Using Nicotine Gum To Stop Smoking
Chewing a piece of gum in order to stop smoking? Yes, chewing nicotine gum can help you quit your addiction to cigarettes but it isn’t quite the same as chewing a piece of your favorite minty gum. Chewing nicotine gum in order to quit smoking works by allowing your body nicotine while you aren’t smoking cigarettes in order to do so. It is meant to help you deal with your nicotine cravings through a means that isn’t smoking tobacco. That is the idea here – you chew nicotine gum instead of smoking cigarettes in order to deal with your cravings. This way, you aren’t dealing with the intense effects of nicotine withdrawal and you are getting your nicotine in a way that isn’t smoking. But is the use of nicotine gum worth your time? Can it actually help you to quit cigarettes? Sure, you now know the idea behind chewing nicotine gum but what you don’t know is whether or not it is right for you.
Chewing nicotine gum regularly in order to deal with cigarette addiction is a rather tricky method. What I mean by this is that you are fighting fire with fire. Smoking cigarettes is obviously a lot unhealthier than chewing nicotine gum but it is the nicotine that gets you addicted to cigarettes in the first place. So, when you consider the fact that you are substituting nicotine with nicotine you can begin to see how this particular method can be counterproductive. The use of nicotine gum does allow a smoker to deal with withdrawal symptoms and kick the habit of smoking, but it does not totally eliminate the underlying addiction. With that said, it is important to note that the proper usage of nicotine gum is to cope with cigarette addiction as opposed to ending it entirely.
Chewing nicotine gum will not allow you to simply end your addiction to smoking cigarettes. The idea is that you chew nicotine in order to deal with the effects of withdrawal and cravings. You can’t simply “beat” your addiction with nicotine gum. It just doesn’t work that way. Rather, you are supposed to use it to get through the early stages of quitting cigarettes in order to get used to not smoking and to make changes for the better in your lifestyle. A typical usage period of nicotine gum is 12 weeks. What this means is that you to use nicotine gum for this period of time and then gradually stop using it. If all goes well, the nicotine gum will help you to become accustomed to a non-smoker lifestyle, eliminate triggers for smoking, and end your addiction to nicotine. However, as I said before this type of stop smoking method can be counterproductive.
You can’t use nicotine gum forever which means that you need to have a cut off point for its usage. Typically, you don’t want to use nicotine gum for more than 12 weeks. So in the time span of 12 weeks you’ll want to have reduced the amount of gum you are chewing and then finally end its usage completely. There is a problem here, though. As long as you are using nicotine gum you are still technically addicted to nicotine. You are no longer smoking cigarettes to fuel this addiction but you are getting your nicotine in another form. At some point you are going to need to rely on your own will power as nicotine gum cannot totally remove your urges to smoke. It can help you get on the right path and it can help you to get used to not smoking cigarettes, but you are the ultimate decider as far as whether or not you will smoke another cigarette. This is something you need to think about when considering the use of nicotine gum. Nicotine gum is a great aid to get you on the righteous path of quitting but it also cannot do all of the work for you and it still technically has you addicted to nicotine.
