Quit Smoking Benefit Lasts A LifetimePerhaps you've been smoking for years, perhaps even most of your life, and you think you're well past the days when it would benefit you to quit smoking. "I'm going to die someday, anyway," you might tell others as an excuse. "I've been smoking for too long for it to be any good to quit now." But the benefits of being able to quit smoking are not only for the young and new smokers. No matter how long you have been smoking, you can still get a much healthier body back, lowering your very increased risk of diseases by half or even equal to that of a person who has never smoked.
Stop making excuses. You can have smoked for thirty, forty, or even fifty years, yet any minute you can summon the willpower not to smoke is another minute in which your body begins to heal. If you don't see the benefits of being able to quit smoking and continue to smoke, you will continue to undermine your body's struggles to heal itself by adding further damage to your organs, immune system, and healing system. When you quit smoking, your body will feel the benefits of being smoke-free within only twenty minutes' time. If you overcome your nicotine craving, your heart rate and blood pressure return from elevated to normal and within eight hours, your body benefits from oxygen levels returning to normal as nicotine and carbon monoxide-toxins that harm your body-are reduced by half. If you continue to quit smoking, you will continue to see benefits in only one day after your last cigarette when carbon monoxide is completely eradicated from your body and your lungs begin to clear themselves of excess mucus. Within two days of your last cigarette, nicotine is no longer in your body (although the cravings will undoubtedly remain-keep up resisting temptation!) and you may notice you now benefit from improved senses of taste and smell. Three days after you quit smoking completely, your breathing will improve so that you're no longer short of breath, and your energy levels will increase. Within a few weeks, if you have totally quit smoking without slipping, your nicotine cravings should vanish nearly completely and your blood circulation will recover. What are the long-term benefits you'll see when you quit smoking? In only three to six months after you've quit smoking, your lungs' ability to clean and purify the air you inhale will increase by 10% so that you experience less coughing, wheezing, and shortness of breath. What's the main benefit one year after you have quit smoking? Your chances of coronary heart disease are cut in half. Five to fifteen years after you quit smoking, you continue to benefit each day. Your chances for lung, pancreas, mouth, throat, cervix, esophagus, and bladder cancer are cut in half and your chances for a stroke or heart disease are that of someone who has never smoked. There are the superficial benefits, too: you, your home, and your car will no longer reek of smoke, your skin and teeth will become less yellow-tinged. There are the financial benefits; how much money would you save if you didn't buy cigarettes this week, month, or year? You'll benefit from not having to find a place in an ever-increasing nonsmoker's world to light up, even if it's cold, wet, and rainy. It's never too late to quit smoking and reap the benefits of a healthier, happier life! |