Stop Smoking: Exercise Can Help

by Heather Long | More from this Blogger

08 Nov 2006 10:28 AM

I made a confession earlier - today I took the first step in stopping smoking. I am not lighting a cigarette. I am cleaning out the ashtray. I am dismantling my 'smoking area' where I go to smoke. I am changing habits formed over 20 years of addiction in order to break that addiction and put myself in the non-smoking section of the restaurant.

Exercise Can Help

When you are trying to quit smoking, it can be incredibly hard and not just because of the withdrawal symptoms and the changes in daily habits, the rise in stress levels, but also because of the fear of gaining weight. Nicotine can actually speed up your metabolism. During the quitting process, your metabolism may slow down for a little while and you may have a tendency to eat more to replace the hand and mouth habit.

Eating more while your metabolism is slowing down can actually increase your weight because more calories while fewer calories are being burned are how you gain weight to begin with. But you don't have to put on weight and right now, I'd trade five pounds for a life free from a bad habit. But exercise can help you. To not only avoid the weight gain, but to help you stop smoking.

When you exercise you:

• Reduce stress (this is a great way to help stave off cravings for a cigarette)
• Stave off depression by releasing endorphins into your body that lift your mood
• Get a mood boost from the same endorphins that stave off depression
• Reduce nicotine cravings and can actually help you wean off the patch (waves hand for me here)
• Gives you greater confidence and motivation and a belief in yourself that you can stop smoking and be a non-smoker and not just a former smoker
• Improve your body's physical conditioning, including your lungs and reduce the amount of breathlessness and huffing and puffing you may do

Exercise is a great way to replace what you have lost. Add up all the time you spent on cigarette breaks and I guarantee you - that even if you only smoked for 10 minutes out of every two hours, that's almost a 120 minutes you've added to your day and you can use it for exercise.

Exercise can also help you to cut back on your cravings. Want a cigarette? Go for a ten-minute brisk walk. Want a cigarette but don't want to go outside? Meditate and visualize for five ten minutes, taking deep breaths. Walk up and down the stairs every day and keep track of how much easier it gets.

Exercise can help you stop smoking. What are you doing to help yourself today?

Related Articles:

My Spouse is an Addict

Stress Busting for Men & Women

Is Your Brain In Shape?

Ten Reasons to Quit Smoking Today

Learn more about Heather Long

Heather Long is 35 years old and currently lives in Wylie, Texas. She has been a freelance writer for six years. Her husband and she met while working together at America Online over ten years ago.

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