What to Expect After You Quit Smoking
Nicotine Withdrawal and How to Deal with It
The most common withdrawal symptoms associated with quitting smoking include dizziness, trouble concentrating, headache, fatigue, irritability, anxiety, and a craving for sweets. The majority of these symptoms can be traced to how nicotine interacts with adrenaline and blood sugar in your brain.
Nicotine consumption stimulates a release of the hormone adrenaline. Adrenaline is released naturally in stressful situations to boost mental and physical performance. In prehistoric times, adrenaline is what helped us to run faster and innovate on the fly to capture prey or escape predators. Adrenaline does this, in part, by speeding the absorption of blood sugars, causing heightened alertness and an increased heart rate.
When you stop smoking, your body craves those bursts of energy caused by your intake of nicotine. The first 72 hours are the most difficult after quitting smoking because of this blood sugar problem. Your body must learn to regulate its sugar levels on its own, since your regular intake of nicotine disrupted and sped up the natural absorption of blood sugars while you were a smoker.
This blood sugar issue is the primary reason why many smokers complain of weight gain after quitting smoking. Your body, used to instantaneous blood sugar release from smoking a cigarette, becomes hypoglycemic (low on blood sugars), creating the urge for food. However, once you have eaten, it may take up to 20 minutes for that food to be digested and absorbed into the bloodstream, and by then you have probably started eating something else, accustomed as you are to instant blood sugar release.
A good way to combat this is by drinking juice throughout the first week after you stop smoking. Juice is high in sugars without nearly as many calories as food, and can help you control weight gain in those crucial days right after you quit smoking.
Other withdrawal symptoms are purely psychological, like craving a cigarette on your coffee break or while drinking alcohol, or in other social situations. In those cases, develop strategies to help you cope with withdrawal, like chewing gum, occupying your hands with some sort of object, or going outside for a change of scenery.