I was reading a recent article in the ‘Times’ regarding women’s health problems called ‘How to stub out the habit’ by Dr Mark Porter, which in itself was informative and helpful to those wanting to quit smoking. But what got my juices flowing was that the article blew a smokescreen over the real reason why folk smoke or cannot break the habit, which like all other habits and addictions is based around the persons mindset.
Dr Porter mentioned the use of willpower and talked a great deal about the use of drugs as replacement treatments but not once mentioned the real cure i.e dealing with and changing the reasons why people think they need to smoke! Talking about the use of varenicline as the most popular treatment amongst his patients he goes on to say, “Trials show a success rate as high as 44 percent at the end of the course, reducing to around 25 percent after the end of a year. (Around half of all smokers relapse within a year of quitting whatever method they use.) But real-world quit rates tend to be lower than this, and side-effects can be an issue, particularly feeling sick, insomnia and nightmares.” Hmm, those side effects don’t sound too good, probably need more drugs to cure them and the success rates don’t seem to be all that clever either especially in the real-world that he mentions, wherever that is – aren’t his patients in the real-world?
Willpower is only as good for as long as you can keep it going, which in most cases isn’t very long, and it can cause a lot of anxiety which of course gives the smoking habit a hole in your defences through which to climb. Drugs are to my way of thinking the last resort, why substitute one drug for another and fill the drug companies coffers at the same time. They merely mask the symptoms without getting to and healing the root causes of the problem. How we live is determined by how we think, thought is the start of every action that we take from who we like and dislike, what we like or dislike, whether we are positive or negative, what causes us stress and what gives us peace of mind and whether we choose to smoke or not. If we choose to do something that we don’t really want to do we have the option to be able to alter the way we think about it. Hypnotherapy is a great way of overwriting old ways of thinking with better and healthier options, quickly and painlessly and without the side affects that both willpower and drugs may produce.
So, nice article Dr Porter and I’m certainly not trying to put you down over this, anyone helping people to stop smoking is good in my book but lets not blow a smokescreen over the real reasons people smoke, the reasons that once dealt with then become the cure – thought!
I am generalising of course but ever since I was nursing I have been struck by how few doctors really are interested in the ‘mind – body’ relationship and pooh pooh things like hypnosis that really can offer permanent behavioural change. Why won’t more GPs link up with Clinical Hypnotherapists to offer a more holistic approach to treatment especially in areas such as smoking and weight loss.
In the last six years of working with my friend Adam Eason a clinical hypnotherapist and seeing him in action, I have witnessed first hand how he has helped thousands of people with his simple to use audio hypnosis MP3s overcome addictions such as smoking with NO SIDE EFFECTS EXCEPT better health prospects.
Come on Dr Mark Porter – you can offer better advice than at present (what about the NHS Smoke Stop programme as well) and I directly challenge you to check out the help Adam Eason and other Clinical Hypnotherapists could offer your patients.
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