They make quitting less painful

Let’s face it: quitting smoking can be hard, but it can be done!

Quit-smoking medicines can make quitting easier by reducing your withdrawal symptoms.

woman with cup of coffee thinking

Think back to when you first began smoking cigarettes. You probably started as a teen or young adult. Most people don’t go from not smoking to smoking regularly overnight:

  • The first few cigarettes you smoked probably made you feel uncomfortable. You may have had a coughing fit, or felt sick to your stomach. But you kept trying cigarettes.
  • It took time for your brain to get used to the effects of nicotine, the powerful drug in cigarettes.
  • You learned by experience how to smoke so your lungs didn’t hurt so much, and so you got enough but not too much nicotine.

Quitting smoking is the same thing in reverse:

  • If you have smoked for a long time, you may experience uncomfortable and unpleasant moments as you get used to not having nicotine around anymore.
  • This is called withdrawal, where you feel physically uncomfortable and may have a hard time concentrating or sleeping. You may feel anxious or irritable.
  • In addition, many people have increased urges to smoke that can become hard to control.

When you quit you also have to figure out how to get through the day doing all the things you usually did, but now without a cigarette:

  • The good news is that just like learning how to smoke when you were younger, you will learn how to not smoke over time.
  • Withdrawal, urges, and getting through the day without smoking generally gets better a few weeks after quitting.

Getting through the hard times when quitting can be tough. Quit-smoking medicines can help. They can decrease the intensity of withdrawal and urges. This allows you to concentrate more on figuring out how to get through the day without cigarettes. Learn more about why quitting smoking is hard or about how quit smoking medicines work.

If you’ve used quit-smoking medicines before and felt like they did not help enough, there are new ways to use medicines that may help even more. These include using two NRT medicines at the same time or starting to use quit-smoking medicines before you try to quit. Learn more about new ways to use quit-smoking medicines.