Caffeine may or may not be good for you but I don't want to be beholden to anything. No caffeine in the morning is no problem. Views on what is healthy for you are always changing. Red wine, classical music, or pot, each user group has some study that says there are health benefits. You wouldn't believe how many pot heads tell everyone it is a cure for everything and has absolutely no negative health issues. Then they tell me they can't get through a day with out it. People seem to want an altered consciousness and always have. Look at how old alcohol is or chewing cocoa leaves.
That’s coca leaves. Coca is the plant that cocaine is derived from. Cocoa gives us chocolate. Two entirely different plants.
Another perspective. For those that can quit smoking and replace a bad habit with a good and everything works out - wonderful! But for those that can't, or don't wish to, there is a way to mitigate the habit. My wife and I buy whole Virginia tobacco leaves, shred them ourselves with a manual shredder [costs $40]. We use a cheap hand roller [$3] to roll cigarettes with unbleached cigarette papers [1 to 3 cents each in bulk]. Whole leaves do not have the hefty cigarette taxes, so the habit costs my wife and I around $500/year total. The tobacco is very low in nicotine, yet very satisfying, so we can go hours without a cigarette. A lot of chemicals put in typical cigarettes are avoided this way. As far as impact on health - my wife recently had a migraine-related seizure last year. At the hospital she was fully checked out with chest x-rays, EKG, 2 CAT scans, etc. The verdict was that she was perfectly healthy and they asked if she exercised because her vitals were so good. And this is a lifelong smoker. The only recommendation made was for supplemental magnesium to help with migraines. That's worked great. I do not post this to dissuade anyone from trying to quit as it is still a bad habit, we all know that. But for some people quitting is just too hard or sad and there are ways to 'improve' it.
My issue now is that I have quit for 11 months but I have gained 20 pounds. Not easy to shed for me either.
That's very common. Try looking into appetite-suppressing foods and drinks. And of course adopting some form of physical activity that you enjoy and sustain often works for X-smokers. All that matters is whether you feel better about yourself now than you did a year ago.
One is not enough. From a (meta-)study published a few days ago: "There was evidence of a non-linear association between consumption and some outcomes, with summary estimates indicating largest relative risk reduction at intakes of three to four cups a day versus none (...)" http://www.bmj.com/content/359/bmj.j5024 Christian
Ahhh, it's great to be smoke free still. When I first started this thread she was my girlfriend and we quit together. Now we will be married as non-smokers in just a couple of weeks! I admit, there has been times of temptations but something has kept me from taking that first smoke!