If you have recently made the choice to quit smoking, congratulations. You will enjoy improved health as well as a newfound freedom from this habit and addiction. Exercise can assist you in improving your overall health and serve a useful purpose in weight control. In fact, exercise can even help you with the quitting process. Unless you have health restrictions, the sooner you begin exercising, the better.
Smoking and Weight Gain
Other than the fear of going through withdrawal, most smokers fear gaining weight after stopping smoking. In fact, it is the reason many of them hang onto the habit. It is a valid fear: According to Quit Smoking Support, the average smoker gains about 8 lbs. after giving up the habit. Nicotine does speed up your metabolism, so it is easy to gain weight without eating more after you quit. Many people substitute food for cigarettes as they regain their sense of smell and taste after quitting. Taking in more calories while burning fewer adds up to putting on weight.
Exercise Benefits
Taking up exercise after stopping smoking has some obvious benefits, such as weight control. Exercise can also reduce stress and depression and improve your mood. The act of accomplishing something you might have been unable to do beforehand will increase your confidence. You will have greater physical fitness and performance. It is like adding something to your life while you are taking something away, only the thing you are adding is health-giving rather than health-destroying. Check with your physician to make sure you are healthy enough for physical activity.
Helping You Quit
A study done at Brown University and published in the June,1999 issue of "Archives of Internal Medicine" reported on the exercise experiences of 281 women who were in the quitting process. All the women attended a 12-week smoking cessation program, and 134 of them also participated in supervised exercise sessions. The researchers found that the exercise subjects were twice as likely to quit and to stay smoke-free. By the end of 12 weeks, 19.4 percent of those exercising had stopped smoking for two months compared with 10.2 percent of the control group. One year later, 11.9 percent of the exercises still were not smoking, compared with 5.4 percent of the controls. By the end of treatment, the exercising women had gained only half the weight of the control group and were in better shape physically.
The Brain and Exercise
Researchers at the University of Exeter found that changes in brain activity that were brought about by physical exercise might help reduce cravings for cigarettes. Ten people who smoked regularly were asked to cycle at a moderate pace for 10 minutes after abstaining from cigarettes for 15 hours. They were given MRI scans while viewing 60 images of cigarettes that would normally cause cravings. On a different occasion they viewed the same images without having done the exercise. The MRI showed different images for the two conditions. After no exercise, there was greater activity in the brain areas where reward processing and visual attention take place. These areas were not activated after exercise and the smokers reported fewer cravings for cigarettes. Lead researcher Kate Janse Van Rensburg commented that the evidence suggests that exercise can help people give up smoking. The study was published in "Psychopharmacology" in January 2008.
