Did you know when you combine a weight management intervention with stopping smoking, it can drastically reduce weight gain associated with quitting.
When is the last time you thought about stopping smoking? Maybe like most smokers, you’ve quit several times in the past, only to start again, back at square one. One of the most talked about issues when contemplating stopping smoking is the whole issue of weight gain. Chances are one or more of the following questions have popped into your head:
– Will I put on weight if I stop smoking?
– How much weight do you gain after stopping smoking?
– Why am I gaining weight after quitting smoking?
– Does smoking increase metabolism?
– How can I avoid gaining weight when I quit smoking
Tobacco use continues to be a major public health issue and there is no doubt that what comes with quitting is often weight gain. Studies have shown that those who smoke in addition to being overweight are at an increased risk for the development of Type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and cardiac disease.
The good news is that a proper weight management intervention can help in the prevention of the onset of such conditions while addressing unwanted weight gain.
It takes between 4 and 21 days to change a habit so as much can be expected for smoking. Those 21 days can be overwhelming and challenging, that’s where Motivation comes in – we have a range of programmes designed specifically to help people through such a transition.
Upon quitting smoking, people who have a higher BMI (Body Mass Index – check yours here) at the time of stopping have been proven to gain in excess of the average person who has a normal BMI to begin with. This is where commencing a weight loss programme ties in nicely with quitting at the same time.
Many smokers attempt to cope with the nicotine withdrawal by substituting eating for the hand-to-mouth behaviour of smoking. You’ve quit smoking and this is your reward but it comes at a cost with the addition of extra calories to your diet in place of cigarettes. In some cases where there may not be an increase in the amount the quitter eats some people experience a change in taste, developing a sweet tooth, one that they’d not know they had. Too much refined sugar in the diet is always something we want to avoid and to address this our programmes are designed to be low in sugar.
The concept of food or oral reward links back to mental programming from childhood. You may remember being told during your youth, “finish your dinner and you can have dessert.” Our programmes address such psychological programming that may be impacting your ability to stop smoking. Classic examples of oral reward take place all the time when it comes to cigarettes: perhaps during a busy workday, you escape out from your desk for ten minutes or at the end of the day when you feel you deserve a cigarette having been stressed all afternoon.
Stress is, of course, another huge contributor to why people smoke with smoking often seen as a way to de-stress. In this podcast and using our programmes we examine your stress signals and why you turn to a cigarette to cope.
There is a large body of evidence that shows that 80-90% of people that quit smoking gain weight but there is also a lot of positive evidence that when you combine a weight management intervention with stopping smoking, it drastically reduces those percentages.
Why not download our free Quit Smoking guide. Great advice and tips to help you quit smoking, once and for all.
What are you waiting for? Click here and request a callback today and find out how Motivation can help you to stop smoking and not put on weight.
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