Smoking – Stress Buster Or Enhancer?

Does smoking keep all your stress and worries at bay? Do you stay calm after smoking a cigarette or two? If you ask these questions to any smoker, the answer is a definite yes. They will tell you that whenever they smoke, they feel light, all stress and anxiety is gone and an amazing sense of satisfaction takes over all the negative thoughts. This feeling of calmness is actually the culprit in drawing people to smoke. Yes, it is true that symptoms causing stress and worries are kept at bay after you smoke. However, this is a momentary thing.

What are the immediate effects of Smoking?

Cigarettes contain nicotine that reaches your brain within 10 seconds. It then releases dopamine, which gives the feeling of calmness and tranquility to the smoker. Dopamine, popularly known as pleasure chemical, is present in the human body and is responsible for soothing the nerves and relaxing the muscles. Moreover, it helps uplift mood and enhances concentration levels.

When you take a deep breath, you inhale more oxygen and this helps you relax and feel light. The same happens when you smoke. As smoking is banned in public places, smokers tend to go out. This gives them a break from the monotonous schedule and so they feel stress free.

Therefore, yes there are immediate benefits of smoking. It definitely helps you relax and stay calm.

What Follows next?

The calming effect of smoking is a psychological condition. The nicotine in cigarette affects the neurotransmitters and thus, changes the brain chemistry. With this change, there is a change in the working of brain cells. The pleasurable effects of smoking stay for a while after which, the brain cells return to their normal working. After the effect of nicotine fades, your mood gets worse. You then need to smoke another cigarette for restoring the nicotine levels and uplift your mood. So, we see that there is no de-stressing; you are just pumping in the nicotine, which is hazardous to your health.

The Harmful effects of Nicotine

Nicotine is a very addictive substance, and when it combines with carbon monoxide (CO) in cigarettes, it can lead to a sharp increase in heart rate and blood pressure. Nicotine and CO combination is quite deadly, as it lowers the oxygen level in the body and prevents oxygen flow to the brain. Less oxygen supply impairs the concentration power of a smoker.

Another harmful impact of nicotine is that it constricts the blood vessels. The heart in such a situation has to work harder to circulate blood to all the other body parts. This eventually puts the smoker at greater risk of cardiovascular diseases. Smoking adversely affects the bones and joints thus, making him/her susceptible to bone-related problems.

Smoking can make you infertile as well. It can cause impotence in men, and in women, it can increase the risk of complications during pregnancy. Smoking is also one of the main causes of cancers. It can give you cancers of mouth, throat, liver, kidney, esophagus, stomach etc.

Now, what should be the next step?

After reading all the aforementioned harmful effects of smoking, will you still say that smoking relieves stress? Smoking affects the overall health of the smoker and puts him/her at the risk of countless health problems. The only good that smoking does, is giving you a temporary relief however, it is a placebo effect.

About Author

Jim Helly is an avid blogger who writes on varied stuffs like human wellness, nutrition, impotence, smoking dangers, quit smoking etc. She is currently writing for medexpressrx.com.