The best method to stop smoking is to stop it abruptly, and stop it for good. Often it is difficult but most practical. Initially you will feel irritable, and be in a bad mood. You may even develop nausea and stomach upset. You may cough more than usual as your lungs would have to function without swirling smoke. Do not sit back and feel miserable. Go ahead do something which was not of a routine kind or go for a long walk, wash your car, look after your garden, fly a kite or just do one of the relaxing exercises.
When you get the craving for a smoke try an alternative like a cold glass of juice or a chewing gum. Reward yourself in small ways on each achievement. The craving for a cigarette will subside considerable after seven days. It takes from 6 months to one year to lose the craving completely. When you finally give up smoking, it will benefit you in many ways: your appetite will improve, your food will taste better, your complexion will be clearer, your breath will be sweeter and you will not inflict lethal smoke on your neighbours.
A few hints when you know you are smoking too much and find it difficult to give up. First, taper it down, cut the number of cigarette smoked per day, do not inhale deeply, smoke only half cigarettes and throw away the rest. Smoke cigarettes containing less tar. Changer over to pipe, cigar or hukka. It is less injurious. Getting to how levels of nicotine makes it easy to give up. The American Cancer society confirms that smokers of low nicotine brands are giving up at a rate higher that the other smokers (16 percent for men and 35 percent for women.) fix a target and decide upon a day when you will stop smoking completely.
Announce it to your friends and relations. The awareness that smoking is bad for health has come in a big way. Per capita consumption of cigarette has come down to the lowest level in most countries including the tobacco growing U.S. since 1957. Overall smoking in the U.S. had declined from 42 percent in 1965 to 32 percent in 1986.
Cigarette smoking is like a non-verbal communication. Refusing an offered cigarette may sometimes be taken as a slight. Smoking is supposed to help to eliminate slowly a negative feeling. It helps to cope with stress. You may be using cigarettes for stimulation or, may be, even for sedation or to go to sleep. It becomes a psychological need. Keep a diary, note you peak period when you have the greatest craving. This diary will help to tide over the difficult period.
If you have cut down on cigarettes, the craving will also reduce and when you stop it completely you will not face a great upheaval. In fact, many ex-smokers have mentioned that they hardly felt ill effect at all. Now they feel how easy it was: they feel more healthy and have a bigger zest for life. Physicians can play an important role in this. Most smoker claim that they will quit smoking if told to do so. It is an experience that at least one third will try to quit when told to do so. Unfortunately 2/3 of smokers have never been told my their physicians to quit the habit or stop it completely.
Relapse
Many among those who have give up, start smoking again due to stressful moments or while on a holiday. Do not fool yourself by imagining that you can begin by smoking one cigarette without getting hooked. Do not feel guilty if you have a relapse. You are not superhuman. Think of it as a temporary phase, an isolated event which you can put behind you. It is a matter of trying harder more sincerely and trying it all over again. This time you will succeed. A cigarette has been defined as a piece of paper at one end of which there is fire and at the other there is a fool.