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Addiction is often considered an actual condition, as though it was a disease or illness of sorts. Others claim that everyone has full control over the addiction they got themselves in, and should all be able to stop – without medical help. Depending on how you see it, there is one (more…)
Take Your Freedom Back and Still Be Fooled
Take our freedom back? Our habit, our cigarette. I just watched this commercial on TV about the new electric cigarette called BLU. Sure, it's tobacco-less and all, but it still is a way of taking nicotine into the body. Nicotine is a terrible poison that will end up killing you.
Did you know that even more nicotine has been found in cigarettes over the last few years? But an electric cigarette is just another way to get pure nicotine (in liquid form) into your body.
You figure, you take anywhere from four to fifteen puffs per cigarette. Each puff delivers one milligram of nicotine to the brain. With twenty cigarettes in a regular pack, that adds up to between 100 and 300 doses of nicotine per day. Who knows how much you smoke with the electric acquivalent.
The dose is taken through the lungs, and within seconds of inhilation, it hits the brain. Thus the behavior of smoking is reinforced with a nicotine dose. The behavior itself is also addictive just through sheer repetition, whether electric or otherwise. So what if there is no tabacco? So you aren't exhaling smoke into another's space, and it is more socially exceptable?
Did you know that nicotine can enter the body through the skin or mucous membranes as well as being inhaled into lungs with a cigarette? This is another reason second hand smoke is so deadly. Electric cigarettes are a miraculous find toward eleviating that.
Nicotine fools the body into thinking there is more glucose in the bloodstream, which gives a smoker the feeling of not being hungry. We all know what going without meals and nourishment can do to us (like making us cranky and tired).
When nicotine hits the brain, it prevents the neurons from transfering information throughout the chain that helps it receive needed information that helps with muscle movement and energy level. Because it makes the brain release more chemicals than it would normally, it makes the person feel more alert and even relaxed. Nicotine even fools the brain into making you feel happy, due to other chemicals being released. This is a good part of the reason for addiction.
So it all comes down to this: Do you want to become even more addicted to nicotine and have a heart attack even sooner? Are you more concerned with the social aspects of smoking? Aleviate that and you're free and clear! How much more fooling is your body going to take, before it's heart breaks down and you have a heart attack? How much longer?
Or do you really want to be healthy and live longer? They say you take about seven minutes off of your life every time you smoke a cigarette. So if you smoke just one pack a day (electric or tabacco) you are losing over two hours of life each day.
Smoking in the Elements
I didn't realize just long I'd been away from this lovely community until Breathing Happy sent me an email wondering about my two week absence. It wasn't that I'd forgotten; I've felt my lack of blogging. Life just keeps intervening.
My grandpa is now home from the hospital (thank you for all the kind thoughts, by the way), his healing process is being really slow, so we've all been trying to take care of him the best that we can. That, plus the fact that I'm a full time college student and a part time cashier makes life a little stressful.
However, this doesn't mean that Breathing Happy hasn't been on my mind.
I was actually talking to one of my managers where I work about my plans for the future, which lead to my passion for blogging, and, specifically, this blog.
When I told him that I was blogging here and what Breathing Happy is, he said, "But you don't know anything about smoking! You don't know what it's like to try to stop doing something like that."
And, he's right. I don't understand, but I have empathy for people who are trying to quit, and I can give advice based on research and what people I know who do, or have in the past smoked, tell me.
Here, in Kentucky, it's been super cold all day, and it wasn't until I started working on my laptop and bundled up on the couch that I actually felt truly warm.
While walking in the cold and wind between classes, I thought, "Smokers must be miserable right now..." If you quit smoking, one less thing that you'll have to worry about is having to stand outside in nasty weather to soothe your craving.
Besides that, the very fact that you have to go outside in some situations must get old.
In the city I live in, there was a law passed that made it to where all public places are smoke free. Now, I'm happy that I don't have to worry about secondhand smoke, but I have plenty of customers who are upset when they discover that we don't have a smoking section. This is understandable; I wouldn't want to stand outside because of my addictions.
So, if you quit smoking, you not only loose the annoyance of being forced outside of public places in some situations, you also don't have worry about having to stand in the cold, the snow, the rain, etc. to feed your addiction.
Take care and never give up.
Getting Burnt?
Only a headless turkey would sunbathe without protection. Why then would reasonable people put themselves in harms way and bake in the sun? We all know that over exposure to the sun causes skin cancer and wrinkles.
On the same note, it only makes sense to not contaminate yourself and those around you with toxic tobacco or marajuana smoke (yes 420 friendly smokers are at risk, too).
Of course, this turkey could swath itself in sunscreen and limit exposure in short incriments of time. This would allow for a protective suntan, which is healthier and more comfortable than a blisterining sunburn.
What about smoking? The only protection any of us have to avoid it, to not partake in administering the poisons and sufficating smoke into our systems. Drinking more water or eating more vegetables and fruits, even getting more excercise and fresh air won't make up for or elieviate the detrimental effects of draging on a cigarette or joint.
Buy a pacifier and tug on that for a while instead of the butt of a smoke. It might look silly, but it would be a lot smarter.
Only turkeys taste better when they are smoked!
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