If you’re a smoker, there will come a point in your life, and it may even be now, that you will seriously be thinking of quitting. There are any number of reasons why this may be. Perhaps you don’t cherish your lovely smoker’s cough. Perhaps you are becoming more concerned about your health. It doesn’t really matter. The fact is that we know what smoking does to us, how it is affecting our lives and that eventually, we need to stop. But actually moving forward with that plan is sometimes the hardest part.
With so many treatment options available, choosing the right one can seem like a daunting task. The easiest thing to do is to take a look at each option individually, make a list of the pros and cons, pertaining to each and try to determine which method will work best with your lifestyle. Once you have done your homework, it makes it easier to choose which method that that you feel will work for you.
The difficulty when I quit was that I had no idea as to which method of quitting was the right one for me. Therefore a quick visit to the doctor helped me determine which method was right for me, both in effectiveness and fewest side effects.
We discussed many of the methods available and their side effects, but we also focused a lot of the conversation on the psychological part of quitting as well, since for most people, including myself, that would be the most difficult part of quitting smoking.
Preparing yourself mentally to quit smoking is not something that I even considered. I always assumed that to quit smoking, you did just that – quit! Maybe go on a wild emotionally charged fit for a week or so when nobody wants to be around you and that’s it, you’re done. I hadn’t even thought about the fact that quitting would necessitate lifelong lifestyle changes.
So after the conversation with the doctor and after choosing the treatment method I was comfortable with, she told me to pick a quit day a couple of weeks out and use the time in between to prepare for my new smoke-free lifestyle. In those two weeks it became evident how much my life revolved around smoking and how much I wished to be rid of the habit. So I began to take positive steps like smoking outside; throwing out my ashtrays; and even cleaning my carpets, bedding and curtains.
Quitting smoking is very hard thing to do, anybody who has quit is quick to tell you that it has been one of the most difficult things that they have done within their life. It is also one of the most rewarding accomplishments that one will achieve by overcoming your addiction to nicotine, I will be the first one to tell you how hard it is but being able to walk past the store and not have to worry about if you have enough cigarettes for the night, is absolutely priceless.