Can CBD help you quit smoking?
New year, new you – everyone tries to bring about personal change with resolutions. The most popular include:
- Improve your fitness.
- Improve finances.
- Lose weight
- Make more time for your loved ones
- Stop smoking
The fifth is very common as millions still smoke cigarettes, unfortunately it is also one of the hardest to keep. Tobacco is a leading cause of heart disease and cancer and causes a variety of lung diseases. In the United States alone, more than 40 million adults are addicted to nicotine. Worse still, treatments for tobacco addiction seem largely ineffective.
Smoking cessation medications do not provide guaranteed results in the long term. But there is a promising solution to this problem. CBD (cannabidiol) is an active ingredient that is obtained from the hemp plant and is now often used for medical purposes. So can it deal with tobacco addiction? How to stop smoking using CBD oil? Read on to find out all this.
Is CBD addictive?
As most of us know, smoking marijuana is addictive. Is CBD then addictive? In reality it is not. Cannabidiol is one of the non-toxic cannabis ingredients and does not alter brain function. This is why you cannot develop an addiction to CBD. In addition, cannabidiol can alleviate the psychoactive effects of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the main active ingredient in recreational marijuana.
How CBD helps you quit smoking
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1. CBD combats tobacco withdrawal symptoms
Nicotine is just as addictive as hard drugs like cocaine. That's why it's so hard to quit smoking. Once you try to quit this deadly habit, you will be faced with an almost insurmountable barrier of withdrawal symptoms. It's not just the urge for another cigarette. Tobacco withdrawal develops within a few days and is accompanied by headaches, increased appetite and irritability, anxiety, insomnia, high blood pressure and depression.
The worst part is that you may feel this nightmare for weeks. If it were easy to get through this period, smoking would not become a global problem.
So how can CBD help you overcome nicotine addiction? The fact is that CBD regulates the sleep/wake cycle, pain, mood and satiety. It fights headaches, promotes restful sleep and regulates blood pressure. With this in mind, CBD can relieve some physical symptoms of nicotine withdrawal and help you get through this period without much difficulty.
2. CBD cigarettes can relieve tobacco cravings
You take a cigarette out of the pack, light it and take a quiet, long, warm drag. They have been doing this for years, day after day. Stopping this is unimaginable: this ritual is imprinted in your memory. It's part of your identity. However, you can also try a CBD cigarette instead of a regular cigarette if you feel the urgent urge to smoke. It can be your first step towards overcoming tobacco addiction. Additionally, CBD prevents most nicotine withdrawal symptoms from damaging your body and mind.
Therefore, you can maintain the smoking habit while replacing regular cigarettes with a much healthier alternative. This way, quitting smoking is much easier than simply making a sudden drastic change to your routine.
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3. CBD helps you relax
Cannabidiol has obvious, well-studied anti-anxiety properties. Both animal and human studies show that CBD reduces anxiety just as much as diazepam, a common sedative. For example, CBD brings relief to people with fear of public speaking. Cannabidiol also shows enormous effectiveness in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
All in all, it is an effective stress-relieving supplement that will help you deal with panic attacks and depression caused by quitting smoking.
4. CBD reduces cigarette consumption
Researchers discovered a direct connection between CBD intake and cigarette consumption. One study showed that people addicted to tobacco reduced their cigarette consumption by an impressive 40% by taking CBD. In addition, CBD minimizes the pleasure of smoking cigarettes. In other words, nicotine won't give you that pleasure when you take CBD.
Another study showed that smokers who took CBD were less motivated to smoke cigarettes.
In this study, 30 smokers took 800 mg of CBD after quitting cigarettes overnight. Participants reported that they enjoyed watching other people smoke less. In other words, it was easier for participants to ignore cigarette stimuli.
RELATED: Top 10 Benefits of Vaping Over Smoking
There was no significant difference between the CBD and placebo treatments when it came to cigarette cravings and withdrawal.
However, the researchers examined short smoking abstinence periods (11 hours). There is not enough time for the most physical nicotine withdrawal symptoms to occur. This could be a possible reason for such observations on the effectiveness of CBD against tobacco withdrawal in this study.
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How to take CBD for tobacco addiction
As we found out, CBD helps you quit smoking. But how to take cannabidiol to overcome nicotine addiction? Here is a step-by-step guide:
Choose high quality products
There is one rule you should always follow: buy CBD cigarettes, tinctures, vape oils and other products from reliable and reputable brands. To do this you must check:
- The THC content in each product. It must be below 0.3%.
- The hemp source. Prioritize brands with their own hemp fields in the US or Western Europe.
- Certifications and drug testing. It is always better to choose certified products that meet US hemp cultivation standards and undergo regular third-party laboratory testing.
Adjust CBD dosage gradually
“How much CBD should I take to fight my tobacco addiction?” you may be asking. The exact dosage depends on your metabolism, weight and the intensity of cigarette withdrawal complications such as headaches, sleep disorders, high blood pressure, etc.
RELATED: How to Beat Nicotine Addiction Naturally with Cannabis
Therefore, you should consult your doctor to decide the starting dose and increase it slowly for better results. You can start with 12-15 mg of CBD per day to see how your body responds to cannabidiol. If such a dose works well for you, you can start taking more CBD to reduce the importance of cigarette irritation.
CBD can be a viable solution for those trying to quit smoking. First, cannabidiol combats several tobacco withdrawal symptoms such as anxiety, insomnia, headaches, and high blood pressure. Second, it helps you ignore references to cigarettes. Third, CBD cigarettes can be a temporary healthy alternative to traditional cigarettes on the road to quitting smoking.
Finally, CBD reduces stress and helps you deal with emotional pressure. With this in mind, CBD is your opportunity to break the suffocating chains of addiction and literally breathe freely.
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