Urges that happen weeks or months after quitting

[beacon]

From whyquit.com

 

Joel's Reinforcement Library

 

Thoughts that seem worse than urges experienced the first few days

 

 

The urges that happen weeks or months after initial quitting can catch you much more off guard than the urges encountered during the first few days. When you had an urge at 10:00 am the day you quit smoking, it was no big deal. You likely had one at 9:55 am just before it. In fact, the first few days if you went to long without an urge you would have felt something was wrong. Although, some people just have one urge that first day. It hits them when they wake up, goes away when they go to sleep, at which point they dream about smoking all night. In essence, it was chronic.

 

When you start to get more time under your belt not smoking, the triggers become more sporadic. At first separated by minutes, then hours, eventually days and weeks. But they still happen. When they occur after a long period of time they catch you much more off guard.

 

Also, in the beginning, when your guard is up and urges are frequent, you are constantly talking yourself through them. You are then basically reinforcing your resolve over and over again all day long. When you stop having chronic urges, you naturally stop reinforcing your resolve throughout the day. Then when the trigger hits, not having talked yourself through it very recently, you sometimes have a harder time mustering up the initial motivation for quitting and ammunition for staying off.

 

One other factor happens with time making urges feel stronger. You start to forget smoking but still remember the "good" cigarettes. You forget the ones you smoked automatically, paying no real attention to even as you smoked them. You forget the nasty one you despised as you smoked them. You forget all the associated annoyances that went with being a smoker. Then you start to remember the best cigarette you ever had in your life. If you focus on this cigarette without recalling all the others and the problems that went with the others, it is hard to not want it.

 

But that "one" cigarette concept is a fantasy. Not smoking will never be as good as that fantasy, but smoking will not be like that fantasy either. Smoking is what it was at the end, the day you quit-not what it was like early on when it initially hooked you. At the end, smoking was annoying enough to make you want to quit, even though you were going through a horrid withdrawal and psychological readjustment process to do it. You then understood that smoking was making life complicated, ruining your health and basically slowly killing you. Well, cigarettes haven't changed. Just your memories of them have.

 

Remember cigarettes as they really were, not how you wished they were. Then when the urge is triggered, you will have the ammunition to squelch it. You will recognize that you were just having a bad moment, when you were quitting you were having "bad days." When you were smoking you were a slave to a product that was killing you. You fought long and hard to overcome that control and you never want to relinquish your freedom of choice over such a deadly product again. To keep the control, remember, when the urge is triggered-never take another puff!

[Ramona]

The isolated urges are cunning.  You'll be cruising along for days and days without the merest thought of a cigarette and then something will smash you in the face.  They seem so much stronger than the ones you expect.  I guess you should expect the unexpected at all times!

[Runfree]

Thank you Beacon!  This is territory ahead for me so reading this is very timely.

[Chrysalis]

A lot of us go through a rough patch somewhere around 4-6 months after quitting. I know I did. Everything that Joel mentioned in this blog happened to me plus one other thing-- impatience. As Joel said, in the beginning you are mentally prepared to do battle with Nicodemon and battle you do! But as the weeks go by, the cravings and the obsessing about smoking gradually fade and your confidence in your ability to keep your quit grows. And, really, you can pretty much just start enjoying your new smoke-free life. Wonderful. 

 

But very often, something happens about 4-6 months after your quit that starts to trigger the cravings all over again. These new cravings are not nearly as bad as the original ones and not nearly as frequent. But you have LOST PATIENCE with them! Even if they are only happening for 5 minutes once every 2 or 3 hours, you tend to think, "These cravings never stop! I can't stand it any more! It's not fair that I have to keep dealing with this sh*t!" That is when you start to think of having "just one" cigarette to relieve the cravings and you start to fantasize about that "one perfect cigarette" that only exists in your fantasies. In other words, we mentally exaggerate the  frequency and severity of the cravings and minimize our progress not because the cravings really are worse, but because we're out of patience with the process. 

 

That was most assuredly my problem-- out of patience! And I almost smoked as a result. Fortunately, a fellow quitter at about the same point in his quit as me pointed out that my problem was not the sporadic cravings themselves, the problem was my lack of patience with the process. I realized that he was absolutely right. So I resolved to muster up more patience and to view the frequency and intensity of my cravings with more objectivity-- yes, they were annoying but they were not NEARLY as frequent or as intense as at the beginning of my quit. I was going to remain patient and committed and out-last Nicodemon no matter what! And I did. 

[Ricki M]

Thank you for helping us stay aware of our quit...this is really good information.  This would have probably helped me last time I quit but I thought I could do this on my own.  Now I know better. 

[MarylandQuitter]

As Joel said, in the beginning you are mentally prepared to do battle with Nicodemon and battle you do!

 

Just to clear up an innocent misconception, Joel doesn't use "Nicodemon" for the reasons shown below.

 

From Joel's Board

The in-depth view of why we don't embrace the term of "Nicodemon."

 

Nicodemon seems to give the impression of an evil persona associated with the chemical nicotine. Nicotine is no more evil than arsenic or carbon monoxide or hydrogen cyanide--all chemicals found in tobacco smoke. Although nicotine is unique among the thousands of other chemicals that comprise tobacco smoke because it is the addictive chemical in tobacco.

 

Even so, the idea that nicotine is somehow calling to a smoker who is off smoking for weeks or months is quite inaccurate. It is the person himself or herself whose own mind is creating the desire from triggers that he or she is experiencing. Those triggers are also not evil, they are just life events being experienced for the first time.

 

I think the problems I have with the terms is they make nicotine seem to have more power than it actually does. The personification given to it can make an individual feel that nicotine has the potential of tricking him or her into smoking. An inanimate object such as a chemical has no such power. As John has said often nicotine has an IQ of zero. People do not overcome the grip of chemical addictions by being stronger than the drug but rather by being smarter than the drug.

 

Lets not give nicotine more credit than it is due. Lets not make it some cute and cuddly or evil and plotting entity--it is a chemical that alters brain chemistry. It is no different than heroin, cocaine or alcohol. These drugs don't have cute names given to them either and giving them to nicotine can start to make it seem different than these other substance--more trivial or less serious in a way. Nicotine is not more trivial than other drugs of addiction and in fact kills more people than all other drugs of addiction combined.

 

I think the only place where I think I have ever appreciated the term "Nicodemon" is in this one string. Because in this one post the lies that people make up in order to secure their continued use of a deadly drug are all dispelled in one quick swoop. It has a short, simple and catchy title that seems to fit the logic used in this piece very well--Nicodemon Lies. But anyone reading this whole article and the associated links quickly will realize that these are not the lies of a demon, these are the lies made up by an addict rationalizing, legitimizing, defending and protecting his or her drug use. They are the lies that people make up and tell themselves to defend the otherwise un-defendable.

 

People cannot rationalize the reason that they smoke with truths; they can only do it with lies. More important for people here though is that a person cannot secure his or her quit by telling himself or herself lies either, but he or she can secure his or her quit by telling himself or herself the truth. The truth is that the only way to keep yourself smoke free is to simply accept the truth that to stay smoke free you must never take another puff!

 

Joel

[babs609]

I did always use the term "nicodemon" when the urges came...but not in a way that i wasn't aware his non existense...or not taking responsiblity for myself..or even giving it power...but more like using it as a visual in my head of this stupid, ugly looking monster who is always trying to find a weakness in me...try to seduce me into taking that puff and I would actually have chats with "it"  "bring it on biatch"  or "is that all you got?"  or...."nice try idiot"  it worked so many times and has gotten me through many cravings and not only that I usually ended up laughing at myself for it....but I am well aware that it's the addiction and it's me....and there is no actual demon...yes...that is true

[Chrysalis]

I understand why Joel is uncomfortable with the term "Nicodemon." Some people could use such a personification to claim that they are helpless to quit smoking (as in, "The devil made me do it!"). It's better to accept personal responsibility over your choices.

 

But I agree with Babs-- viewing the source of these off-the-wall urges and ridiculous excuses to smoke as coming from an evil demon helped me to visualize someone or something I could fight against and triumph over. I liked using the term "Nicodemon" and found it helpful. 

 

As always with quitting smoking, everybody's quit is unique.

[cpk]

Just to clear up an innocent misconception, Joel doesn't use "Nicodemon" for the reasons shown below.

 

From Joel's Board

The in-depth view of why we don't embrace the term of "Nicodemon."

 

Nicodemon seems to give the impression of an evil persona associated with the chemical nicotine. Nicotine is no more evil than arsenic or carbon monoxide or hydrogen cyanide--all chemicals found in tobacco smoke. Although nicotine is unique among the thousands of other chemicals that comprise tobacco smoke because it is the addictive chemical in tobacco.

 

Even so, the idea that nicotine is somehow calling to a smoker who is off smoking for weeks or months is quite inaccurate. It is the person himself or herself whose own mind is creating the desire from triggers that he or she is experiencing. Those triggers are also not evil, they are just life events being experienced for the first time.

 

I think the problems I have with the terms is they make nicotine seem to have more power than it actually does. The personification given to it can make an individual feel that nicotine has the potential of tricking him or her into smoking. An inanimate object such as a chemical has no such power. As John has said often nicotine has an IQ of zero. People do not overcome the grip of chemical addictions by being stronger than the drug but rather by being smarter than the drug.

 

Lets not give nicotine more credit than it is due. Lets not make it some cute and cuddly or evil and plotting entity--it is a chemical that alters brain chemistry. It is no different than heroin, cocaine or alcohol. These drugs don't have cute names given to them either and giving them to nicotine can start to make it seem different than these other substance--more trivial or less serious in a way. Nicotine is not more trivial than other drugs of addiction and in fact kills more people than all other drugs of addiction combined.

 

I think the only place where I think I have ever appreciated the term "Nicodemon" is in this one string. Because in this one post the lies that people make up in order to secure their continued use of a deadly drug are all dispelled in one quick swoop. It has a short, simple and catchy title that seems to fit the logic used in this piece very well--Nicodemon Lies. But anyone reading this whole article and the associated links quickly will realize that these are not the lies of a demon, these are the lies made up by an addict rationalizing, legitimizing, defending and protecting his or her drug use. They are the lies that people make up and tell themselves to defend the otherwise un-defendable.

 

People cannot rationalize the reason that they smoke with truths; they can only do it with lies. More important for people here though is that a person cannot secure his or her quit by telling himself or herself lies either, but he or she can secure his or her quit by telling himself or herself the truth. The truth is that the only way to keep yourself smoke free is to simply accept the truth that to stay smoke free you must never take another puff!

 

Joel

Thanks. I link these mental urges with the brain having been used to the shot of dopamine that came with smoking. Is that correct? I find if I set a goal - however small - like walking for 30 minutes, or going to the grocery story to pick up fresh produce...the brain seems satisfied, because dopamine is linked to goal setting-action-and reward. I haven't been thinking in terms of nicotine as much as re-wiring my life to satisfying the dopamine "gotta have it" urge with healthy motivation-action-reward situations. I've read that smoking causes big dopamine rushes...and after quitting  the opposite occurs...less dopamine production...so one has to be smart and set up many motivation/action/reward situations. This is working for me although I'm still learning to use it. Does Joel discuss dopamine production/depletion in any of his videos?

[MarylandQuitter]

Does Joel discuss dopamine production/depletion in any of his videos?

 

No videos but these may help...

 

http://ffn.yuku.com/topic/11305/Addiction-Dopamine-The-Salience-Theory

http://ffn.yuku.com/topic/11725

http://ffn.yuku.com/reply/239182/Some-new-findings-on-Nicotine-Addiction#reply-239182 

 

Joel's response on FFN Board.

I remember in my early days of learning about other drug addictions, it became very obvious to me why crack cocaine was so addictive and why cocaine addicts would go through such great lengths and seemingly sacrifice everything in order to get the drug. It was capable of releasing so much dopamine that it was depleting the body's normal supply. Then when a person would do anything that would normally bring pleasure--with the minimal amount of dopamine left, normal activities that used to bring about pleasure seemed to become empty or meaningless. This is why people using cocaine found themselves losing interest in other things that should have been important--in a real sense--they were losing their ability to get pleasure out of pleasurable things.

 

It seems that this parallels to a degree what happens to smokers. Not only is nicotine releasing the same neurotransmitter, but it is impairing the mechanism to shut down the action of dopamine. Again, the end result is things that should be pleasurable will become a bit diminished by this chronic action.

 

The cost of such chronic pleasure is the minimizing of real life. That is what the real toll of smoking is--and the real benefit of quitting. Once again you can feel good from accomplishments. I think that is why people take greater pride in things after they quit.

 

I always joke with spouses who call me up saying they don't know what they can do to make their husband or wife quit smoking. They often ask me if they should threaten to leave the spouse if he or she doesn't quit. I always warn them to be careful when making such a threat. Giving a smoker a choice between take me or your cigarettes, you'd be surprised at how often "me" is going to be left behind.

 

Again, here you can see why. The normal pleasures brought about by a relationship are minimized if dopamine is in fact impaired--the smoker is in a sense incapable of feeling as good from a relationship or any other activity.

 

But the smoker needs to understand that to ever be able to fully appreciate life itself, they need to stop taking drugs that interfere with normal life pleasures. The answer is not to find a drug that works better. As this article so eloquently points out at the end, "It would be hard to design a drug that acts on the reward center that would be more effective than nicotine."  

 

I suspect it could be done though--but the end result would just be another drug that is robbing the user of the ability to feel pleasure from pleasurable things. This in itself is robbing the user of the ability of a quality life.

 

Yes nicotine being delivered in a cigarette form is addictive and deadly. But even without the other chemicals additional health consequences--nicotine itself is robbing the individual of really experiences little life's pleasures--and this is a travesty in itself. Again, the solution is not another drug that is even better--the solution is to let your body get back to normal and never be thrown so off track again by knowing to never take another puff!

 

Joel

[cpk]

MQ Re: Dopamine.  Thanks. Great read. I'll check out the links over the weekend. This is exactly what I was talking about.

[Tyme2B]

Great information. Thank you Beacon & Maryland. Guard the Quit with sneak attack cravings.

[Doreensfree]

Hole this is helpful to the newbies .!!!