One of the biggest reasons to stop us from giving up bad habits is the fear of withdrawl symptoms.
Any addiction has withdrawal symptoms and we all experience them differently, but they are rarely pleasant to say the least.
Recently, I wrote a post about how I quit smoking cigarettes without any pills, therapy or other miracle cures and it reminded me the withdrawl symptoms I experienced and I decided to share with you my experience so you will know what's waiting for you of you decide to quit smoking.
The first withdrawal symptom was that I felt incredibly irritable, everything was simply annoying, my job was annoying, my wife was annoying and even my mother was annoying. The trick to overcome this annoying feeling simple - meditation. I simply integrated a meditation session to my morning routine and poof! The irritability was gone.
Another symptom that appeared were constant heat and cold waves. I started sweating and feeling hot flashes and shivers of cold. I was really surprised by that since I never heard such a reaction exists. I didn't have a good solution for these temperature changes so I just suffered through for about a month.
Besides the irritability and heat waves, I felt very tired for a couple of weeks. Nicotine and other shit they put into cigarettes acts as a stimulant and once the body stopped getting those drugs it had to restore the natural balance. Luckily, I workout almost daily even as a smoker and doing good and challenging workouts kept my energy levels pretty high and got that poison out of my body quickly witg sweat.
The worst withdrawal symptom I experienced were head aches, I have a high pain tolerance and I can suffer through quite a lot of pain. Headaches always kill me and the headaches caused by the withdrawl were a bitch. The only thing I found to alleviate the suffering was drinking alot of water and getting enough sleep.
It didn't help much though and in the two weeks the headaches lasted I simply felt bad most of the time, after 2 weeks it just passed.
Besides having physical symptoms, I had one mental symptom - for a month I constantly saw strange dreams. Dreams of people smoking next ro me and offering me cigarettes, dreams of me smoking realizing it and throwing the cigarette away. Every time I was offered a smoke in my dreams I said no and woke up, thinking how strange is that my own subconscious is battling with my addiction in such a way. The dreams passed and since I had only one dream of me smoking and once I understood that I immediately threw the cigarette away.
In retrospect, I think it wasn't easy to live through the withdrawl after 17 years of smoking a pack a day, but it wasn't that bad and I really feel that there is nothing to be afraid of withdrawl symptoms once you quit smoking.
The secret is to be prepared.
If you need advice on how to quit smoking cigarettes or support consider joining the Breaking the chain channel on discord right here https://discord.gg/btwXFH.
We offer support and with all addictions.
Thank you for your time.
With love.
Eugene
