Smoking cigarettes is dangerous, which everyone knows. What everyone might know is exactly why smoking is dangerous to your health. When you smoke you put harmful chemicals into your body and second hand smoke affects the people around you. If you are considering quitting, knowing the dangers that occur as you light up can help you.
Addiction
As a new smoker you might not feel the need to continually light up, but as time progresses you can become addicted to cigarettes. Cigarettes contain nicotine, which is physically and psychologically addicting. Stop-smoking-tips.com, says that once you inhale the nicotine in a cigarette, it can reach your entire body in 15 to 20 seconds and withdrawal symptoms can begin within 30 minutes after finishing the cigarette. As you withdrawal from nicotine you can feel restless, edgy and irritable, and will want to do is have another smoke.
Skin Damage
Every time you light up a cigarette you advance the aging of your skin. Over time, your skin will naturally lose oil, elasticity and collagen production slows down. Repeated facial expressions cause deep grooves to set in and wrinkles are formed around the mouth. Smoking causes the blood vessels in your skin to constrict. When the blood vessels tighten up, it becomes harder for the nutrients in your bloodstream to be delivered. According to MayoClinic.com, cigarettes contain over 4,000 chemicals that also damage the collagen in your skin, which is responsible for elasticity and a youthful appearance.
Oral Health
Most people seem to know that smoking stains your teeth. Your pearly whites can turn yellow and brown, but smoking can cause more serious dental concerns. Smoking is linked to dental disease and oral cancer. According to HealthNews, 90 percent of people who develop mouth, lip, tongue and throat cancer all smoked tobacco. Tobacco destroys your teeth, gums, tongue and throat.
Organ Damage
Each time you inhale while smoking, you put thousands of harmful chemicals into your body. They enter your lunges and then move through your bloodstream. As blood cells travel to your organs to deliver fresh oxygen, they are polluted with chemicals such as carbon monoxide, ammonia, cyanide and formaldehyde. These blood cells travel to your brain, heart, stomach, bladder, kidneys and virtually everywhere in the body. These are just a small number of chemicals that are responsible for cardio and pulmonary disease.
