Quitting Smoking

[Nestito]

hello all, so I would really like to quit smoking. i've been a smoker for approximately nine years and i feel as though a lot of my thyroid function is dependent on this annoying habit.

i've tried vaping nicotine instead, but it doesn't have nearly as good as an effect on my bowels as the plant does. i've been peating close to a year and have definitely experienced some favorable results in regards to skin and hair quality and moods, fat distribution, etc.

cigarettes also seem to help keep my carotenemia at bay. the soles of my feet clear up pretty quickly.

so yeah, any tips? trying to stay away from thyroid hormone if i don't have to use it, especially now since it's about to be nice and hot out.

thanks.
nestor

 

[marcar72]

I would suggest to you a book called "Easy Way to Stop Smoking" by Allen Carr. It's got a really good success rate. It helped me kick the habit about 7 and 1/2 years ago.

Allen Carr's Easy Way To Stop Smoking: Allen Carr: 9780615482156: Amazon.com: Books

 

[Nestito]

I would suggest to you a book called "Easy Way to Stop Smoking" by Allen Carr. It's got a really good success rate. It helped me kick the habit about 7 and 1/2 years ago.

Allen Carr's Easy Way To Stop Smoking: Allen Carr: 9780615482156: Amazon.com: Books

thanks, for your reply. I have read that one, it's great. I don't have much resistance against the bigger monster the 'psychological' dependence on nicotine.

i just fear a sudden on lash of hypothyroidism that quitting may bring.

 

[Diokine]

High dose pregnenolone - will completely change your taste for cigarettes.

I second the suggestion of Allen Carr's work.

 

[marcar72]

Well from what I understand it's the nicotine in tobacco that helps with metabolism. One should be able to replace that with some form of niacin, like niacinamide which is highly liked by the Peat crowd.

 

[denise]

You're right to be afraid to quit without some other metabolic support. I read Alan Carr's book a year ago, quit smoking, was super proud of myself, and then my entire system totally crashed. I had no idea how dependent my metabolism on the nicotine, since my thyroid was totally kaput.

Why are you wanting to stay away from using thyroid? It may be the best way to handle at least the initial crash, and once you're stable and feeling okay, start working out other ways to support your thyroid so that things start functioning normally again on their own. The weeks after you quit are not the time to be guessing about which supplements to take. Unfortunately, I didn't know what was happening and didn't have access to thyroid meds at the time, so my nose dive was fast and steep, and I'm still clawing my way out. At least have some thyroid on hand in case your less radical measures don't cut it. That's my 2 cents, anyway. Best of luck!

 

[Dessert_All_Day]

Meditation might help.

 

[beta pandemic]

how many cigs to you smoke/day?
And what brand do you smoke?

i would taper off VERY slowly. Im talking -1 cig/day every seven days.

 

[Nestito]

Well from what I understand it's the nicotine in tobacco that helps with metabolism. One should be able to replace that with some form of niacin, like niacinamide which is highly liked by the Peat crowd.

I use niacinamide daily, doesn't really have an effect on cravings, thanks again for your thought.

You're right to be afraid to quit without some other metabolic support. I read Alan Carr's book a year ago, quit smoking, was super proud of myself, and then my entire system totally crashed. I had no idea how dependent my metabolism on the nicotine, since my thyroid was totally kaput.

Why are you wanting to stay away from using thyroid? It may be the best way to handle at least the initial crash, and once you're stable and feeling okay, start working out other ways to support your thyroid so that things start functioning normally again on their own. The weeks after you quit are not the time to be guessing about which supplements to take. Unfortunately, I didn't know what was happening and didn't have access to thyroid meds at the time, so my nose dive was fast and steep, and I'm still clawing my way out. At least have some thyroid on hand in case your less radical measures don't cut it. That's my 2 cents, anyway. Best of luck!

I think it was one of your posts I read a while back amidst others that brought this up to my attention. I should get my hands on some cynoplus, just in case. Were you eventually able to break free?

Meditation might help.

haha yes, definitely. what wouldn't it help? :) thanks.

how many cigs to you smoke/day?
And what brand do you smoke?

i would taper off VERY slowly. Im talking -1 cig/day every seven days.

I smoke the turquoise American spirits, the supposed organic ones. They do have lots of nicotine in them. Close to a pack a day.

I think what'll do is start vaping again, to get nicotine that way and reduce smoke exposure and keep a pack of spirits around I can smoke when I need to in case the bowels don't move as easily or I notice carotenemia. and taper off that way.

Does that sound like a good idea?

 

[DrJ]

High dose pregnenolone - will completely change your taste for cigarettes.

I second the suggestion of Allen Carr's work.

I would second the suggestion for high-dose pregnenolone. 100mg/day for 5 days a week and I just completely lost the desire to smoke, like a switch was turned off or something.

 

[Nestito]

I would second the suggestion for high-dose pregnenolone. 100mg/day for 5 days a week and I just completely lost the desire to smoke, like a switch was turned off or something.

hmmm? which pregnenolone are you taking? I haven't really researched it as I figured I'm only 26, if I focus on thyroid then preg should come internally.

and I'm also concerned with it's hair loss effect that I've read in some people taking it.

 

[Niganwhite]

It's difficult, but keep to quit it!

 

[denise]

I think it was one of your posts I read a while back amidst others that brought this up to my attention. I should get my hands on some cynoplus, just in case. Were you eventually able to break free?

I'm glad you saw my previous posts! After what had happened to me, I felt like I needed to shout it from the rooftops, in case it could help someone avoid that mess. What's ironic is that immediately after quitting, I wanted to shout about Alan Carr's book from the rooftops, but within 10 days, I changed my tune to "Alan Carr is awesome, BUT..."

Boy, how to answer that last question? By August, haidut came out with his TyroMix, and I tried it, and it was life-changing. My depression lifted, my bowels started moving again, my libido resurrected somewhat. There was still something missing, though. Around the same time, I read the book Smoke Screens: The Truth about Tobacco, which made me doubt the absolute negativity of smoking. (It was utterly convincing. I don't recommend reading it if you're really set on quitting. ) Between reading that book and my total frustration with how much my health had deteriorated after quitting, to even being angry at Alan Carr for having so cavalierly assured me that I would experience no negative health consequences after quitting, last September I ended up deciding to smoke again to see if it would help. This was a very deliberate choice. Carr's book had really worked as far as breaking me from the psychological need for it, so it wasn't just a matter of rationalization. This time I decided that I would only smoke organic, and that I would only roll my own--I wouldn't even buy American Spirits. This way I'm avoiding as many added chemicals as possible, and also rolling my own makes the act more deliberate. You can't just pull one out of the pack at a moment's notice. Also, they taste about 10x better than even a premade American Spirit. I have on two occasions in the last 9 months bought a pack of AS, and they were vastly inferior. So I've been smoking about 4/day (before I quit last time I was smoking usually 9/day). Unfortunately, though, I didn't actually notice any difference in how I felt. It didn't improve my bowels any more; it didn't make me lose any of the weight I'd gained, etc. So that's another layer of frustration. I've been thinking about quitting again, but I'm afraid to in case I crash again. At least I do have my TyroMix on hand, but what if it's not enough?

So, I guess the answer is no, I haven't yet broken free. I wish I could go back to the time when I smoked only occasionally, once a day in the summertime, quitting for months at a time, etc., without thinking about it. I ramped it up after an emotional breakdown 8 years ago and it turned into an everyday habit that kept increasing as my stress levels and health problems increased. At the time I thought of the smoking as just a stress reliever that didn't actually provide any real benefit, but looking back, I now realize how much slack (for thyroid and sex hormones) the nicotine was picking up for me. In that sense, I'm grateful for it. It was a life-saver (almost literally).

Maybe I'll look into a course of high-dose pregnenolone. I have some Pansterone, but I'm guessing that would be too much DHEA at the same time.

 

[Nestito]

I'm glad you saw my previous posts! After what had happened to me, I felt like I needed to shout it from the rooftops, in case it could help someone avoid that mess. What's ironic is that immediately after quitting, I wanted to shout about Alan Carr's book from the rooftops, but within 10 days, I changed my tune to "Alan Carr is awesome, BUT..."

Boy, how to answer that last question? By August, haidut came out with his TyroMix, and I tried it, and it was life-changing. My depression lifted, my bowels started moving again, my libido resurrected somewhat. There was still something missing, though. Around the same time, I read the book Smoke Screens: The Truth about Tobacco, which made me doubt the absolute negativity of smoking. (It was utterly convincing. I don't recommend reading it if you're really set on quitting. ) Between reading that book and my total frustration with how much my health had deteriorated after quitting, to even being angry at Alan Carr for having so cavalierly assured me that I would experience no negative health consequences after quitting, last September I ended up deciding to smoke again to see if it would help. This was a very deliberate choice. Carr's book had really worked as far as breaking me from the psychological need for it, so it wasn't just a matter of rationalization. This time I decided that I would only smoke organic, and that I would only roll my own--I wouldn't even buy American Spirits. This way I'm avoiding as many added chemicals as possible, and also rolling my own makes the act more deliberate. You can't just pull one out of the pack at a moment's notice. Also, they taste about 10x better than even a premade American Spirit. I have on two occasions in the last 9 months bought a pack of AS, and they were vastly inferior. So I've been smoking about 4/day (before I quit last time I was smoking usually 9/day). Unfortunately, though, I didn't actually notice any difference in how I felt. It didn't improve my bowels any more; it didn't make me lose any of the weight I'd gained, etc. So that's another layer of frustration. I've been thinking about quitting again, but I'm afraid to in case I crash again. At least I do have my TyroMix on hand, but what if it's not enough?

So, I guess the answer is no, I haven't yet broken free. I wish I could go back to the time when I smoked only occasionally, once a day in the summertime, quitting for months at a time, etc., without thinking about it. I ramped it up after an emotional breakdown 8 years ago and it turned into an everyday habit that kept increasing as my stress levels and health problems increased. At the time I thought of the smoking as just a stress reliever that didn't actually provide any real benefit, but looking back, I now realize how much slack (for thyroid and sex hormones) the nicotine was picking up for me. In that sense, I'm grateful for it. It was a life-saver (almost literally).

Maybe I'll look into a course of high-dose pregnenolone. I have some Pansterone, but I'm guessing that would be too much DHEA at the same time.

thank you so much for sharing your story. I will definitely look up smoke screens as it sounds like a really interesting read. ah, I wish we would have never started. but oh well, here we are. must proceed.

have a blessed day. :)

 

[denise]

After several people mentioned pregnenolone for quitting, I googled around a bit and found this study.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22188108

I searched for info about this a couple years ago—I'm not sure how I missed this one. But it's pretty amazing the differences in hormone levels between the smokers and nonsmokers. It reinforces in my mind that when I really ramped up my smoking, I was unconsciously doing so medicinally, as I had horrific uterine fibroids at the time. It makes me wonder how much worse things might have been if I hadn't smoked. Of course, if I hadn't been smoking, I may have just sought help sooner because things would have gotten bad that much sooner.

 

[DrJ]

hmmm? which pregnenolone are you taking? I haven't really researched it as I figured I'm only 26, if I focus on thyroid then preg should come internally.

and I'm also concerned with it's hair loss effect that I've read in some people taking it.

Can't really advise on hair loss effects since I never looked into it, but I use Life Extension 100mg capsules. Now I am only taking it 2x per week. I started taking it when I was 30 (now 33).

 

[achillies]

Your smoking to keep serotonin down and t3 up. A lot of people self medicate with cigs unknowingly.

Lower all regular protein Take 2-3 tablespoons of gelatin after meals. Sugar. Aspirin to block tyrtophan absorption.

I stopped 4 years of nicotine easily.

People smoke to lower serotonin and increase dopamine and t3

 

[Frankdee20]

Nicotine has paradoxical effects depending upon dosage. Low doses act as a CNS stimulant, higher ones dull the mind. It mimics acetylcholine, ultimately, and secondary Dopamine effects.

 

[Amazoniac]

Solving problems can be stressful if the person feels stuck, and movement works against that, similar to mice having something to bite during stressful times. There's the classic nervous pacing.

It's rare to find people that take into consideration the movement aspect of smoking.

The effect of chewing gum on tobacco withdrawal
I don't know if it was obvious to everyone already, but it was only now that I made the connection.

 

[Braveheart]

"I'm great at quitting smoking, I do it all the time!"