The best thing you can do for yourself, your loved ones and those who live with you is to give up smoking. Wherever you live in the UK, you have easy access to a free service that’s proven to help you stop smoking. This is the NHS Stop Smoking Service, a national network of advisers who are trained to help you quit. They provide accurate information and advice on how to quit, and give you professional support during the first few weeks after you have stopped smoking.
Please check out the NHS online services that are available at:
www.nhs.uk/smokefree/help-and-advice/local-support-services-helplines
Top tips on how to quit
To begin with, establish your ‘quit date’. Make your deadline a few weeks ahead to help you create your positive mindset and organise our personal campaign, as follows …
- Let family and friends know that you’ll be giving up smoking on that date. That way you’ll get their help and support.
- Jot down specific reasons why you’re quitting and keep the list handy for later, when you need to fight the urge to smoke. Resisting these urges is the key but, if you persevere, these urges will become less frequent and gradually weaker.
- Write down when you smoke and the reason. This knowledge will help you understand the times and occasions when you are most vulnerable to the smoking urge.
- Consider aids that will help reduce your urges to smoke, such as nicotine patches or electronic cigarettes, also known as vapourisers. Such aids can be particularly useful if you have already tried to quit and relapsed.
- A day or so before your ‘quit deadline’, buy no more tobacco or cigarettes.
- When your ‘quit day’ arrives, dispose of any remaining cigarettes and associated smoking items such as lighters and ashtrays.
- After a couple of days, reward yourself by treating yourself with the money you’ve saved by not smoking.
- Aim to minimise any possible weight gain by eating a healthy diet (see pp.66-70).
- For the same reason, take regular exercise to help with weight control and stress control.
- During the ‘giving up’ process, try to avoid situations where others are smoking.
- Remind yourself frequently, ‘I am strong enough to do this.’
- If you relapse, set another quit date and use the knowledge you’ve gained first time around to help you succeed the second time.
You will know when you’ve succeeded because the urge to smoke will become so weak that you will have no problem passing through that moment, a moment that will finally vanish forever. At that point, you will begin to appreciate some of the immediate benefits: you will feel fitter; your sense of taste will be enhanced and you can enjoy a genuine sense of achievement.
Read more about quitting smoking
What about ‘vaping’?
‘Electronic cigarettes are proving more attractive to smokers than NRT [nicotine replacement therapy], while providing them with a safer alternative to cigarettes. There is evidence that they can be effective in helping smokers to quit and little evidence that they are being used by never smokers.’ This recent comment comes in a briefing report on electronic cigarettes from ASH (Action on Smoking and Health).
SEE ALSO: The benefits of E-Cigarettes
