How Antidepressants Help You Quit Smoking
When you make the choice to stop smoking, there’s something you might not have realized yet. Stopping smoking can cause you to experience feelings of #depression. One of the reasons for the feelings of depression is because smoking can become a habit that’s emotional in nature.
But it’s also because of what nicotine does inside your body that doesn’t have anything to do with depression. Nicotine is an addictive substance that makes you feel good, so your body wants more of it.
Nicotine affects the brain by giving you an endorphin spike. These endorphins in your brain are responsible for making you feel good. Once the nicotine is lessened, you don’t get those same emotional highs that you did when you were smoking like you normally would.
By not having this endorphin release, your moods are going to swing and feelings of depression can start to occur. Antidepressants help you quit smoking because they stop that nicotine process.
Who should use this medication? Antidepressants are great for people who have tried to quit cold turkey and haven’t been able to – and they’re also an alternative for people who have tried nicotine patches or other aids but weren’t able to quit smoking. This kind of medication works to help the brain’s chemistry feel good without the use of nicotine.
The plus side to using an antidepressant is that they don’t have the same strong addictive power that nicotine has, so you won’t become addicted to them. What they can do is gradually ease you through the withdrawal from nicotine so that you don’t have to suffer with the frustrating symptoms of depression and anxiety.
When you smoke, the nicotine levels don’t stay the same, so you experience periods of low mood, irritability and frustration when you can’t have a cigarette. Once you get a cigarette, the nicotine level is charged back up and your mood improves. An antidepressant medication works to keep your mood on an even keel. You won’t get the highs and lows that you get with nicotine.
Since the products don’t have any nicotine in the ingredients, antidepressants can also be used together with other stop smoking aids like the patch. This is an effective method for people who are using smoking cessation aids and are still having trouble with withdrawal side effects.
Another factor in choosing to go with this kind of medication is that antidepressants can be used short term to get you through the roughest days of stopping smoking, which can in turn help boost your determination to make the change.
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