As you are going through the denial-binge cycle and denying yourself from smoking, you stress level will continue to rise as you keep thinking about lighting up a cigarette over and over again.

 
Denial-Binge Cycle May Cause Depression

This may continue so much so that you may even develop or fall into depression. Take for example the chocolate illustration. When you decide not to eat chocolates at night, you may fall into temptation and eat even more chocolates at night.

Because of this, there is a pitfall of going back to the bad habit of eating chocolates at night and the entire process and cycle is repeated which also can make you feel like a failure.

Chances are this may already sound familiar to you. Also, the chances for this denial-binge cycle are more likely to happen if you just suddenly, at the spur of the moment decide to quit smoking without having to be prepared.

Being more prepared will lead to a high probability in succeeding to quit smoking.

 
The Early Stages Of Relapses

During the whole quitting process, there are certain periods of time that you will be more likely to succumb to relapses. This is more so during the early weeks and months as your body slowly adjusts to becoming a nonsmoker.

People who experience relapses are more likely to experience it during the first two months. During these months, your plan, determination and willpower will be greatly tested. Also, if relapses happen, you will also need time to learn and educate yourself on the type of situations that have caused you to smoke again.

You will also be able to gauge the situations you can handle and recognize the situations in which the temptation to smoke is just too much to bear.

 
Relapses Can Happen Even After A Few Years

Although relapses happen to smokers more in the early months, there is also a possibility of smoking again even years after you’ve given up the cigarettes. During your life, there may be some even that took place that can put you under extraordinary stress, ie: the death of a love one.

Before you realize it, your old methods of handling stress occur again and you will find yourself smoking again. Besides, all it takes is just one cigarettes for you to get hooked back into the habit.

When you continue on your journey, you will be better prepared to handle possible situations of relapses. You will learn what works and what doesn’t and will slowly form your own strategies to quit. The whole journey can be educational and you will be better equipped to quit smoking in the end.

A relapse is what happens when you smoke again after a period of time of not smoking. The question is how to you actually perceive a relapse? I personally believe almost all smokers will experience a relapse and it should also be viewed as a learning experience.

It is also an opportunity to find more about why did you pick up the cigarette again during that time. For example, you can learn about what are the triggers you should be watchful for or how to better position and have better preparation with your next attempt.

Actually, unless a relapse happens, it’s harder to gauge the real reason for you to smoke. The relapses play a part as stepping stones to the pathway of being smoke-free.

Now, a relapse does not mean that you have failed. The moment you have failed is the moment you decide that you don’t want to ever try to quit.

Relapse Causes

At time, you are able to predict that when you are about to smoke again. You may find yourself unusually thinking about smoking more often than normal.

The level of anxiety and irritation may also increase, so much so that the people around you may notice these changes and provide a feedback to you.

When you are able to recognize that a relapse is going to happen, you can often block the process.

Quit smoking studies have shown that smokers who have tried to quit experienced relapsed five or six times before entirely giving up smoking altogether.

There are some reasons for you to have a relapse.
1. Situation of stress
2. Unbearable cravings to smoke
3. Going through depression
4. Conditioned to smoke when you were in a situation, and you are in that situation again
5. Not prepared with a plan when facing stress.

The Denial-Binge Cycle

There is also another reason or cause of relapse happening. It’s called the denial-binge cycle. This starts when you suddenly changing your patterns of usage towards something or that when you deny yourself of having something.

Let’s say you want to stop eating chocolates at night to lose weight. The moment you decide so, the next phase of the cycle takes place by you developing extreme cravings for the chocolate that you have denied yourself.

As your cravings grow, you tend to think about consuming it more and more often.

If you went searching on how to quit smoking online, you will already have come across plenty of resources on ways and methods to quit smoking. Most of them actually states ways that actually are effective to quit smoking but it’s not universal.

This means that one method may work for one but may not work for another. It is also important to assess the methods that didn’t work. Not only that, you must also know what has made you to smoke again, in each situation and each circumstances.

Your Peers

One of the most stated reasons for failing to quit is the lack of support. Through hard time, you’ll find it extremely challenging if you don’t have family or friends to see you through.

Start by telling those peers in advance that you want to quit smoking. In this way, people are more conscious about your efforts and it will help to quit smoking easier.

Also, look at your peers around you before you attempted to quit smoking. Did any of your peers offered cigarettes to you?

If there’s anyone also told you don’t bother or express any doubts about your effort to quit smoking, please avoid them immediately. They could a factor as to why you failed to quit smoking.

At times, you may get quite moody and irritable that no one can stand being around you. If you have experienced that, you will be able to tell that these irritable moments are due to withdrawal symptoms.

Lack of Plan

One of the ways to combat the above is to plan ahead. Just suddenly deciding to entirely quit smoking may not be the smartest idea. This leaves you unprepared for challenges. The spur of the moment decision to quit may also result in higher chances for relapses.

Also, trying to quit when you are dealing with more than usual stress is a bad idea. For example, there may be some crisis such as a divorce, death of a family member, breakups, or getting laid off your job may be a bad timing to quit smoking.

The process of quitting smoking requires you to use a lot of energy. If you are using energy for these unusual stress, it’ll be better to hold on and wait for things to settle down to give up the cigarettes.

No Purpose

On top of that, the reasons and purposes to quit smoking are equally important. For example, if you had an unsuccessful attempt to quit, did you quit smoking for others? Or was it a personal decision for yourself upon a self realization?

The truth is nobody can quit smoking for you, only you can do it for yourself. If you have a strong purpose, it will hold as foundation to your willpower as challenges come.

Looking back at your attempts and let’s analyze what has seemed to work for you. At times, your attempts may have been just a short while, perhaps for months, weeks, days or even hours.

Just because you didn’t manage to quit permanently doesn’t mean that you have entirely failed or that you have wasted your time.

You can look what attempts that cause you to maintain smoke-free the longest and from there shape up a plan to quit smoking.

Your Support Groups

When you were trying to quit, did you have any support groups or friends that are willing to give their fill encouragement to you? This will be a great deal of help especially when things are tough and challenges get in the way.

Take for example, a friend may bear or have more little patience with you when they know you are more irritable when you are trying to quit smoking. But be careful as this may only work for a short while.

Your family is also another precious support group because they are the people you see every single day!

Their belief in your efforts to quit smoking may directly affect whether you succeed or not. In fact, their support is more important any of your friends or peers because you are most emotionally connected to them.

It would be great to get a partner and a friend to quit smoking with you. There are many people who want to quit smoking and chances are, it won’t be very hard to find them.

All you have to do is ask. Also, no one would understand better than someone who is trying to quit and going through the same challenges as you are.

The Methods You Tried

During the course of trying to quit smoking, did you try to use nicotine replacement products over the counter such as the nicotine patch of gums? Or have you tried medication like Bupropion?

If you did, how did these work out for you? Were they effective?

Have you tried to quit smoking via hypnosis? Were you able to not think about smoking anymore after your sessions?

Did you also try alternative methods such as herbs, acupuncture or any natural remedy?

Now what you can do is to look at what methods has helped you to go on not smoking the most time, you can then focus on the method most that helped you.

But the rule is that you start by focusing on only one method first, and then slowly move on to the others.

Most smokers who try to quit smoking will at least attempt a few tries before they are able to kick away the habit forever. Some of you may succeed in days and weeks, but some of you may only succeed after a few months and even sometimes, a few years.

I truly believe that smokers who make these quit smoking attempts for many times and not succeeded yet, are not prepared to quit smoking. They have not done any research on what it truly takes to quit smoking and are not well positioned both physically and mentally.

Of course, even the most successful ex-smokers will experiences relapses before quitting forever. But with proper preparation, when relapses happen, it will give you a good indication and help you to discover where you went wrong and to rethink your strategy for quitting.

Keep in mind even if relapses happen, you did not do anything wrong or that you’ve failed. It just means you’re not entirely ready at that point of time to quit. Besides just like anything in life, it’s hard to succeed during the first try.

There are a few questions below you can ask yourself during the course of quitting smoking.
How many times have you tried to quit smoking?
My guess is if you’re like any smoker, the number of times you’ve tried to quit is at least 3 times.

The good news is that if you’ve noticed the amount of time you go on without smoking, the period of time that you go on without smoking becomes longer. This indicates that your body is slowly adapting for it to be without cigarettes.

However, the amount of times you’ve quit is more important that the time you’ve remained smoke-free. Why is that so?

It is because each attempt creates an opportunity to bring you a step closer for you to quit smoking and achieve your goal.

Here are other questions that can help you to further reflect on your number of attempts to quit.

What is the longest time you can go on without having a cigarette?

Each time you attempt to quit, do you clearly know why you want to quit?

I hope you will ask these questions each time you attempt to quit smoking.

Smokers who have been smoking for quite some time will know what they will naturally develop a psychological dependence on cigarettes. Even if the body is not cravings for cigarettes at a point in time, the mind may.

Slowly but surely, you will turn to smoking as a friend. Through challenges, stress and even good times, you’ll find yourself smoking more and more.

In fact, any time you are facing any emotions at all, you think that smoking can help. This becomes your psychological support which just comes with detrimental effects, both physically and psychologically.

Plus, the false effect of nicotine that helps you to ‘relax’ only further gives you the illusion and further reason to turn to cigarettes for comfort.

In Order To Beat Cravings Better

Thus, your challenge is not only to deal with the withdrawal symptoms of quitting but also to deal and handle the way you deal with emotions. In order to beat cravings, you must first think of ways to handle your negative emotions and stress without cigarettes first.

When you do that, you are in a better position to quit smoking because you will be able to focus on just battling the physical aspect of quitting smoking.

Realize that you are not the only one that is going through this challenge, though it may seem overwhelming at first.

Millions of ex-smokers around the world have also battled and emerge victorious from the battle you are about to step into.

Now it’s time to collect some data of yourself on your own. This will help you to get an objective account of your situation.

1. How many cigarettes do you smoke a day?

2. Which time of the day do you smoke the most?

3. How many cigarettes do you smoke are a result of habit?

4. When you are alone, how many cigarettes do you smoke?

5. How do you feel each time before you smoke?

6. Which activity and which time of the day you find it most difficult to quit?

Please answer the questions above honestly, this will help you to really understand better about your own situation and to why you smoke. It will also help you to understand better what it takes to help you to quit.

When it comes to addiction, some people may naturally think that it only applies to drugs such as heroin or cocaine. It wouldn’t be surprising if you hear some people actually saying that they are not addicted to cigarettes at all and as if they can quit at will.

Unfortunately, the reality is that as much as some would not want to admit that they are addicted to cigarettes, studies have shown that nicotine is indeed more addictive than heroin.

Nicotine is the main substance in cigarettes that makes you addicted that wanting to smoke more and more. Even in small substantial amounts, nicotine can be lethal. Just a drop of pure nicotine on your skin could end up killing you.

When you start smoking a cigarette, it will only take seven seconds for the nicotine to reach your brain. What you may not know is that is actually faster than nicotine being injected into your veins.

The fact that nicotine can reach your brain cells so quickly is what also makes it so addictive. Did you also know that millions of dollars have been spent on research to ensure cigarettes are design in a way to most effectively deliver nicotine to your body?

Once nicotine is in your brain, it will make you ‘feel’ good by stimulating certain parts of your brain cells. The more you feed your brain to nicotine, the more your brain will be used to it. The sudden lack of nicotine fed to your brain will make your brain crave for it, and hence the whole feeling of addiction.

The relaxation effect comes from satisfying your addiction rather than actually relaxing it, giving the false feeling that cigarettes actually help you to reduce stress! The truth is it certainly doesn’t!

What’s more dangerous is that your brain will get more used and used to it, resulting in even greater feeding nicotine and you ending up smoking more and more! That’s why most smokers who start with few cigarettes a day can end up with more than 2 packs a day.

Quitting smoking can be one the biggest challenges in life that you may have to face once you decide to quit smoking. But the great thing is that once you are able to do this, you’ve programmed your mind to be able to do greater things in life. There are a few stages of quitting smoking.

By looking at these stages, it’ll help you figure whether you’re ready to quit smoking or not. Basically, there are 6 stages of quitting smoking. People who want to quit will have to go through these six stages.

 
Stage 1: Pre-Contemplation
During this first stage, the smoker has no desire or whatsoever to quit smoking. There is not even an inch of thought of giving up cigarettes. The only thing that matters is to enjoy cigarette smoking. Well, what may be surprising is that only a small fraction of people feel this way and I’m sure you don’t. If not, you won’t be reading this at all.

 
Stage 2: Contemplation
During this second stage, the person is actually thinking about quitting smoking. Though the person may not be entirely prepared, but he or she may be considering even the effects of smoking or what how will it feel to be smoke-free. At least all smokers will come to this stage.

 
Stage 3: Preparation
Now, the person is starting to take action to do something rather than just thinking about it. He or she may start with just cutting down the number of cigarettes or just switching brand or type of cigarettes to lighter ones. There is a motivation and desire to stick to quitting and also some plan to stop.

 
Stage 4: Action
During stage 4, the individual is trying very hard not to smoke. There is a strong conscience and motivated and purpose for not smoking. With that in mind, the individual also is dealing the problem, withdrawal symptoms both physically and psychologically. This may be a challenge and serious help is needed for much better chances of quitting.

 
Stage 5: Maintenance
During maintenance, the individual has succeeded in not smoking for a brief period of time approximately 6 months of more. The person will become more and more relaxed and used to not smoking. Though there will be some challenges, this will put the person’s determination to the test.

 
Stage 6: Relapse
During this stage, the person has gone back to smoking after awhile can this can be extremely dangerous for some people because this can be very damaging to the willpower. The individual may feel that they have failed and they can’t quit smoking. The truth of that matter is that this is a very common thing that most smokers face and it may take several successful tries to quit smoking for good.

Perhaps you may know that quitting smoking brings great benefits but you may be not be aware how much it brings much benefit and greatly improve your life and health despite the amount of years you’ve been smoking.

So it doesn’t matter whether you’ve been smoking for 1, 3, 10, or 30 years. Your body will experience healing as soon as you cease to smoke. In facts your body will start to heal by itself as soon as you stop smoking for the last 20 minutes.

Below is the breakdown of the benefits that you will experience after you’ve stop smoking.

Time after You’ve Stopped Smoking and Benefits Your Body Will Experience

20 Minutes – Pulse rate and blood pressure returns to normal.

8 Hours – The level of carbon monoxide in your body drops and the level of oxygen in your blood increases.

24 Hours – Chance of heart attack reduces.

48 Hours – Nerve endings regenerates and food smells and tastes better.

72 Hours – Breathing becomes easier as bronchial tubes relax.

2 Weeks to 3 Months – Decrease of tiredness, shortness of breath, coughing, congestion, energy increases and walking and exercising becomes easier.

1 Month to 9 Months – Cilia in the lungs regenerates. Reduction in the shortness of breath.

1 Year – Risk of heart disease decrease by 50% compared to a smoker.

5 Years – Risk of lung cancer decrease by 50%.

10 Years to 15 Years – Regeneration and replacement of pre-cancerous cells. Same health risks of a non-smoker.

Other Benefits of Quit Smoking

More than just health, quitting smoking includes other benefits as well. I’d say that regaining control of your life would be the main one. On top of that you’ll definitely save a bulk of cash and setting a better example to your family and your community.

Ask any ex-smoker about their journey and their benefits and it’s not surprising that you may them say they have a sense of pride and accomplishment, being more positive and productive at work, improved appetite, having better relationships with people, increased energy levels, better appearance, better attraction and the list goes on.

Here’s what you can do, come up with a list of reasons to quit smoking. Think for a moment. What are all the possible benefits, including short term and long term benefits you will experience when you decide to quit smoking.

The more detailed and specific, the better. Include how you feel about yourself and how you will feel if you’ve succeeded to quit smoking. The clearer you are about your reason, the more focus you will be about quitting.

The simple fact is that you know smoking is not good for you. In fact, nobody has to tell you to quit; you know you ought to quit. The irony is that when more people tell you to quit, you naturally want to quit less.

The truth is that nobody can force you, make you quit and chances are you have already tried more than once to quit. Let me guess, did you smoke the ‘just one’ cigarette?

Before you knew it, you probably started at ground zero again. This cycle can go on and on and many smokers would give up or at least, for a period of time.

Now, if you’re thinking about quitting again. You have definitely made the right choice by not giving up. Besides, did you know that most ex-smokers tried to quit an average for five times before they truly give up the habit?

Tobacco and Its Health Effects

The reason why people who care about you ask you to quit smoking is because they know smoking is bad for your health. Thought it may be irritating at times, you know that they have a point.

I mean of course sure, being pestered all the time is not healthy either but, cigarettes is the number most preventable cause of death in the world and is also the leading cause of illness and death in many other countries.

Emphysema – an abnormal accumulation of air in tissues can damage the air sacs in your lungs, which is difficult for oxygen to be released into the bloodstream from the lungs. On the other hand, chronic bronchitis causes inflammation and irritation to the air ways of your lungs due to cigarette smoking.

Affecting Others with Your Smoking

It’s also not news that people around smokers suffers detrimental effects of smoking from inhaling your smoke.

Secondhand smoke causes many illnesses such as chronic bronchitis, heart disease, asthma and cancer. More than 100,000 people die worldwide because of secondhand smoke.

What’s surprising is that smoke of those who smokes questions whether secondhand smoke brings illness and it may be a lies by public groups who are anti-smokers.

However, many evidence and facts have proofed that secondhand smoke does kills. So make the right choice today by deciding to quit for once and for all.