How to stop Smoking

The following quotation is from a presentation by Dr. Fenton Howell to a Joint Committee On Health And Children in January 1999.

"The reality is that smoking will kill 50 per cent of smokers.... tobacco is a highly addictive product, anyone that has ever smoked will testify to the difficulty in quitting. Quitting is a difficult process, usually no more than 2 per cent of smokers successfully quit their addiction in any one year on their own."

The Irish Cancer Society estimates around 7,500 deaths a year in this country are due to smoking while the Department of Health estimates that around 30 per cent of all cancers are due to smoking. It is thought that approximately 30% of the Irish population still smoke.

Some facts from The World Health Organisation -

• About 15 billion cigarettes are sold every day or 10 million every minute.
• Cigarettes cause more than one in five American deaths.
• The tobacco market is controlled by just a few corporations - namely British, Japanese and American multinational conglomerates.
• Evidence shows that 50% of those who start smoking in adolescent years go on to smoke for 15 to 20 years.
• Every cigarette smoked cuts at least 5 minutes of life on average - about the time taken to smoke it.
• Smoking is the single largest preventable cause of disease and premature death. It is a prime factor in heart disease, stroke and chronic lung disease. It can cause cancer of the lungs, larynx, oesophagus, mouth and bladder, and contributes to cancer of the cervix, pancreas, and kidneys.
• More than 4,000 toxic or carcinogenic chemicals have been found in tobacco smoke.
• In 1997, the tobacco industry's spending on advertising in the United States was about $15 million a day ($5.7 billion for the year).

In the face of these horrific statistics it is no wonder that, at any one time, it is estimated that 40% of smokers are trying to quit.

Hypnotherapy is proven to be the best method of stopping smoking in studies published by WHICH magazine in 1994 and NEW SCIENTIST magazine in 2001.

Since 1992, according to New Scientist magazine, it has been known that

"Hypnosis is the most effective way of giving up smoking."

Hypnosis when combined with other modalities such as NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) techniques achieves high success rates in the hands of a skilled therapist.

The Kerry Hypnotherapy Clinic specialises in tailor made, smoking cessation programmes that utilise the most powerful techniques for rapid and long-lasting results to your benefit.

When something becomes a habit, it has moved from the conscious mind to the sub-conscious and this is what happens within a short time of starting to smoke. The sub-conscious is a very simple, yet powerful part of our mind that operates on survival principles and it is slow to change any habits or patterns of behaviour. It's rationale is that I've survived up to now doing this so I will continue doing this and continue to survive . Happiness doesn't enter into its considerations. The sub-conscious mind is more powerful than your logical, conscious mind and in conflict situations will always win out. This is why, though a smoker is aware of all the facts about smoking, he or she will continue to pay thousands of euros every year for something that is likely to kill and debilitate them.

As Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Director-General of the World Health Organization put it -

" A cigarette is the only consumer product which when used as directed kills its consumer. "

Along the way, smoking affects your looks: smokers have paler skin and more wrinkles. This is because smoking reduces the blood supply to the skin and lowers levels of vitamin A.

For men in their 30s and 40s, smoking increases the risk of erectile dysfunction by about 50 per cent.

Erection problems in smokers may be an early warning signal that cigarettes are already damaging other areas of the body - such as the blood vessels that supply the heart.

The final iniquity for many smokers is a slow, tortuous death, gasping for breath in the grip of chronic emphysema.

The power of hypnosis is that it can rapidly and powerfully re-programme the sub-conscious mind and bring it into line with your conscious will to achieve the goal of becoming smoke-free. When this happens you are likely to be astonished at the stark contrast between quitting with hypnotherapy and trying to quit using other methods. With the powerful, rapid results of The Kerry Hypnotherapy Clinic programmes you need no longer be mentally torn apart and in dreadful humour; as you leave cigarettes behind you, you can remain happy and calm and 100% focused on your goal of remaining smoke free.

The physical addiction to nicotine is gone within 3 days and the psychological addiction has been treated with a specialist hypnotherapy programme that places you as an individual at the centre of its focus.

The Kerry Hypnotherapy Clinic creates tailor made programmes for each smoker, usually lasting just under 2 hours, that combine hypnosis and other appropriate modalities to maximise the opportunities for you to become smoke-free and allow you to breathe easily again.

If you have the conscious desire to be smoke free then with your co-operation we will harness your sub-conscious mind to the goal of exclusively breathing clean, fresh air and turning your life around.

Many people are afraid of gaining weight when they quit cigarettes; suggestions to avoid this eventuality can also be included in the programme.

The benefits of becoming smoke free go beyond you personally.

Many children wish that a parent who smokes would quit. It has been shown that people who are around your cigarette smoke but don't smoke themselves also suffer serious health consequences, in particular children.

"It is now known that exposure to passive smoking causes a number of fatal and non-fatal health effects. Heart disease mortality, sudden infant death syndrome, and lung and nasal sinus cancer have been causally linked to passive smoking. Serious effects on the young include childhood induction and exacerbation of asthma, bronchitis and pneumonia, middle ear infection, chronic respiratory symptoms, and low birth weight. In adults, acute and chronic heart disease and lung cancer are causally associated with exposure to passive smoking." - Dr. Fenton Howell

In 2002 HBSC Ireland surveyed 8,424 Irish children from randomly selected schools throughout the country and reported the worrying statistic that 18.6% of children report that they currently smoke.

"the tobacco industry in Ireland needs about 25 new smokers every day just to keep market share current and at least 20 of them will be children" - Dr. Fenton Howell

There are many good reasons to become smoke free, including your very continued existence. There are no good reasons to continue smoking except perhaps the difficulty of quitting. Hypnotherapy can take you beyond this limitation.

Claim your freedom, quit now and forever through one session of hypnotherapy with the Kerry Hypnotherapy Clinic.

"There is only one time that is important - NOW!
It is the most important time because it is the only time we have any power over"
Attributed to Tolstoy