You quit smoking, yay! But now you're addicted to the nicotine gum and secretly it's actually starting to rub off on you. Instead of taking a relaxing smoke break, you just grab another gum. This might make you feel a little inferior and that's probably why you came to this blog, because quitting smoking is one thing, but how do you get rid of that nicotine gum again? Because really, you've only changed the form of getting nicotine, you're still addicted.
To find out, please continue reading this blog.
"Healthy" substitutes for cigarettes are often still a source of nicotine. The addictive substance that now also makes it impossible for you to stop chewing gum. Now you may think that you should just vape or smoke an electronic cigarette to get rid of that nicotine chewing gum again.
This could be a good idea.
Research shows that smokers who have quit often rely less on their electronic cigarette than on nicotine gum.
Another reason why this may be a good idea is because nicotine gum chewing is not entirely without risks. Of course, it is much safer than smoking, and scientifically there are no adverse long-term effects of nicotine chewing.
However, user experiences show a different picture, people suffer from, for example:
- Nightmares
- Nausea
- Stomach Problems
- High blood pressure
- Premature baldness
- Eye Problems
- Dry skin
So much for the practical side of reducing nicotine intake.
Stopping addiction instead of replacing it
As mentioned, you probably wanted to quit smoking and just not be addicted. Instead of not being addicted, you just traded one addiction for another.
Incredibly frustrating!
Maybe you just wanted to save money, and while that nicotine gum is cheaper than cigarettes, it's not exactly free right now either.
Therefore, to stop addiction, it is important to identify triggers or causes of this addiction.
Keep a journal
To find out why and when you chew nicotine, you can keep track of the times you grab such a gum. For example, pay attention to the following:
- What kind of activity are you involved with?
- Are you alone or are there people around you?
- If there are people around you, what kind of people are these?
- Do you have a particular emotion or tension?
- Are you thirsty or hungry?
By answering these four questions, you can find out if you chew gum when you are bored, when you have certain people around you, when you are stressed or just to suppress hunger.
If you chew nicotine gum because you're bored
Do you find that boredom causes you to grab a gum? If so, it's important to figure out why you see that as the solution to boredom and not find other ways to cope first.
For example, you can fight boredom by watching videos on YouTube, reading, painting, writing or whatever, but something stops you from doing activities to keep you from being bored except for the chewing gum.
A hypnotherapist can help you figure out what beliefs you have about finding enough challenge in your life. In cases like this, these beliefs are often about social anxieties "What will people think of me if I do this?" or "Am I good enough?"
These types of fears a hypnotherapist can help you with, such as to boost your sense of self-confidence.
When you chew nicotine gum by certain people around you
Colleagues who only seem to criticize, an evaluation interview, your mother-in-law, that annoying uncle. People can cause stress for all sorts of reasons. In this case, too, a hypnotherapist can help you with calming techniques and beliefs that won't make you need that stupid gumption.
First, you can use mindfulness techniques to stay calm during awkward conversations. This allows you to stay on top of the information of the conversation and not fantasize during the conversation about possible dismissal or a family feud that just can't be reconciled.
This also allows you to be more responsive to the issues raised.
In addition, hypnotherapists can also help you with your social beliefs-why does it matter what your mother-in-law thinks of you? As long as you don't live in her house and your partner puts you number one instead of his/her mother?
These types of beliefs can be found out with a Socratic Conversation. In it, the "why" question is repeated several times to get to the core of your thoughts.
In the process, you can also learn techniques to not only stay calm, but also to enter the conversation with more confidence. When presenting in front of colleagues, for example, there are several ways to reduce anxiety before the presentation.
Nicotine gum chewing when stressed
General stress is very annoying. You're just busy busy busy and worried about whether you'll get everything done. So much to do in so little time.
However, nicotine gum is not always going to help you calm down. Instead, you need to look more for the causes of stress and take practical steps to reduce it.
First, you can start with the practical steps to reduce stress:
Step 1: Start your day with meditation
In the morning, stress can already be at your throat. You need to do this and do that, so now meditate as well . If necessary, set the alarm 10 minutes earlier. What you are going to do is sit quietly on your bed or in a specially made meditation corner. There you will first just focus on your breathing for 10 minutes and nothing else. This is quite difficult, but practice makes perfect.
In fact, by doing so, you reduce the amount of stress hormones at the very beginning of the day, and as a result, you have less stress throughout the rest of the day.
Step 2: Use mindfulness
During your busy schedule, you are probably thinking about your busy schedule. As a result, your focus is not with the task at hand. Instead, by being mindfull and paying attention to what you're doing and not what you're going to do, you can get better in the flow and, as a result, get your tasks off your to-do list faster (and better).
Step 3: Find out why you actually get stressed and take on so many tasks
For this step, you can seek help from a hypnotherapist. As mentioned, people and situations can cause a lot of stress, but why really? Together with a hypnotherapist, you can find out what situations cause you to suffer from stress.
Then you can use regression to find out where that belief that makes such a situation so stressful came from. During regression, you go back to an event in your life that determined a belief. Then you can look at that event with more emotional distance to see if that belief makes as much sense as it has always seemed.
Chewing gum when you're actually thirsty or hungry
Eating is something fun, but also something that some people want to avoid at all costs. Chewing gum with nicotine provides a calming feeling that makes hunger seem not so important.
Still, it is then wise to drink a large glass of water first, as feelings of hunger and thirst are still sometimes confused.
Next, again, it is important to figure out why you prefer to chew rather than eat. Do you do this to avoid snacking or to really avoid eating? And what alternatives are there?
Hypnosis can help with healthy eating, for example.
As with quitting smoking, quitting nicotine gum can be done with the help of hypnosis. In particular, beliefs about nicotine gum, stress and other factors play an important role in the journey to just not being addicted to anything at all.
Want to know how hypnosis works? Then come to a free online master class or take a course at the Hypnosis Institute Netherlands.
Also pin this handy infographic as a reminder:
Sources:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0376871614019863
irene
on 30 Jan 2018