Nicotine Withdrawal

As we have seen, nicotine is a powerful drug.  When your try to withdraw from it by stopping smoking, you’re going to experience some pretty unpleasant side effects. They symptoms usually begin within a few hours of the last cigarette you smoked, reaching their peak after about 3 days and then gradually reducing over the next few weeks.

Common withdrawal symptoms experienced include:

§                     Irritability

§                     Craving tobacco

§                     Anger

§                     Over-eating or weight gain

§                     Problems concentrating

§                     Depression

§                     Headaches

§                     Tiredness

§                     Constipation

§                     Restlessness

§                     Anxiety

§                     Dizziness

§                     Sleep problems

That’s some list, so it’s not surprising that so many people fail to quit on their first attempt. It can take many attempts at trying to quit smoking before you will eventually succeed.

Interestingly, the peak of withdrawal is at around the 3-day mark. By this time the nervous system begins to work naturally again in the way it was intended and within just a few weeks your body is back to normal in terms of the way nicotine directly affects the brain and nerves, although you still are not 100% clear of the associated health risks of smoking – yet!

If nicotine withdrawal were the only factor involved in giving up smoking then the cold turkey approach might be more effective - unfortunately it isn’t that straightforward. Once you have got over the problems of nicotine withdrawal, the problems of habit and mood start to kick in and these can be just as problematic and painful as the physical withdrawal process.