How To Help Your Husband Quit Smoking
If someone you know is trying to quit smoking, he will need help from friends, family, and even colleagues. If you wish, you can do a lot to help a person give up cigarettes.
Smoking is a serious addiction that is difficult to cope with. Already after 7-10 seconds after the first tightening, nicotine penetrates the brain, where it provokes the release of the hormone dopamine – a source of pleasure. Getting on such a dopamine hook, day after day a person becomes addicted. And no horror stories about lung cancer, impotence and other terrible consequences of smoking on such a person, alas, do not work.
Besides, some studies indicate that a person can quit smoking, on average, with only seven attempts! This means that a person who quits smoking needs support like no one else. After all, he is one-on-one facing two sides of nicotine addiction: mental dependence, which can be handled by the attention and support of loved ones, as well as the physical – here a person can turn to pharmacological support for help.
How to stop smoking with an electronic cigarette? You are bored with other ways that do not work, nicotine chewing gum, from which you hiccup, patches with nicotine and strange inhalers that do not give you enough effect that you get after the first puff of a “real” cigarette. Allen Carr’s book helped me, but after five months I lit it again.
If a person close to you decided to fight with nicotine addiction, then you simply must help him with this. But be careful. Cries and reproaches can only exacerbate the problem, and a person can finally give up.
Quitting smoking with the help of electronic cigarettes is very simple, and this is the process of weaning ourselves from nicotine addiction by fighting physical dependence on nicotine (nicotine addiction). You have two ways with an e-cig (read more here):
1. Reduce the level of nicotine or to the minimum and continue to smoke without giving up the habit.
2. Smoke less and less, and then quit at all
The Case Against Quitting Cold Turkey
What can you do if you want to help your husband quit smoking?
With a person who is trying to quit smoking, spend as much time as possible. Perhaps you will go in for sports together or decide to travel. However, try to behave as naturally as possible, as if someone close to you had never smoked before, and this problem does not exist.
Be patient! Be prepared for the fact that perhaps the first pancake will be a lump, and the attempt will have to be repeated. Make it clear to a loved one that he is doing a great thing, and the decision to quit smoking is the right step on the path to health. However, do not overdo it, and leave the ball on the side of the smoking field. It is essential that the smoker independently came to such a decision.
You can buy him an e-cig vaporizer and try to quit with the help of it.
Tell a loved one that while quitting smoking is better to give up alcohol, and to reduce the consumption of coffee and tea, it is better to drink decaffeinated coffee, water, fruit juice.
Listen to a loved one. This advice may seem obvious, but it is important when you seek to support a person who is struggling with smoking. If you try to understand all his fears and experiences, you can better understand the situation. Also, he will be able to share with you his problems and less resist the temptation to pick up a cigarette.
If the nicotine addiction is too strong, it can be pacified with a nicotine patch, which reduces withdrawal symptoms in the first days and weeks of failure. Gradually, it is better to discard the patch, a week or two after you quit smoking. The desire to smoke goes to 4-6 months without cigarettes. And after 10-12 months, the smell of tobacco smoke does not cause any emotions, except disgust.
Try to get better acquainted with the problem. Understanding why it is important for your loved one to quit, and the right advice can significantly help him. The trick is that in order to quit smoking using an e-cigarette, you have to do everything gradually and even slower.
Do not always talk about quitting smoking. It will be difficult to refrain from constant talk about smoking control, but they can lead to the opposite result. The smoker may feel anxious, and he will have a desire to smoke. Constant talk about smoking can annoy a smoker. Instead of discussing this issue, find more positive and inspirational topics for conversation.
Come up with fun. You can help a loved one quit smoking if you try to distract him from his thoughts about smoking. It will bring him real benefits, and he will not think about the burden on cigarettes. You can think of something simple: drink a cup of tea, read an interesting article from a magazine, or take a walk with a dog.
Come up with prizes for achieving goals. Encouraging good results can help combat smoking. It may be worthwhile to come up with a list of goals and rewards for achieving them. At the same time for each next goal achieved the smoker will receive a more valuable prize. After a week of abstaining from cigarettes, you can give him movie tickets, and a month – a message subscription. And for quitting smoking throughout the year, he can win dinner at an expensive restaurant.
Do not let him surrender. Do not criticize if your loved one breaks down and smokes a cigarette. Instead of getting angry and saddening him (he probably feels guilty already), offer help and help him back on the right path.
About the author: Christina Matthews, the journalist who studies the latest news in the health industry. Now she studies the effects of smoking and vaping on health and reasons for such its popularity.