The Two Week Sample

As Joel reminds us, by the two week mark we have put ourself in position to accurately sample the free, still healing and emerging life that was not long ago buried beneath dependency, fear and despair. You've successfully navigated the up to three days needed to remove all nicotine from your bloodstream. You've now extinguished the vast majority of your regular subconscious nicotine feeding cues and may be nearing the point where you experience entire days without major challenge.

You are probably beginning to appreciate that each time you encounter an as yet un-reconditioned subconscious crave trigger that you are being rewarded upon completion with another piece of the puzzle, one more aspect of a life once dominated by chemical dependency upon smoking nicotine.

By now any initial fears that you were leaving a massive portion of "you" behind, that life without smoking nicotine was almost unimaginable, are being calmed by the honest realization that even the love in our heart, we get to bring it with us.

The excitement you're feeling now, about your freedom and healing, swim in it! Yes, there may be a few more remote triggers up ahead but look forward to each as a glorious moment of healing, not with dread or fear.

As for the conscious thoughts that may at times seem to fill your mind, don't run or try and hide from them. Most reflect the years of lies we fed and sold ourselves in order to look in the mirror each morning and not see a real drug addict looking back. Dig in, sort through the chatter and find the rationalization bantering about. Whether the rationalization, minimization or blame transference involves some aspect of like, stress, taste, love, boredom, oral fixation, flavor, or the addict's false illusion of "just one," grab hold of it and put it under honest light.

Our brain did not grow millions of extra nicotinic receptors (up-regulation) because of like or love. Our lungs did not grow taste buds inside them in order to support some bizzare taste rationalization or tobacco advertising.

Pleasure? Is that what we felt when we'd waited too long between fixes? Which cigarettes each day were truly pleasurable? What about all the others each day, the ones smoked while on auto pilot, that seemed to fill the ashtray and empty the pack without us hardly noticing it was happening? The all came from the exact same pack. Why were they not just as pleasurable?

Might nicotine's two-hour chemical half-life inside the human bloodstream and the fact that a bit of time had passed between nicotine feedings help explain those we thought "pleasurable? As Joel is fond of saying, it isn't that we liked smoking but that we didn't like what happened when we didn't smoke. All the neurochemicals that nicotine controlled via acetylcholine receptor sites already belonged to us. We left absolutely none behind.

Talking about flavor, now scores of neurochemicals are beginning to flow in response to life not in compliance with nicotine two-hour half-life mandatory feeding clock. When the moment calls for deep deep relaxation it will not be destroyed by a nicotine induced adrenaline rush. When it calls for genuine sadness or sorrow it will not be interrupted by a nicotine induced dopamine "aaaahhh" reward sensation.

The next time that joy fills your life for more than thirty consecutive minutes it will not be interrupted by a command to leave and find an acceptable place to service a mandatory chemical need. Take a swim in the gradually emerging you! You've already recovered many of the pieces of the puzzle and are now in a position to sample and notice what it can again be like being "you." Let recovery be your gift of the long forgotten "you" to you. Embrace it!

When you meet the ex-smoker who tells you that they still yearn to smoke nicotine it's because they took their smoking rationalizations with them. Few had the benefit that we've had to fully explore this most amazing chemical and its impact on our physical, subconscious and thinking minds.

Although it has been seven years since I was where you are, and more than four years since I've known anything you'd vaguely consider an urge or crave to smoke nicotine, we are at this moment both equals under the law of addiction. For no matter how many pieces of the puzzle we collect or how deep, calm or comfortable these minds become, our now arrested dependency has traveled with us. It paints a rather bright line in the sand, a line that does not discriminate.

The key to staying on this side of the line and keeping our now arrested dependency on the other is as simple as ... no nicotine today, Never Take Another Puff, Dip, Patch, Suck or Chew! Yes you can, yes you are! We're with you in spirit!

Breathe deep, hug hard, live long,

John (Gold x7)

Nicotine Dependency -
a disease of learning and memory?

Sharon, that's nicotine's only claim to fame, that stolen "aaah" sensation. But for each stolen "aaah" there's either a corresponding low or need to feed (an urge or crave), or there would have been a low if we hadn't engaged in early dependency compliance (almost as if on auto pilot).

Many if not most actively feeding drug addicts -- regardless of chemical -- feel convinced that their "aaah" is worth all the bad that comes with it. Forget for the moment the super toxin nicotine's assault and ravage of the human body, including gradual significant destruction of the brain's gray matter (see Nicotine and Brain Damage ). Instead try to place value upon non-injury related costs.

Is the pack-a-day smoker who spends $3.50 a pack saying that their stolen "aaah" feelings are worth the $1,275 a year, plus transportation costs to get to their supplier, plus the fifteen 40-hour work weeks (608 hours) devoted to servicing their addiction (assuming 5 minutes per smoke). Wouldn't an honest mind also add the value of the constant interruption of life itself, with loss of some of its most special moments, as servicing our addiction took priority over companionship, eating, thirst, accomplishment and, yes, even brief breaks from true romance.

Although researchers tell us that our brains likely have varying degrees of diminished gray matter as compared to those who never became dependent upon nicotine, the irony of it all is that nicotine addiction isn't initially associated with memory loss or an inability to learn but with remembering too well and an inability to forget.

The brain's dopamine pathways are supposed to act as a wonderful built in teacher with pre-programmed values that place priority on survival acts. The pathways not only create powerful aaah sensations but also record a super high definition pre-frontal cortex memory that ties each "aaah" to the specific event stimulating its production. Each time our senses remind our brain of previously recorded associations it can instantly trigger dopamine flow as we anticipate the arrival of even more dopamine that will come when the expectation is actually fulfilled.

Researchers have found that when deprived of the anticipated result (in the nicotine addict's case, not receiving a new supply of nicotine) the normal baseline level of dopamine output, which flows to some degree in all of us, is actually diminished or shut off. They believe that this can foster a sense of anxiety or even depression and may form the basis for crave episodes.

Why do so many of our brother and sister nicotine addicts sacrifice life itself for a chemical? I submit that it isn't because of the "aaah" itself but that the circuits producing the "aaah" have been hijacked. It is extremely challenging to make sound value decisions when the very goal pathways designed to teach importance and establish priorities have been taken hostage by an external chemical.

It's easy for the drug addict who is temporarily satisfied to briefly find logic and reason about the need to quit. But experience a shut down of all dopamine output while saying no to a powerful memory that associates getting more nicotine with another powerful "aaah" and see what happens.

We give thanks that recovery anxieties associated with encountering a triggering association don't last longer than 3 minutes before normal natural dopamine flow is restored. We give thanks that most of these powerful "pay attention" memories and the particular place, person, time, activity, sound, smell, or emotion association between them and smoking are broken with a single encounter during which the mind does not receive the expected result. We give thanks that we now realize that everything we feel and sense during these challenges is a sign of just how deeply nicotine had invaded our lives and a true sign of healing. We give thanks that at the end of each such encounter that we are returned yet another aspect of life.

Nicotine dependency recovery is about picking up the pieces. It's about learning and discovering that everything we did while using nicotine can be done as well or better without nicotine's influence upon us. It's about allowing the time needed to put yourself in position to realize that human relationships carry potential to be vastly more wonderful than chemical ones. This is likely the most wonderful holiday gift that you've ever given you, Sharon. Hold it close and protect it above all else. We're each with you in spirit.

Breathe deep, hug hard, live long,

John (Gold x7)

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Much of the above discussion is from an article by Dr. Steven E. Hyman, M.D. entitled Addiction: A Disease of Learning and Memory, appearing in the August 205 edition of American Journal of Psychiatry at pages 1414 to 1422. This link is to a full text copy of the article: http://ajp.psychiatryonli...i/content/full/162/8/1414