Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable illness and death In Spain alone there are already 58,000 tobacco-related deaths annually.
Smoking kills half of its users prematurely, causes multiple health problems for exposed people, and leads people infected with COVID-19 to be admitted to intensive care more frequently.
Prolonged consumption of nicotine produces addiction, and therefore Abrupt cessation of consumption triggers a withdrawal syndrome which is characterized by the following symptoms: irritability, frustration, anger, anxiety, difficulty concentrating, increased appetite, restlessness, depressed mood and insomnia.
That is to say, initially, when one tries to eliminate tobacco from one’s daily life, one feels a strong protest from the body, which was accustomed to that substance. This is one of the reasons why quitting tobacco is difficult, but with the right support, quitting tobacco is possible.
Giving up an addiction involves going through a series of phases
The psychological approach to smoking initially consists of evaluate how this habit has developed ; This includes knowing what factors are maintaining tobacco consumption.
By knowing the reasons that explain why the person continues smoking, we can influence these triggers, which are often automated.
The person who suffers from an addiction (whether to tobacco or some other substance) moves through a series of phases: precontemplation, contemplation, preparation for change, action, maintenance and, when this occurs, relapse
The initial evaluation of the case will allow us to know in which phase of this process the person is, and this is essential, because depending on this the therapy will be oriented in one way or another, the objective being to accompany the patient as they advance through the successive phases. until you manage to completely quit tobacco and become an ex-smoker.
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Quitting smoking involves dealing with ambivalence
The smoker is divided between the desire to smoke (craving) and the reasons that drive him to stop smoking In this struggle it is useful to remember that motivation is a state, it is not a stable aspect; This means that motivation fluctuates depending on what the person feels, thinks and does.
There are internal triggers (getting rid of anxiety) and external triggers (being exposed to situations associated with tobacco). Internalizing the reasons why a person decides to quit smoking is essential, because values are more stable than motivation and they can serve as something solid and stable to hold on to.
It is as if we were on a boat in the middle of a storm; The tossing and heaving waves, strong winds and instability would represent the unpleasant sensations associated with withdrawal syndrome, but if we have a good anchor, no matter how strong the waves are, the boat will not sink.
This anchor represents our values: taking better care of our children, enjoying better health, increasing our life expectancy to see our grandchildren grow up, showing ourselves that we can achieve difficult things, improving our performance in sports, having a home free of bad things. smells where our friends and family can feel comfortable, have more money for the things that are really important, or whatever our reasons are for quitting the tobacco habit.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, a useful approach to quit smoking
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a therapeutic approach that maintains that a large number of psychological problems, very different from each other, share a common characteristic, and that is that the person suffers from a series of discomforts (anxiety, sadness, hallucinations , pain or desire to consume) and tries, in multiple ways, to reduce these unpleasant experiences. In the short term, attempts to control the discomfort may be helpful, but in the long term they lead to exacerbation of symptoms and, more importantly, to neglect those things that are important and valuable to you.
In the case at hand, many smokers smoke to avoid unpleasant situations such as anxiety, nervousness, insecurity in social situations, or boredom.
This type of psychotherapeutic approach aims help the patient examine the usefulness of his attempts to control discomfort and show that, in the long term, these strategies are ineffective. The objective, therefore, is not so much that the patient does not have a bad time, but that he learns to tolerate the discomfort so that attempts at control do not lead him to distance himself from the things that really matter to him.
Clarifying these really important things is crucial; thus the values of the person who intends to quit tobacco become the new compass the commitment to quit smoking being a deliberate decision, made from freedom, not least from other less consistent factors such as fear of the consequences of smoking or the desire to please someone.
