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The first 2-3 weeks: Will you choose emotional and physical withdrawal together? OR Emotional withdrawal only?

JonesCarpeDiem
1 5 12

Everyone who knows anything about quitting smoking will say the first 2-3 weeks are when most people experience the strongest withdrawal symptoms of their quit.

  

The title implies you've made a choice one way or the other as to whether to replace the nicotine.

  

If you replace the nicotine, you will experience the emotional withdrawal but not necessarily the physical as you are using nicotine replacement.

  

So what happens when you use an NRT and you stop using it?

  

You may likely experience some of the symptoms of physical withdrawal. If you lowered your dose to nothing before you stopped using the NRT you may eliminate most of the withdrawal symptoms.

  

So, how will you deal without nicotine?

  

You've come a ways toward the realization that you don't need to smoke just because you think of smoking. You have that power. Once you understand  you don''t need to smoke just because you smoked in a similar situation in the past, smoking is not required like you believed it was.

  

So, yes, you've come a way and gained some ground.

  

If you experience some physical withdrawal after stopping the NRT, accept it. This freedom doesn't come free.

  

you know you can do it now The only way out is through.

5 Comments
About the Author
Hello, My name is Dale. I was quit 18 months before joining this site and had participated on another site during that time. I learned a lot there and brought it with me. I joined this site the first week of August 2008. I didn't pressure myself to quit. HOW I QUIT I didn't count, I didn't deny myself to get started. When I considered quitting (at a friends request to influence his brother to quit), I simply told myself to wait a little longer. No denial, nothing painful. After 4 weeks I was down to 5 cigarettes from a pack a day. The strength came from proving to myself, I didn't need to smoke because I normally would have smoked. Simple yes? I bought the patch. I forgot to put one on on the 4th day. I needed it the next day but the following week I forgot two days in a row I put one in my wallet with a promise to myself that I would slap it on and wait an hour rather than smoke. It rode in my wallet my first year.There's nothing keeping any of you from doing this. It doesn't cost a dime. This is about unlearning something you've done for a long time. The nicotine isn't the hard part. Disconnecting from the psychological pull, the memories and connected emotions is. :-) Time is the healer.