Stop Smoking Tips

What Creates the Energy Rush?

Nicotine also has an effect on the brain and its function. Like a computer your brain process information and then stores it for future use. In a computer this information is stored in the form of electricity while in the brain neurons are the cells that transfer and integrate that information.

Each neuron has thousands of bits of input from other neurons in proximity in the brain. These signals help the neuron to calculate if the signal it receives will be passed to other neurons in the pathway.

The signals that run through the neurons are conducted as electrical current but between neurons there are chemical transmitters called neurotransmitters. These neurotransmitters move over the space between the two neurons and fit into a special receptor in the cell. Once in place they set in play a physiological change that allows the neuron to send the signal.

Each neurotransmitter has a specific family of receptors or places to bind on the cell. Nicotine works by inserting into a receptor that normally takes acetylcholine. Depending upon the area of the body acetylcholine is responsible for delivering signals from the brain to the muscle, controls heart beat and breathing, oversees the flow of information in the brain and plays a role in learning and memory.

Nicotine will lead to a burst of activity in those receptors but there is no regulation to the distribution of the chemical like there is for acetylcholine when the body releases it. This increased stimulation will lead to an increased amount of body and brain action that the smoker interprets as a way of re-energizing themselves. Using these pathways reaction time and ability to pay attention will improve.

Stimulating these neurons will also promote the release of dopamine in the reward pathway of the brain. Simply put these chemicals make you feel pleasure and feel good which encourages the smoker to seek that peace and happy feeling again and again.

It will also increase the release of glutamate which is a transmitter involved in learning and memory. Researchers have found that glutamate may create a memory loop of the good feelings that you receive from the nicotine and further drive the desire to use the source of the drug.

What Damages the Smoker’s Body

Nicotine may cause all of these effects in the body but it is only ONE of the over 4,000 chemicals KNOWN to be in cigarette smoke. The real damage that happens to the lungs happens from the smoke itself. While inhaling smoke particles are also deposited into the lungs. These particles are bits of hydrocarbon that damage the lung tissue and cause cancer.

These particles are deposited into the alveoli (small air sacs in the lungs) and because of their weight they do no leave. The body scrambles quickly to try to neutralize the hydrocarbons and other chemicals that are deposited but unless the smoker smokes only one cigarette every 3 days the body is unable to keep up the housekeeping duties.

These particles that get deposited in the lungs cause many health problems, all good reasons to quit smoking.

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