Weedless Wednesday
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 @ 3:57 AM
Prince George, B.C.- Today is Weedless Wednesday, the day those who still smoke, are encouraged to try and give up the habit for one day.
Weedless Wednesday is smack dab in the middle of National Non Smoking week, and this year the theme is “Breaking up is hard to do.”
The Province of B.C. has been trying to make that “break up” a little easier with the free access to nicotine replacement therapies. Since the program was launched at the end of September, more than 63 thousand British Columbians have requested the free nicotine therapies.
Melodie St. Jean of Prince George registered with the smoking cessation program. A smoker for 30 years, she has now been smoke free for more than 90 days. “I wanted to quit for a while, but having access to the nicotine reeplaement patch through the program gave both me and my husband the added incentive to make this leap.”
The New Year has started off with about 4,500 people placing orders for nicotine replacement therapies.
Of the orders received since the free program was launched at the end of September, 3,680 have come from people with in the region served by Northern Health. That represents 6% of all orders, the lowest percentage among all Health regions.
It is estimated there are 550 thousand smokers in the province.
Comments
Good luck to all you try to quit today. It will be hard, it will make you feel worse for a while until your body gets used to it but in the end, you will benefit from this.
BS, quitting is not hard. It’s only because people have been told for years and years how hard it is that they have come to believe it. It does not make you feel worse to go without a cigarette. Using aids like nicorette, lonsenges, etc just prolong the addiction to nicotine and you will still have to go through the withdrawls after you quit the gum. So the real fact is, nicotine is out of your system in less that 72 hrs, regardless of how long or how much you have smoked, and the physical craving ends after that. Plus any physical craving instantly goes away if you dd something else, or just think about something else, before long you won’t even know your body craved a smoke it is that quick to go away. It really is easy, don’t let anyone tell you different.
Wow! I wish I were as strong-willed as you. How long did you smoke? Did you even smoke at all?
After being a smoker for twenty plus years and having tried to quit many times, I finally kicked the habit three years ago.
For me, I did crave the nicotine, but the hardest part was finding something to replace the habit of always lighting up in certain places or at certain times. Even now, I often crave a smoke when I’m having a beer, am on a coffee break, when I get into the car, etc. I’ve changed my pack of smokes a day habit to a two packs of gum a day habit.
Quit 2 years+ ago after smoking for 34 years. Your right, the mental part, and associating smoking with activities are hard to get past. But that isn’t what all the ads want to lead you to believe. They want to convince you that your body NEEDS nicotine and the ONLY way you can quit successfully is if you use thier habit prolonging aid and gently wean yourself off. To this I say BS and will continue to say BS because it is. Do you pull a sliver out slow? Do you take a bandaid off slow? If you do, you know the pain is longer than if you just did it and got it over with.
And to just add to the above. I have never ever craved a cigarette since quitting because I choose to be non-smoker instead of a smoker who has quit.
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