In an earlier blog post I reported the news that if not smoking stresses you out, you might as well continue, because smoking 5 a day will give you the same chance on a heart problem as feeling stressed because you don’t smoke.
Another research on that topic shows that smoking doesn’t relieve stress. Where 1 in 5 smokers say they smoke to relieve stress, the research doesn’t underpin that. There is no relationship found between smoking and reducing stress. The details of the study have been published in British Journal of Psychiatry.
What this research revealed was that quitting does! Even though, the withdrawal symptoms in the early days of not smoking seem to cause discomfort, overall the stress levels of non-smokers and ex-smokers are lower.
The researchers examined the anxiety levels of approximately 500 smokers, before and after they tried to give up. They gave up participating in the NHS smoking cessation programme, using nicotine patches.
After 6 months, 68 of the 491 participants had restrained from smoking and reported to feel less anxious than when they were smoking.
However, the people that tried to attempt to stop, and were unsuccessful were more stressed.
The stress caused by this situation has nothing to do with smoking, but all with the disappointment in oneself, feeling a failure and undermining self-esteem.
The conclusion of this research for me is that, if you contemplate to stop smoking, or change another habit, make sure you prepare yourself. As it can be very damaging to start a project and fail; it makes sense to ensure that you have systems in place that will help you succeed.
If you want to learn how to de-stress, please check out my workshops, or online products.
If you need coaching support because you want to make changes, please get in touch with me, for an initial meeting, via Skype, phone or face-to-face and make sure you are a winner!
