Myth #4: Smoking relieves stress
On the contrary, it causes nervousness and a desire to light the next cigarette. Tobacco smoke does not relax, but inhibits the functioning of the central nervous system. Having become accustomed to a cigarette, a person can no longer relax without it. This is a vicious circle: both the occurrence and cessation of stress begins to depend on smoking. The smoker has the illusion that the cigarette helped him calm down because he switched from stressful thoughts to a process that does not require thinking. Deep breathing while inhaling smoke and the familiar feeling of a cigarette in your hand also play a role. Tobacco smoke has nothing to do with it. You can drive away anxiety by taking a few deep breaths or twirling a small object in your hands: a pen, etc.
Pseudo-help of cigarettes for stress
Many people think that nicotine calms the nerves and reduces stress from smoking, however, this is a temporary relief. It, like a real toxic substance, penetrates nerve cells, inhibiting some mental processes. As a result, temporary calm occurs.
However, once the nicotine wears off, the person experiences:
- even greater horror;
- emotional arousal;
- anxiety.
All these sensations are fueled by the thought that the cigarettes may run out, or there will not be a suitable moment to smoke. It is not difficult to guess that this entails additional worries and stress, so it is naive to believe that cigarettes calm the nerves.
The detrimental effect of nicotine on the human nervous system can be considered the fact that whenever a smoker is denied the opportunity to take a drag from a cigarette, it causes rage, trembling hands, a nervous state and other unpleasant symptoms.
Pseudo-help of cigarettes for stress
Nicotine is a stress factor because:
- This is a toxic substance, therefore, like any drug, it is addictive. The dose has to be increased, and the lack of nicotine itself puts pressure on the nervous system.
- Poisoning the body with the toxic component contained in a cigarette leads to the fact that the cells do not have enough oxygen. This reduces productivity, the ability to control your emotions and causes additional stress.
- Psychological factor. A person gets very used to holding a cigarette in his hands several times a day, so on a subconscious level he can no longer quit this bad habit. This causes psychological discomfort and nervous agitation.
As we can conclude, cigarettes do not calm the nerves, but, on the contrary, have an extremely negative effect on them.
Myth #8: Light cigarettes are not that bad for your health.
Unfortunately, they are no less harmful than regular ones. Constantly using light cigarettes, smokers puff more often and deeper, which can subsequently lead to cancer not of the lungs themselves, but of the so-called pulmonary periphery - the alveoli and small bronchi. And, as a rule, they smoke more of these cigarettes - where can you go if the body demands its own norm? In addition, there is evidence that the labeling on a pack of cigarettes about the content of tar and nicotine is often not true, since it is quite difficult to maintain compliance with the standard in the production of tobacco products.
Myths about cigarettes and smoking: part two
The first part of the article is here.
Smoking calms you down . A favorite myth and the first excuse of any smoker. Valerian and motherwort “calm”, and nicotine, like alcohol, kills beneficial substances and vitamins that help strengthen the nervous system. Think for yourself - if nicotine had a calming effect, it would have long been used in medicine as a cheap anti-stress drug. The truth is that nicotine is a stimulant that increases the heart rate and triggers the release of adrenaline into the blood. So what is happening that makes smokers believe in the anti-stress effect of a cigarette? In fact, the components of tobacco (tar, nicotine, smoke) do not relax, but simply “slow down” the most important parts of the central nervous system, which is why it seems to a person that he has stopped responding to factors that previously worried him. Plus, the repeating ritual itself calms you down: take out a cigarette, light it, take a drag. In the same way, any automated action “helps”, the execution of which does not require expending mental effort. But, having gotten used to a cigarette, a person cannot relax without it. Nicotine creates a withdrawal syndrome that keeps the smoker in constant tension and uncertainty. In this state, without noticing it, a person is almost the entire time during which he does not smoke. With the arrival of a new dose of nicotine, the withdrawal syndrome is temporarily relieved, and the end of anxiety and tension gives the addict the illusion of pleasure, relaxation and calm. That is, in fact, it is the same “calm” as relief after you take off your shoes, which have been rubbing your feet for half a day (so that after a couple of minutes you put them back on).
Smoking is my personal choice, which does not affect others . How many people do you know who smoke alone, locked in a special, completely isolated room? Meanwhile, the smoker’s right to cigarette smoke ends exactly where the others’ right to clean air begins. However, more often than not, no one takes this into account, while there is simply no safe level of exposure to tobacco smoke. Moreover, the so-called “secondary smoke” that people who are near a smoker are forced to breathe contains at least 400 harmful chemicals, radioactive isotopes and about 70 carcinogens. The body of an ordinary person, unlike the body of a smoker, is not prepared for the effects of such aggressive agents, and therefore suffers from them several times more severely. Most children in the world are passive smokers, and 50 million pregnant women are forced to become passive smokers every year. It has been scientifically proven that passive smoking is the cause of most cases of lung cancer and cardiovascular diseases in non-smokers. According to Sergei Yakovlev, chairman of the National Society of Industrial Medicine, in 2004 children accounted for 28% of the 600,000 premature deaths caused by second-hand tobacco smoke. The most interesting thing is that even specially equipped smoking-free zones in restaurants and cafes cannot save the situation. They are useful only to the administration of the establishment, as they reduce the risk of fire, but such zones are absolutely unable to reduce the level of exposure to tobacco smoke for non-smoking visitors. In fact, all people (both with and without cigarettes) are still in the same room, and ventilation and filters remove, perhaps, the unpleasant odor, but not isotopes, resins and carcinogens. So, dining in the “non-smoking area” of such a restaurant is no safer than dining at the same table with a smoker. Now imagine for a moment how many smoking people just one non-smoking person encounters per day: smoke follows him in parks, on the street, on approaches to schools and universities, at entrances, at metro stations, at bus stops, in corridors and workers’ toilets premises, in cafes and snack bars, enters the apartment from neighboring balconies and leaks from the entrance. Can smoking be considered a personal choice of one person that does not affect others?
The most harmful thing in a cigarette is nicotine . This is wrong. Nicotine is an active substance that causes addiction; the main harm is caused to the smoker by smoke and cigarette tar, along with which a lot of pathogenic substances penetrate the body. It is these ingredients that enter the internal organs (from the mouth to the bladder) that cause disruptions in their functioning and initiate the development of tumors.
Nicotine is not harmful at all . The opposite misconception is that nicotine is a dangerous substance. For example, it is extremely toxic to insects and warm-blooded animals, which is why it was previously widely used as an insecticide. Currently, in order not to spoil the mood of smokers, not nicotine itself is used for these purposes, but its derivatives (for example, imidacloprid). In large doses, the substance acts as a neurotoxin, causing paralysis of the nervous system (respiratory arrest, cardiac arrest, death). It is interesting to know that the average dose of nicotine contained in one cigarette (1 mg) will certainly kill the smoker if administered intravenously. The only thing that saves a smoker is that the main part of the nicotine is burned when smoking a cigarette. And the very amount of substance absorbed by the body when smoking depends on many factors.
If you smoke for a long time, then quitting is harmful - too much stress for the body . In fact, the true stress for the body is to continue smoking. Improvement in health is observed, on average, within 2-3 weeks after quitting smoking. According to the famous doctor S. Yakovlev, 3-9 months after quitting smoking, respiratory function improves by 10%, and after 5 years the risk of myocardial infarction is reduced by 2 times.
cigarettes are less harmful than others . This is an advertising ploy - tobacco cigarettes contain enough nicotine to form a strong addiction. Cigarettes with menthol and other “lady’s” options (long, thin, “elegant” cigarettes) form tobacco addiction even faster than usual. As a rule, such cigarettes have a simple perforated filter, which does not protect the smoker at all, but makes him puff harder, inhaling more harmful substances. In general, when smoking light or ladies' cigarettes, smokers inhale deeper, smoke more often, increasing the number of cigarettes smoked per day, and subconsciously retain the smoke in their lungs longer in order to obtain the required amount of nicotine.
Other
Myth No. 9: If you quit smoking, you will gain weight.
Smoking itself has no effect on body weight. It only weakens the feeling of hunger and, by the way, increases the predisposition to cellulite, impairing the supply of oxygen to cells. The problem is that many former smokers use food as a substitute for cigarettes, which is why they gain weight. In addition, their taste sensitivity is restored and their appetite returns. But within a year of quitting nicotine, most people lose all the kilograms they had gained. A person who quits smoking and maintains it for two years is less likely to become obese than a heavy smoker. In general, there are no fewer smokers among overweight people than among those who have no problems with excess weight.
Myth one: “A cigarette helps you relax”
The effect of nicotine on stress has been discussed for a long time. Basically, this is said by people who smoke, who “calm down” after lighting a cigarette.
In fact, cigarettes do not help you relax, but smokers are calmed down by the ritual - take out a cigarette, light it, take a drag, exhale.
Nicotine is the most harmful substance
of the 4,000 substances contained in smoke.
It does not have a calming effect, otherwise it would have long been used in medicine as a cheap remedy for stress. But smokers, on average, live 10-16 years less than
non-smokers.
Myth #10: Secondhand smoke is not dangerous.
In fact, it is even worse than active smoking. Cigarette smoke is divided into two streams - the main stream, which enters the lungs when inhaling, and the side stream, from the light smoldering at the end of the cigarette, where the concentration of harmful chemicals is 50-100 times higher. This sidestream smoke doubles the risk of lung cancer for passive smokers. The “forced smoker” suffers more because the sidestream of smoke, due to the lower combustion temperature of tobacco, is several times more carcinogenic than the smoke inhaled by the smoker. If parents smoke, the child is 4-5 times more likely to get colds, pneumonia, bronchitis, asthma, and his mental and mental development is impaired.
Myth seven: “Smoking is a personal choice”
Tobacco companies often present smoking as a free choice for adults.
This is a crafty argument - two thirds of the population in Russia do not smoke, including children and pregnant women. And the smoker’s right to cigarette smoke ends where others’ right to clean air begins.
Also, according to research, most smokers begin to use tobacco at the age of 13-14 years, when there can be no question of free ADULT choice.
How addiction is formed
With regular smoking, tobacco addiction develops in just 3–18 months, and in women it develops more quickly than in men. With tobacco addiction, the body activates a mechanism to regulate the level of nicotine in the blood. With the cessation of its supply, respiratory depression occurs, tobacco withdrawal symptoms appear: loss of appetite, discomfort in the stomach, slow heart rate, drop in blood pressure, anxiety, irritability, obsessive sensation of the smell of cigarette smoke, and the urge to light a new cigarette is formed.
Research by Dutch doctors for 2008–2010 showed that smoking is the cause of:
- 98% of deaths from laryngeal cancer;
- 96% of deaths from lung cancer;
- 30% of all deaths from cancer of other etiologies;
- 75% of deaths from chronic bronchitis and emphysema;
- 25% of deaths are from coronary heart disease.
Do cigarettes help relieve stress?
The relaxing effect of cigarettes comes partly from the smoking process itself. The habit creates a certain illusion that smoking calms the nerves and saves from stress.
Intrusive thoughts that push a person to smoke give rise to the illusion of escaping from despondency, difficulties and troubles. Having discussed problems collectively in the company of co-workers or standing alone by the window, blowing smoke and sympathizing with oneself, the smoker gets a feeling of a kind of relaxation. But a smoke break does not solve problems at all.
Smoking is a short-term reduction in anxiety, a certain pleasure. The intense, measured breathing of a smoker is a source of relaxation, but do cigarettes relieve stress and calm the nerves? After all, it is not clean air that is inhaled, but smoke, and stress lingers.
Many people think that they are indulging in tobacco, but by smoking several cigarettes in a row, day after day, the indulgence turns into a nicotine addiction, which will subsequently be difficult to overcome.
Smoking and stress have nothing in common, except for the negative impact on the body.
Cigarettes are only harmful to human health
Unbiased facts
According to the World Health Organization, about 5 million people die annually in the world from causes directly related to smoking, and more than 30% of all cancer deaths are associated with smoking. A 2011 release from Rospotrebnadzor noted that over the past 20 years, the number of smokers in Russia has increased by 440 thousand people, while more than 260 thousand people die prematurely from smoking-related causes in the country every year. An adult has the right to choose what lifestyle to lead. To smoke or not to smoke? When making this decision, rely not on myths, but on facts. You can quit smoking on your own or with the help of medical professionals.
Expert: Galina Filippova, general practitioner, candidate of medical sciences Author: Anton Troitsky
The material uses photographs belonging to shutterstock.com
Why is tobacco so feared?
The money spent on the fight against smoking, which is snatched from tobacco companies and milked from state budgets, is an amount with a large number of zeros. It is not surprising that such golden shine attracts so many fiery fighters, angry speakers and passionate guardians for the happiness of mankind. People will always pay two types of citizens, it was the royal philosopher Marcus Aurelius who said: “Those who entertain them, and those who frighten them.”
Of course, the scale of entertainment show business is still larger, but the business of “scaremongers” is also quite flourishing.
Hundreds of foundations safely pocket tobacco millions, feeding doctors and journalists, politicians and public figures. Of course, you can still fight against abortion, against power plants, against genetically modified products, against the bad environment, against the crisis of overproduction, against the automobile industry.
But in most of these cases, on the side of “vice” there are usually too powerful forces that are still quite successfully resisting such attacks. Try the same genetically modified products again and half of all US farmers will rebel against you; no one is foolish to butt heads with such bulls. And the tobacco companies turned out to be quite fat and appetizing, but at the same time too weak. Atu them, atu!
The successes in the fight against the demonic potion are amazing - bastions fall after bastions. Smokers were hung with red flags on all sides, non-smokers were told that those with smoking things in their mouths were encroaching on your life and freedom. They smoke your children and they will grow up to be stupid freaks, they deprive men of their sexual strength, they jinxed your cows and dance naked on Bald Mountain! In general, the old recipes still work well.
Convincing a modern non-smoker that a person with a cigarette at the other end of a restaurant is not causing him any harm at all is the same as trying to tell a pious man in Cologne five hundred years ago that witches do not actually ferment milk and do not spoil children in mother's womb.
