If you are currently a smoker, it may be hard to imagine a time when you didn’t smoke at all, and harder still to think of a time when you will be finally rid of your vice and be able to include yourself in the ranks of ex-smokers. While it is certainly not an easy task to drop the habit for good, the numerous obstacles that stand in your way are certainly worth going through if you want to be able to love the quality of life that you deserve. As if you needed any more reasons why you should quit, we present here a few of the things that you could look forward to as ex-smokers…

No more stinky breath, clothes or hair. Smokers smell bad, it’s as simple as that. No matter how expensive your cologne is, how freshly laundered your clothes are, or how recently you washed your hair, you will have a smoker’s scent on you. It may not be apparent to you–considering your less than optimal sense of smell–but non-smokers will be able to pick it up.

More money in your pocket. Smoking is expensive. If only for that reason alone, no one should want to take up smoking at all! Think of how much a pack of cigarettes costs, then multiply that by the number of packs that you smoke in a day, in a week, in a month, and in a year. That should give you a pretty good idea of just how much your habit is costing you, and that is only in terms of cigarette costs alone. Far more alarming is what smoking costs you in the long run, and the numerous doctors visits, the missed days at work due to illness, and the treatment costs when you get one of the dreaded diseases associated with smoking, can add up to a substantial amount of money indeed.

Lessening the risk of disease and illness. This is perhaps the most compelling reason to be ex-smokers. The health risks associated with smoking are significant and life threatening, and they include various types of cancers, coronary heart disease, and numerous other health conditions that doctors are only beginning to discover. Quitting smoking now will greatly reduce your chances of falling prey to these diseases, so it would really be in your best interests to be ex-smokers.

In the forty years or so since the Surgeon General’s groundbreaking report on the health effects of smoking, smoking is surprisingly still the main preventable cause of death in the United States. Numerous lives and taxpayers’ dollars are still lost as a result of this damaging and life-threatening habit.

A newer report was released by the Surgeon General recently, in which the “harmful” health effects of smoking was illustrated in greater detail, with particular focus given on the effect of smoking on the various organs in the body. This report served to further emphasize the need to continue global smoking prevention campaigns.

While there has undoubtedly been a lot of progress made with regard to educating people on the harmful links between smoking and health, there still remains a lot of work to be done.

In the newest report released by the Surgeon General on health effects of smoking, a number of new discoveries were announced, among them:

• Smoking can cause people to develop cancer in parts of the body that have not previously been tied in with smoking. These include the kidney, the cervix, and the bone marrow.

• Smoking has a detrimental effect on general health. The adverse health effects of smoking can be passed down from mother to child, they can manifest themselves before birth and last throughout the life of the child.

• Smoking can cause people to develop cataracts, and it may contribute to osteoporosis, which can subsequently increase an older person’s risk of getting a fracture.

• In the years between 1995 and 1999, smoking was the cause of more than 440,000 deaths in the United States every year. This figure represents a 13.2 year reduction of life in male smokers, and a 14.5 year reduction in female smokers.

• The recent efforts of cigarette companies to reduce the amount of tar and nicotine in their products have not resulted in any appreciable benefits in terms of smoking and health.

Based on the results of this 2004 report, a number of conclusions were made, among them:

• Smoking is potentially damaging to almost every bodily organ, it can cause the development of many diseases, and the general health of smokers is impaired.

• Quitting Cigarettes now will bring a number of immediate and long-term benefits to health, greatly reduce the potential risks for incurring smoking-related diseases, and causing a general improvement in health.

• Switching to cigarettes that have lower levels of tar and nicotine will not provide any noticeable advantages with regard to smoking and health.

• Among the other disease that were not previously attributable to smoking but now are, are abdominal aortic aneurysm, cataract, cervical cancer, acute myeloid leukemia, kidney cancer, pneumonia, periodontitis, stomach cancer, and pancreatic cancer. This new list only adds to the list of diseases already known to be the result of smoking such as cancers of the bladder, esophagus, larynx, lungs, oral cavity, and throat, chronic lung disease, coronary heart disease, cardiovascular disease, and the reproductive damage, and sudden infant death syndrome.

There are many different ways by which people manage to successfully quit cigarettes, although there are quite a few tips that can be helpful to anyone.

Believe in your ability to quit. Far too many people give up on quitting shortly after they have started simply because they feel that making an effort is futile and that they are bound to live out the rest of their lives as smokers. Keep in mind that you can get rid of any habit that you weren’t born with and smoking is no different.

Formulate a plan for quitting cigarettes

This part of the process will give you an opportunity to tailor your quitting program to suit your own circumstances. Not everyone quits in the same manner, and you will stand a better chance of success if you formulate a plan that takes your needs into consideration.

Write down the reasons why you should quit smoking

These should be something you believe to be true, and can include everything from prolonging your life and improving its quality, to saving money and preventing your children from taking up the habit as well. Writing all of these reasons down on paper will give you a set of daily reminders that will keep you on track.

Ask help from your family and friends

Let them know that you are in for a tough time and that you will need all the support you can get. Now may also be a good time to apologize in advance for the irritability and mood swings that you will no doubt subject them to!

Set a date for quitting

Decide on a day that you will put your cigarettes down for good and plan for that event. Let your friends know about your quit date and make sure that you remember it. After all, it is not everyday that you get to start your life all over again.

Consult with your doctor

Aside from being able to help you formulate an effective quitting program, your doctor may be able to get you through the tough times ahead with a lot less stress.

It is alarming to note that as many as 100,000 children all over the world begin smoking daily. In fact, as many as 25% of all children in the Western Pacific Region will die from smoking related causes in the future.

If you need a pressing quit smoking statistics to help wean yourself off a life threatening habit, you have come to the right place. Here we present you with a list of statistics that may just convince you to drop that deadly habit for good…

Smoking Statistics

• As many as one in three adult males all over the world smoke.
• Smoking is the cause of death in as many as one out of 10 adults all over the world. If present trends continue, this number will escalate to one in six adults by 2030.
• Smoking causes a death every eight seconds.
• The number of people that smoke in developing countries is increasing, while there is a noticeable decline in the number of smokers in developed countries.
• More than 15 billion cigarettes are sold every day, with 10 million being sold every minute.
• Smoking has killed 12 times more British people than World War II.
• Cigarette smoking has caused over 20% of all American deaths.
• East Asia and the Pacific region have the highest number of smokers in the world, with as many as 2 out of 3 adult males smoking.
• More than 30% of all cigarettes consumed worldwide are in the Western Pacific Region.

Smoking among the youth

• More than 20% of all teenagers aged 13 to 15 all over the world currently smoke.
• As many as 100,000 children all over the world start smoking daily, with approximately half that number living in Asia.
• Studies have shown that teenagers that take up smoking will continue to smoke for the next 15 to 20 years.
• Studies have shown that most teenagers are influenced by tobacco related advertising.
• More than 25% of all youth from the Western Pacific Region will die from smoking related causes.

Health

• 50% of all long-term smokers will die from smoking.
• Each cigarette can decrease a smoker’s life expectancy by as much as five minutes.
• Smoking is the main preventable cause of disease and early death.
• Smoking is a primary cause of heart disease, stroke and chronic lung disease.
• Smoking can cause lung, larynx, esophageal, mouth, and bladder cancer, and it has also been linked to cancers of the cervix, the pancreas, and the kidneys.
• Cigarette smoke contains over 4,000 carcinogens.
• A survey conducted in Great Britain showed that almost 99% of women respondents were unaware of the role that smoking plays in contracting cervical cancer.
• A survey conducted in China showed that 60% of adult respondents were unaware that smoking can cause lung cancer, and 96% did not know that it could cause heart disease.
• More than 25% all heart disease deaths are caused by smoking.
• More than 75% of chronic bronchitis cases all over the world are caused by smoking.

If you are ready to giving up smoking for good, congratulations on your decision! Smoking is an undeniably health damaging habit that can ruin your entire life…

Preparing to quit

• Set a definite date for when you will quit smoking. You may want to have a friend quit at the same date to make it easier for you to quit smoking.

• Keep track of the times and the reasons that you smoke. Pinpoint specific activities that you do while smoking, such as drinking coffee or driving.

• Change your smoking habits. You can start by simply keeping your cigarettes somewhere else or even just smoking with the other hand. You could also try smoking without doing anything else at the same time, and think about the physical sensations that smoking gives you.

• Limit the areas where you smoke. If you are used to smoking in your study for example, you may want to try smoking only outdoors.

• Stifle the urge to smoke even if only for a few minutes. This will get you started smoking less, and you can tale your mind off your need to smoke by chewing gum or drinking water instead.

• Limit your cigarette buying. You could start by buying only one pack at a time at first, and you may even switch to a brand that you wouldn’t normally smoke.

On the day you give up cigarettes

• Throw out any cigarettes you have left, and stow away everything that you use for and while smoking such as your lighter and your ashtrays.

• Change your smoking-related routines. Drink your coffee, eat breakfast, or read the paper somewhere else for example. And when you begin to feel the urge to smoke, find something else to do instead.

• Replace your oral fixation with cigarettes. You could start chewing gum or sucking on hard candies, or you could even carry toothpicks around.

• Reward yourself for your willpower to give up cigarettes with a movie or a good meal.

Giving up smoking for the long term

• Don’t worry about new physical sensations that come as a result of your move to give up cigarettes. You will likely feel sleepier, get hungry more often and even become short-tempered.

• Start exercising. Not only will this take your mind off cigarettes, it will also generally make you healthier.

• Focus on the positive aspects of your decision to give up cigarettes. Think about how healthy you are becoming everyday, how good an example you are setting for your family, and how much better you feel about yourself for being able to give up cigarettes. It is these positive thoughts that will help you stay off cigarettes for good.

• Resist the urge to smoke when you feel stressed or tense. These are the periods when you tend to smoke in the past, and you should try to overcome them by telling yourself that smoking won’t make things any easier.

Don’t worry about relapsing. Almost every smoker tries to quit several times before they manage to giving up smoking for good. Quit again the next day and things will get easier and easier.

Few habits are as addictive and as potentially life threatening as smoking. Nicotine addiction is one of the hardest addictions to cure, and many of the people that are in the grips of it can struggle for several years before finally being able to quit the habit for good. In spite of all this, it is alarming how many people still start the habit today. It is one thing to be addicted to smoking and yet another to willingly take up a habit that has been proven time and time again to be potentially lethal.

Of course once you are already addicted to nicotine, it can be quite a challenge to wean yourself off the substance. Smoking results in a number of physical reactions that a smoker will crave for soon after the last cigarette has been put out. In fact, it is the withdrawal smoking symptoms that come from smoking cessation that make it so hard for many smokers to quit in the first place.

In spite of the inherent difficulty in quitting the habit however, there are a number of stop smoking benefits that are undeniable. For one thing, your sense of taste and smell which have been ravaged over the course of many years of smoking will come back surprisingly quickly, and you will be able to smell and taste food like you haven’t been able to do so for many years.

You will also experience a considerable improvement in the smell of your breath. Let’s face it, no one likes the smell of a smoker’s breath–fellow smokers included–and quitting smoking will give you the benefit of more confidence to get close.

Smoking will also benefit you socially in more ways than one. You may have noticed that smokers are being treated with more and more distaste and even contempt as the years past. And as seemingly unfair and discriminatory as this is, you will largely be able to avoid it by quitting smoking.

Quitting smoking obviously has a number of beneficial effects on your health as well. Numerous diseases have been tied in with smoking, and scientific research conclusively points to links between several deadly diseases and smoking. Lung and other forms of cancer, heart disease, respiratory diseases…the risk of getting all these and more can be greatly reduced by quitting smoking at the soonest possible time.

Making the decision to stop smoking is quite possibly the best thing you could do if you are already in the unfortunate position of being a smoker. It will not come easy however, and you will need all the help you can get in order to succeed. The following stop smoking tips may be useful to you, and they may help you get on the road to dropping the habit for good…

• Draw up a list of why you want to quit smoking. All your good intentions will have a greater chance of succeeding if you have a clear set of goals in mind, and drawing up a list will help you stay on track.

• Decide on a quit date and stick to it. This may be the single hardest stop smoking tip to follow but it is a tremendously important first step. While some people may be tempted to cut down their cigarette consumption gradually, numerous researches have shown that most people simply tend to smoke more of each single cigarette, keeping their nicotine levels at the same level as if they have not reduced their consumption.

• Inform friends and family of your decision to quit. This will automatically give you a support network that may be able to help you in your most trying times. In addition, friends and family members that continue to smoke will hopefully avoid smoking around you, thereby reducing the chances of you being tempted enough to start smoking all over again.

• Throw away everything related to smoking. This goes for ashtrays, lighters, and cigarettes obviously.

• Be prepared for withdrawal smoking symptoms. The most common symptoms associated with nicotine withdrawal are nausea, headaches, tension, stress, irritability, cravings for food as well as cigarettes, and a general feeling of illness. You will probably experience one or more of these symptoms and you will simply have to ride them out. The good news is that most of them will ease up after 12 to 24 hours of quitting, and they should disappear completely after 2 to 4 weeks.

• Steer clear of places and situations that will tempt you to smoke. Most people associate smoking with drinking alcohol, so if you are such a person, it may be a good idea to stay away from drinking during the first few weeks of your quit date. You may also want to avoid drinking tea or coffee if you normally drink such beverages while smoking.

• Focus on one day at a time. You should consider every single day that you manage to keep off cigarettes as a success. Every time you are tempted to smoke, look at how far you have gone and convince yourself that smoking again will put all of those days to waste.

• Don’t be too hard on yourself if you relapse. No one is perfect and smoking is one of the hardest habits to break. Use a relapse as an opportunity to examine the reasons for smoking again, and figure out a way to deal with such situations better in the future.

With the numerous dangers associated with smoking, there is clear evidence that quitting the habit today will greatly improve the quality of your life as well as increase your life expectancy. With that being said however, there are both positive and negative effects quitting smoking, and you should be aware of them in order to prepare yourself for what may occur as well as to increase your chances of success…

Positive effects quitting smoking
After only a few days of quitting smoking, you will feel a lot better than you have since you started smoking. This is largely due to the increased level of oxygen in your blood, the improvement of the function of your lungs, and a general improvement in your fitness level. One thing is almost certain, and that is you will breathe much more easily, since your lungs will work better.

In as little as a few hours after you have had your last cigarette, you will also experience a noticeable improvement in your sense of smell and taste. After a few days of not smoking, your these senses will improve even further, coming close to their normal levels.

More significant positive effects quitting smoking is that your risk of getting a heart attack will get lower with each day that you continue to be free of cigarettes. You will also avoid many of circulatory problems associated with smoking. Your stamina will return to normal levels, and you will even begin to sleep better, waking up feeling more refreshed and energized.

Negative effects quitting smoking
On the downside, quitting smoking will cause a drop in your blood sugar levels. This will cause a number of ill effects as your body struggles to compensate for the changes it is undergoing. Fortunately, you can reduce the discomfort you are feeling by increasing the amount of fluid that you consume, as well as drinking freshly squeezed fruit juice at regular intervals throughout the day. This will help you maintain proper blood sugar levels.

Common negative effects quitting smoking are feelings of irritation and short temper that so many quitters go through. Some ex-smokers also tend to feel more tense, and some may even feel giddy or quite sick. There is a bit of good news in all this however, and that is these symptoms generally last for only a short time.

Many would be quitters also have trouble falling asleep at night, although they may be unusually sleepy during the day. Waking up several times during the night is also a common occurrence, and many people that suffer from these symptoms also have trouble concentrating and maintaining mental focus.

In spite of the many negative effects quitting smoking, the benefits that will result are undoubtedly far weightier in the grand scheme of things. Bo good will come out of continuing to smoke, not two ways about it, and overcoming these initial hurdles will be an effort that will continue to pay off for a long time to come.

Anyone who is planning to give up smoking is in for a very challenging task that will likely result in numerous failed attempts before the habit is finally dropped for good. Nicotine addiction is definitely one of the hardest things to be cured of, and any smoker that has tried to quit will normally go through a number of withdrawal symptoms that make the task that much more challenging.

Nicotine affects the body in numerous complex ways. The initial hit or puff off a cigarette instantly sends signals to the pleasure sensors of the brain, causing the smoker to become more alert and at ease. The problem is that these sensors develop a resistance to the nicotine sensations over time, and the pleasurable feeling that was once felt with a single cigarette requires more and more amounts of nicotine in order to be felt. The pleasurable sensations also disappear quite quickly, leaving the smoker feeling down, less energized…and craving for another cigarette. It is a vicious cycle that has caused millions of people to be hopelessly addicted for many years.

As mentioned earlier, withdrawal smoking effects are some of the hardest things that a would-be smoker has to deal with. Soon after the last cigarette is smoked, the body starts to feel the lack of nicotine and struggles to cope. It is pretty much like a sugar rush, in which the initial burst of energy quickly dissipates, leaving the body starved for more of the substance that caused the reaction in the first place.

When you give up smoking, some of the withdrawal smoking effects you are likely to experience are depression, insomnia, nausea, craving for foods (especially sweets), irritability, and perhaps even a general feeling of illness. While insomnia or nighttime sleeplessness is a common symptom, you may also conversely feel an overpowering urge to sleep during the day.

As for the food cravings associated with smoking withdrawal, many would be quitters attempt to rectify this by eating. With sweets being the most common food crutch of smoking quitters, this can create an excess of food consumption, which so often leads to obesity. This is the primary reason why so many quitters gain weight shortly after quitting smoking.

How do you deal with withdrawal smoking effects? There is no easy way to do that in most cases, and you will simply have to grin and bear it while the craving for nicotine leaves your system. However, you can help the process along somewhat by drinking plenty of water, getting lots of rest and exercise, and possibly sucking on hard candies to help you deal with the oral fixation associated with a smoking habit.

The basic fact of the matter is that smoking benefits no one, and it can actually cause harm to other people just as much as it does to the smoker. As if you needed any more reasons to quit, here are a few facts about smoking that may just cause you to drop the habit for good…

• The main active ingredient in cigarette smoke is nicotine, which is one of the most addictive substances known to man.

• Smoking causes over 400,000 deaths in the United States alone each year, with lung cancer being one of the main smoking related diseases.

• Smoking is also harmful to people around you. This includes members of your family, your coworkers, and every one else that comes in contact with your cigarette smoke.

• Secondhand smoke causes at least 300,000 cases of bronchitis and pneumonia in children below the age of 18 months every year.

• Secondhand smoke increases the chances of a child developing middle ear conditions. It can also increase the risk of coughs and wheezing, and may aggravate existing asthma conditions.

• Teenagers from homes wherein one or both parents smoke are more than two times as likely to pick up the habit as themselves. They are also more likely to start smoking at an earlier age.

• Pregnant women that smoke tend to give birth to children that weigh less than they normally would. Smoking during pregnancy also results in as many as 4,000 babies being stillborn every year.

• Quitting smoking will make an immediate difference. You will be able to taste food better and your sense of smell will also improve. Your breath will also smell a lot better and the normal smoker’s cough will go away. These stop smoking benefits will be apparent in smokers of all ages no matter how long they have been smoking, and it will also be experienced by healthy smokers as well as smokers that already suffer from smoking related health conditions.

• Quitting smoking will greatly decrease your chances of getting lung cancer, other types of cancer, heart disease, stroke, lung diseases, and many other respiratory conditions.

• People that quit smoking are generally healthier than people that continue to smoke. They will have fewer work absences, and generally have less health issues to contend with.

• Quitting smoking will save you a lot of money. With the price of cigarettes at an all time high and expected to rise in the future, quitting now will result in considerable money saved as well as reduce medical treatment costs associated with smoking related illnesses.

• Quitting smoking will result in an overall better quality of life.