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National No Smoking Day is on Wednesday 12 March, highlighting the millions facing an uphill battle with cigarette addiction. Amanda Kendal talks about her efforts to overcome the deadly weed and the help that's on hand
Up in the air
Here we are, once again, at No Smoking Day. I don’t know about you,
but I used to grouch and grizzle whenever this day came round, promising
to give in but informing myself (and anyone else who would listen) that
I would do so when I chose and not on some arbitrarily selected day.
I was a serial giver-upper. So much so that I lost count of the times
that I relapsed, having struggled to go without for a day or two. I might
have been threatening to climb up the wall in frustration, but then there
would always be one tiny little thing that would send my fractious mind
tumbling over and I would scurry for the packet that, with an extraordinary
sense of precognition, I’d hidden at the back of a draw for just
such emergencies.
But one was never enough. Once I’ve had that solitary cigarette,
another would follow as I tried to calm my petulant nerves.
And then there was the socialising. Once, after going without a cigarette
for 11 months, I was offered one by a colleague at a party. “Yes,”
I though to myself. “I would like one.” And I had really thought
that it would be just one. By the next day, I had purchased a packet of
10. Within three days, it was 20. By the end of the month, I was smoking
more than I had ever done before.
It costs a fortune, but no matter how much respective chancellors had
increased the price over the years, with each hike I would initially say
that I was finally going to jack it in - and then I would find ways to
continue to fund my addiction.
So does No Smoking Day make you want to give up? Well, you can, and there
are plenty of ways to boost your chances.
They say that nicotine is harder to quit than heroin, but new hope for
smokers came two years ago when the NHS announced that it would offer
increased assistance to people who wanted to quit.
Today, nicotine patches are available on prescription, a welcome acknowledgement
that smokers who want to give up need constructive support, not simply
ever bigger warnings on their cigarette packets about the damage that
smoking can do to their health. After all, how many smokers do you know
who are going to cough up £4.50 on 20 B&H, only to throw them
straight in the bin because the stern warning on the box has suddenly
brought them to their senses…?
Nicotine patches are one aid, but there is no shortage of others, from
nicotine gum to acupuncture to hypnosis. Some people prefer to go ‘cold
turkey’, while others find that a gradual cutting down can help them
to wean themselves off altogether.
You have to discover what works best for you. But your GP will be more
than willing to help and there are a number of useful links at the end
of this article.
However, it’s one thing to make your home a smoke-free environment
and change your habits when you’re socialising, but if you’re
worried about smoking in the workplace then your union can help too.
UNISON believes that the issue for employers is not whether employees
smoke, but where they smoke. Because the law says that employers must
make sure that their workers are not exposed to hazardous substances,
it would be difficult to say that passive smoking doesn’t constitute
such a threat. You shouldn’t have to work in a smoky atmosphere.
Click
here to read UNISON's detailed guidance on smoking in the workplace
More than once, UNISON has been asked how members can deal with passive
smoking when they are working in a client’s home or in other residential
accommodation. This creates a clash between the right of one individual
to take part in a legal activity in their home and another individual’s
right not to have their own health endangered.
One way of dealing with this question may be to make sure that only those
employees who smoke work with clients who smoke or in those parts of residential
accommodation where the residents are allowed to smoke.
But whether you don’t smoke, have given up, are planning to give
up or have no intention of kicking the weed into touch, UNISON is also
aware of the value of workplaces polices that organise proper smoking
areas for those staff who do smoke.
An outright ban on smoking can alienate smokers and create its own problems,
such as smoking in toilets. And if smokers are forced to stand outside
their workplace, then the employers themselves may feel that this presents
a negative image of their company/organisation to any passers-by or visitors.
But if I can give up, then so can you. Because I did finally manage to
stub out the habit. In the end, it was a combination of a health concerns
and a little sense of competitiveness that arose from knowing that a friend
had managed it.
So, on New Year’s Day 2002, I stuck a nicotine patch on my arm and
threw away my remaining cigarettes, lighters and ashtrays. By the time
that I visited the BodyWorlds exhibition in London that summer, and gulped
at the sight of the diseased lungs, shrivelled and black with tar, it
was a tremendous relief to know that I had not smoked in months –
and an ever greater incentive to make sure that I never did so again.
We all know about the obvious health advantages – cutting our risk
of various cancers and heart disease – but are there any other incentives?
Your sense of smell will gradually return, together with your sense of
taste.
You won’t wake up in the middle of the night coughing unstoppably
or in the morning with a mouth that feels like the cat’s litter tray.
As your body adjusts to life after cigarettes, you’ll find yourself
with more energy and able to do things like climb stairs more easily.
But just one word to the wise. It is said that, when the nicotine is gone,
your libido will start to increase. Not that I’d know anything about
that, of course…
Contact the article's author Amanda Kendal
HELP IS AT HAND“Just another one”, “Oh, I’ll give up tomorrow”, “My grandfather was 91 when he died and he still smoked”, “But I’d put on too much weight”. Which of these excuses have you heard for not giving up smoking? And which of them have you used? Giving up is hard everyone knows that. But there’s support and encouragement out there, just waiting to help you quit. And you can… The official This
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