All addictions start out as something you were trying out, something you always wanted to do. You try it out once and then twice and before you know it, you are hooked to it. It stops being something you like doing, it becomes a habit and then an addiction. Statistically, someone who at the time was not even a smoker but grew up around one introduced most people to cigarette smoking.
This means that they were curious but needed company to fulfill this curiosity, and they found you and coaxed or persuaded you to smoke one with them. You chocked more than once but curiosity got the best of you and you decided to try it out until you got it right. This is the story of people who started smoking as early as ten starts and became lifelong addicts. It is almost impossible to picture a ten-year-old child smoking but the truth of the matter is today, these images are becoming more and more common-place.
How then does one “graduate” from a habitual smoker to an addict? The following are the reasons why you wake up with a hankering:
- Nicotine
Nicotine is a chemical that reacts in the body by stimulating the brain, increasing the body blood pressure, and speeding up the heart. Too much of it can lead to brain damage and contact with nicotine liquid leads to instant death due to nicotine poisoning. Even more worrying about nicotine is the fact that it can be used as a pesticide, kindly bear in mind it is something people ingest while smoking.
Nicotine in cigarettes is found in small doses that increase the heart rate and blood pressure in minimal levels. However, it leads to the production of dopamine in high quantity to give the body a high similar to that experienced during sexual intercourse. The problem however, is that the body gets used to this high and the brain depends on the nicotine to be able to produce dopamine. This dependence leads to withdrawal symptoms when you quit smoking or miss your normal fix due to unforeseen circumstances. That is when people become cranky and moody because dopamine has a calming effect on the body.
Exposure to nicotine at a young age increases the chances of the adolescent to abuse drugs and other substances. Some people who have quit successfully can tell you how hard that road it, in fact many are now advising people to embraced the electronic cigarette which have no nicotine or addictive and harmful products.
- Tar
After two long puffs, you will be in a position to look at your cigarette and see an ugly stain on your filter. This is not saliva; it is the tar that has been trapped on the filter. This tar is found or formed when you burn tobacco or other plants such as marijuana. Unlike nicotine, tar is not addictive; however, the chemicals contained in it are destructive to the lungs and play a major part in browning and blackening the teeth. It destroys the lungs by killing alveoli leading to less oxygen in the lungs and the whole body. That is why smokers cannot run for long.
- Oral fixation
The oral fixation occurs because of the lip getting used to hold on to something. Psychologically the lip develops a sort of dependence on having something on it. This is the same for muscle on the body, that is why you feel like your and is lighter when you do not wear your watch on a certain day, or when you forget your phone. This fixation can be treated in two ways by getting a substitute in for of food, mainly salty junk food such as potato chips and peanuts. The other way is by use of an electronic cigarette to replace and cure oral fixation but also dependence on nicotine as earlier discussed.
Smoking is a bad habit that translates into a lifelong addiction that is almost impossible to break. Those who eventually quit know how easy it is to be entangled into cigarette smoking. To help people get over smoking, players in the industry came up with several therapies such as the nicotine patch and counseling, which worked for some people but not for all.
The e-cig, however, could be on the verge of becoming a revolution with its ability to cure cigarette smoking by replacement therapy where the electronic cigarette replaces the tobacco cigarette. It provides the same high nicotine provide, it is not addictive, cures the oral fixation and is cheaper compared to the number of packs you would smoke every day.
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License: Creative Commons image source- License: Creative Commons image source
Jodie is a blogger and a firm advocate of not smoking tobacco cigarettes, having lost her parents to lung cancer. She recommends anyone who wants to switch up their smoke by looking at electronic cigarette maker Optima cigs for more information.
