Sick again... or still sick???
em
achoodles since about a week after I quit and have been sick for two
months now. Its kind of an up-and-down kind of thing, not too bad, but
there. It flared up again tonight. I saw a doctor two weeks ago and he
said its just a virus and that some viruses take a long time to go
away. My theory is that I'm suffering from allergies and that the
reason they're just popping up now is because my sense of smell, etc.,
has improved since I quit and my body is now better able to react to
whichever allergen(s) may be the root cause of this problem. Bottom
line: I'm tired of being sick.
I'm wondering if anyone might have a theory or is able to shine a
little light on what might be the problem.
Thanks,
Mike
Terryt
"em" <turco...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:ac5beba0-399d-4338...@i36g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
Google "Quitter's flu".
Here's a cut and paste from an article I read at
http://groups.msn.com/AskJoel/general.msnwaction=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=98:
"All recent quitters need to be aware of two things that can happen when
getting cold or flu near the time that they quit smoking. First, a cold may
be more annoying than normal. If anyone gets a cold within a few months of a
quit, it is often a really uncomfortable one. The reason being not only are
you producing excessive mucous from the infection itself, but since your
Cilia are still in the process of cleaning out of the built up mucous that
has been accumulated over the years and decades that never had a chance of
coming out before, the amount of congestion and the symptoms can really make
a person miserable.
Also, with nerve cells that have now regenerated throughout your whole
respiratory tract functioning normally, you can feel pain and irritation
that were dulled when you were a smoker. It may have taken you a little
longer as a smoker to even know when you were getting sick. With impaired
nerve cells you may not have felt earlier symptoms, or if you did you may
not have been able to differentiate what was just an effect of smoking too
much or of actually having some sort of infection. With nerve cells back in
place you are likely not going to be overly tempted to smoke for the concept
of pouring hot irritating smoke on an already irritated throat is generally
not a pleasant thought.
Where you do have to be careful and aware is that when your cold starts to
dissipate, you might get stronger than normal thoughts for cigarettes. For
while you likely cut back on cigarette consumption when you were a smoker
with a cold, when you started to get better you would have to make up for
lost time, or more accurately, for lower than normal nicotine levels since
you had instinctively cut cigarettes down to a bare minimum in those times.
This makes the first time getting well a potentially powerful trigger. Just
be aware of the fact and it will help you to minimize the effect. Then know
that over your lifetime, your colds will probably be less frequent, resolve
quicker and be less severe as long as you always remember to never take
another puff!"
Try some Echinacea. I take those the minute I start to feel slightly sick.
They work wonders.
Terry
Ray Johnstone
wrote:
Most chronic illnesses are commoner in non-smokers. See
http://members.iinet.net.au/~ray/19jun2006.htm
and
http://members.iinet.net.au/~ray/19jun2006.htm
em
> On Fri, 2 May 2008 00:56:46 -0700 (PDT), em <turco.m...@gmail.com>
I've seen quite a few comments like that. I don't think that smoking
is as terrible as anti-smokers would lead one to believe, nor as
harmless as the pro smoking folks would say. I quit for reasons that
were not health related. I am bummed about the weight I've gained,
which, if not lost, is probably more deadly than smoking.
UUUuhhhgggg... I just caught a _nasty_ flu bug, I think, on top of my
other woes.
Mike