smoke.
I once ran a smoker's withdrawal class based on this exact method.
It didn't work very well at all.
Here's what happened instead:
At first it was pretty good. Almost everyone could cut out about 30 or 40 percent of the smoking they normally had been doing. They just gave up the cigarettes they wanted or needed least.
So, that part is a good idea for some people as it lessens the physical addiction somewhat. And, it might then help them quit more easily with a better quitting method.
(Also, doing that; ONLY lighting cigarettes with matches & NEVER with a lighter; & taking at least 1,000 mg a day of C is slightly health-protective for people who continue to smoke.
Unfortunately smoking is horribly bad for your health it doesn’t do anywhere as much for you as quitting & staying away from second hand smoke.)
However, once people tried to cut out the cigarettes they smoked when they were most relaxed & happy, such as right after dinner or when with good friends, they seemed to find smoking less effective in fighting stress. And, hardly anyone could do it.
And, when they tried to quit the cigarettes they smoked when they were stressed or needed them for more energy or better concentration, hardly anyone could do it.
So, almost everyone dropped out when they got to that point.
Listing what reasons most motivate you to quit & why they are important to you can help.
But even better is to see a doctor who prescribes the medications that have proven effective to help people quit and who uses the best current medications.
A combination of the antidepressant, known both as Welbutrin & Zyban, and some kind of temporary nicotine replacement has a decent track record in helping people quit -- better than quitting cold turkey only & MUCH more effective than gradual withdrawal.
And, the preliminary reports I read of recently suggests that the single drug Varenicline may be about twice that effective. Apparently it does what the Zyban does but enough more effectively that the nicotine replacement is no longer needed. So, not only does it work better, it avoids leaving some people addicted to the nicotine replacement.
So, here's my suggestion as a substitute.
If you smoke, get your homocysteine level checked with a simple blood test. If it's 9.0 or higher, smoking is already harming your heart & impairing your circulation as well as accelerating your rate of aging.
(Some people who smoke don’t get lung or other cancers it’s true. But EVERYONE who smokes hurts their heart & circulation. So, take this test so you know it’s already happening to you.)
If you smoke, it's virtually certain to be far higher than 9.0. Then you'll know for a fact with no guessing that smoking is already killing you.
Then list what reasons most motivate you to quit & why they are important to you.
Then make an appointment within the next 10 days to see a doctor experienced in helping people quit with drugs & then quit entirely as soon as you have been taking the drugs long enough. The doctor can advise you how long that is.
That works for many people. There are very sophisticated studies that prove it has a much better track record than quitting cold turkey.
And it takes less than a month to do.
It definitely works FAR more often than a gradual withdrawal method.
The only two people I saw succeed with the gradual withdrawal method were so highly motivated I think they could have easily quit cold turkey & done it much faster than the withdrawal method.
posted by David at 1:29 PM
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