There's no doubt about it, smoking is bad for us; endless health campaigns have spelt it out in no uncertain terms. Then there's the prohibitive cost, the hours spent shivering on the pavement outside non-smoking offices and bars, not to mention the damage we wreak on our looks (a long-term 40-year-old puffer could look up to 10 years older than her non-smoking sister). Yet still we fail to give up the evil weed – why?
Nicotine – fact and fiction
As the chief addictive component of tobacco, many people cite nicotine as the main reason for it being so hard to quit. Certainly, nicotine is highly addictive and can take anything from a few days to a few weeks to exit our systems. But if stopping smoking were as simple as combating nicotine withdrawal, anyone armed with a brace of the requisite patches and drug-enhanced gum would be able to stop more or less overnight.
No doubt about it, such aids will help with your physical cravings, but there's much more to what makes us smoke than mere physical addiction.
A long-term love affair
For many users, smoking is a ritual, a way of life; it's even – somewhat pathetically – a friend. But what kind of friend regularly robs you of your disposable income, makes you behave in antisocial ways and will ultimately inflict physical harm upon you? A not very good one, you'll agree.
Recognising this is the first step to breaking the bond – and the addiction. Whether you choose to use acupuncture, hypnotherapy, patches and gum, or good old-fashioned willpower in your quest, try taking a psychological approach to quitting rather than a purely physical one. Think of it as ditching a lousy long-term lover or the aforementioned dysfunctional friend. It's going to hurt to do it, but once you're out, you'll wonder what you ever saw in it in the first place.
The will to succeed
Many smokers will concede that, no matter how well intentioned, their desire to give up is thwarted by habit. And not just the act itself: for most of us smoking is bound up in daily rituals – the first fag of the day with the first day's coffee, using cigarettes as an excuse to get 10 minutes away from your desk. Then there are the social rituals – alcohol and cigarettes, for example, go (pardon the pun) hand in hand.
By keeping a diary over the course of a week you can discover the automatic triggers that make you want to smoke. And once you know what they are, altering them (avoiding smoky bars and pubs for the first few difficult weeks or switching your early-morning coffee to a fruity smoothie instead) can help to break your usual routine.
If at first you don't succeed…
Fear of failure is another common factor that prevents many smokers from trying to stop, particularly if you've lapsed once or more in the past. But procrastination and defeatism are the enemies of the trying-to-be ex-smoker. Remember, most people take at least three serious attempts before they finally call it quits for good. Stick in there and with the right determination you will (eventually) succeed.
Of course it's not going to be easy. But as anyone who's successfully managed it will tell you, the key to quitting is in taking control of the addiction rather than continuing to let it control you. Why not stop making excuses? It's a new year – how about deciding that this time, at last, it's also going to be a new you.
