Where the time actually goes

Most people underestimate their scrolling by a wide margin. The average person now spends well over two hours a day on social media, and that figure keeps climbing because the apps are built to push it higher. For an ADHD brain, add time blindness into the mix, and a “quick check” genuinely doesn’t register as forty minutes gone until it’s over. That’s not a character flaw, it’s how the ADHD nervous system processes duration.

Zoom out and the cost becomes clearer. An hour a day is roughly a fortnight of your waking life every year, handed to a feed that was never designed with your wellbeing in mind.

The dopamine piece

Doom-scrolling works because every swipe might deliver something boring, something upsetting, or something fascinating. That unpredictability is a variable reward schedule, the same mechanism that makes fruit machines compelling. Your brain releases a small hit of dopamine not when you get the reward, but when you don’t know if the next one is coming.

ADHD brains are especially drawn into this loop because they tend to run on lower baseline dopamine. Seeking stimulation becomes the brain’s natural way of topping that up, and a phone offers an endless, frictionless supply. The trouble is, the hit rarely lands the way it promises. There’s a rush of motivation after something stimulating catches your attention, but it fades fast, and the brain is left still hunting for the next small spike.

Layer on time blindness, impulse control differences, and a tendency toward hyperfocus, and you’ve got a genuinely difficult combination to interrupt from the inside. If you also feel things about the world’s injustices more intensely than most, which is common in ADHD, distressing content pulls even harder, because it adds a stress response on top of the dopamine loop.

Worth knowing: the more this cycle repeats, the less each scroll actually satisfies. Your reward system adapts and needs more input to feel the same lift, which is why sessions tend to creep longer over time rather than shorter. It isn’t you losing willpower, it’s habituation, a well-documented feature of how the reward system works.

What it costs beyond the hours

Screen-heavy scrolling is now consistently linked to higher rates of anxiety and low mood, and researchers are increasingly connecting extended exposure with a shrinking attention span, the ability to sit with stillness, focus, and hold information gets harder to sustain the more the habit repeats. Late-night scrolling carries its own cost too. What starts as a soothing wind-down can easily tip the nervous system into a stress response, which is exactly the opposite of what you need before sleep.

What actually helps, without relying on willpower alone

Working with ADHD clients, I’ve found the strategies that stick are the ones that work with the brain’s wiring rather than against it.

• Substitute, don’t just restrict. Give the brain novelty with a natural endpoint, an audiobook chapter, a podcast segment, a short stretch routine.
• Add friction. Grayscale mode, app timers, or simply charging your phone outside the bedroom all reduce the automatic reach.
• Bound the habit rather than banning it. A fixed 15 minutes morning and evening turns an open-ended pull into a task with an edge, which ADHD brains tend to respect more easily than “just stop.”
• Name the urge. A CBT technique I use often: before you scroll, pause and ask, “what am I hoping this gives me right now?” That small gap of awareness is often enough to interrupt the automatic loop.
• Protect your wind-down window. A staged approach, a warning alarm, then a ten-minute alarm, then lights out, signals the brain to shift gear gradually rather than cutting off abruptly, which tends to backfire.

If this pattern feels familiar and you’d like support building a plan that actually fits an ADHD brain rather than fighting it, that’s exactly the kind of work we do together in sessions, combining CBT with practical, everyday strategies.

With warmth,

Sian

If you are looking for therapy in Newcastle the information below might help.

I am still doing some face-to-face as well as Zoom and Skype sessions

Types of Therapy

Therapy covers a vast array of treatments. The psychological based therapies for mental health problems can be confusing to even those in the profession.

The lines are now blurred, however, traditionally :

Counsellors and counselling was shorter term for things like bereavement and short term issues. Again things are changing but counsellors didn’t always have as extensive training as psychotherapists. Sessions tend not to have structure and are based on what the individual brings to the session.

Psychotherapists, traditionally are trained up to Masters level and specialize in a particular type of psychotherapy:

• Cognitive Behaviour Therapy
• Psychodynamic
• Systemic/Family

There are many many more. Psychology Today www.psychologytoday.com is a great resource for finding information about therapy.

Clinical Psychologists cover an array of psycho-therapeutic techniques but may specialize, they are educated up to doctorate level.

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy or CBT

You might consider therapy for long term mental health issues like anxiety and depression which I would say CBT is one of the most efficient, hence its ubiquity within the NHS. CBT identifies the thoughts that cause distress and gives the client specific tools to change those thoughts and helps identify the behaviours. It is therefore great for behaviour related problems like worrying, overthinking, procrastination, ruminating, addictions, OCD. As a therapist I am also trained in Rational Emotive Behaviour therapy that identifies deep rigid beliefs that lead to all your painful emotions. Anger, guilt shame jealousy and hurt. It also supports unconditional acceptance, which is about responsibility not blame.

Psychodynamic Therapy

Is more “global” as opposed to CBT that is problem specific and is about rewiring the persons life narrative. It places emphasis on the significance of childhood experiences. Psycho-dynamic looks at the patterns of emotions and thoughts and how they interact, placing a lot of emphasis on the internal dynamics of these. It also aims to helps the client rewire their internal narratives to give them a positive sense of self.

Family Therapy

Systemic /Family is an approach helping people understand the dynamics of their family relationships to communicate better by reducing the distress of dysfunctional systems. It can be used for instance when a child or teenager is anorexic or violent. Or even and adult child living away from home but still distressed by the family dynamics. It can also be useful if one of the parents is struggling.

Hypnotherapy

There are other alternative therapies such as hypnotherapy which isn’t as regulated as the traditional therapies. I’m a member of the British Society of Clinical Hypnosis, having trained at the London College of Clinical Hypnosis, there is also the GHR. Hypnotherapy borrows from many traditional psychotherapies and tailors sessions to the individual needs. It is nothing like you see on films and TV. Hypnotists that do it for entertainment are just that, showman. It works in therapy because when you are deeply relaxed you can take in information quicker and it is accepted easier. You cant make anyone do anything against their will and just about everyone I meet who can relax and fall asleep can be hypnotized.

What To Expect From my Therapy ?

Depending on the issue I can see clients for two sessions for something like quit smoking or teeth grinding, the average tends to be around the six sessions for phobias, social anxiety, worry or confidence, milder anxiety. When a client comes in with a cluster of issues like panic, depression, disorder PTSD, OCD therapy can take longer. Comfort eating, eating disorders I can see them longer term but the sessions are spread out. It various quite a lot. I work with a big variety of symptoms and problems, there isnt much I haven’t dealt with these days.

Sessions tend to be face to face in my office in Regents Centre, Gosforth, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne.

Hypnosis can work over the internet if the client can guarantee no interruption. Alternatively, we do half an hour hypnosis work and I can record an MP3 separately.

Sessions are completely confidential and I would only break confidence if I thought my client was a suicide risk or going to harm someone else.

 What to Expect from Your first sessions?

You would normally come to Dobson House and tell reception you are here or during COVID times people text and I come and greet them at the main doors. Masks are expected to be worn where 2m is not possible so I ask on stairwells and corridors. My office is large enough for there to be 2m distance and well ventilated. However, this is always subject to the government advice and rule changes. There is also 3 cafes near by for you friend or family members to grab a coffee. Cosentinos just next to Dobson House main entrance, there is Marks & Spencer’s and Asda just 200yrds away.

The first session is about setting a goal for the outcome of therapy and discussing how it will work. There’s no point in just rambling aimlessly through session after session and not knowing what is being resolved and what is not. I gain an understanding of the issue or issues and then feed back my understanding so we all know what we are focusing on. This sometimes can be the first time a client has seen their issues in an organized format. More times than not, it is the first step in healing and things don’t look as bleak as they first thought.. Also it is the first step on the path towards a solution. Whether I’m doing hypnotherapy or CBT or a combination we don’t always have time for hypnosis.

How do I Book a session?

The easiest way to book a session is to call me on 07737491728. My hours vary but generally I work Monday to Friday till 8.00 pm at night and can see clients for emergencies on a weekend.

Its important to feel comfortable when booking a session so a telephone conversation or video call is offered to answer any questions you may have.

]]> https://peacefulminds.org.uk/i-need-a-therapist-in-newcastle-how-do-i-go-about-it-what-do-i-need-to-know/feed/ 0 https://peacefulminds.org.uk/lock-down-anxiety/ https://peacefulminds.org.uk/lock-down-anxiety/#comments Tue, 10 Nov 2020 09:11:47 +0000 https://peacefulminds.org.uk/?p=6928 Lock Down Anxiety

Anxiety is an emotion that tells us we are under threat or in danger. Its part of our survival system and it is meant to be uncomfortable to spur us into action for self-preservation. (That’s why one of our biggest behaviours we demonstrate when we feel anxious is avoidance or to run)

In the past we would have been more scared of predators and our enemies. Today our anxieties are usually about our predictions, thoughts, fear of being judged and anticipation about possible futures. We really don’t like uncertainty and that makes us catastrophize which is a way of focusing on the worst possible outcome believing it to be the most likely outcome when it’s not. The churning of these awful outcomes along with the phrases that begin with “what if …”  is called worry. Or I call it whatifery.

How many ways can we feel anxious at the moment, here are some common ones?

• Existing anxieties (financial, OCD, social, health, phobias) are experienced with more intensity
• Worrying about your future job and the effect a depressed economy could have on your earning potential
• Anxiety about losing touch with people, they may not be your friends anymore
• Anxiety about catching the virus or a loved one catching it
• Anxiety about your civil liberties being taken away
• You may feel you can’t live with the people you are locked down with
• You may now just feel you’ve been in the house too long and that outside is generally scary or that interacting with people is too overwhelming
• Worried about what happens after lock down

Whichever one you are experiencing there are some general principles you can follow.

1. Put things into perspective. Exaggerating possible, but not likely, outcomes does not prevent them from happening, it doesn’t stop or solve anything. How likely is the virus to kill you? If we go back to March the government had us so scared, we were frightened to set foot outside the door. It depends on your age and underlying health conditions. If you are a healthy child, teenager, young adult it’s not likely to affect you anymore than flu or you may even have mild to no symptoms. The older you get the more chance (but not a guarantee) that you may have it more severely. 50- and 60-year olds can also experience no symptoms. Its worth noting that the average age of death from COVID-19 is 82 years of age. The life expectancy in the UK is 81.

If you are in an at-risk group and take all the precautions necessary if you have to go out. Therefore, by using masks, visors, distancing, taking vitamin D and keeping as much of a fit mind and body as possible you are reducing your risks significantly.  Don’t mix often with those that mix a lot. Even then if you get it is not a guaranteed death sentence, though you might be very poorly.

2. If you ask yourself questions that have no answer but that trigger your internal survival alarm like “what if we are locked down forever and the economy crashes and there is anarchy?”. Or “what if I lose my job?” then you will continually feel anxious as there is no answer to something that might not happen in the future from the present point in time such a now. Whatifery whatifery what a load of piffery – this is a silly but useful saying to alert you to your over thinking

3. Don’t try to control things out of your control. Ask yourself “what can I do something about and what can’t I? The economy, government, people who don’t adhere to rules. Remember no matter how loud you shout at the telly they won’t hear you.

4. Do the things that bring you happiness. It may be limited but identify them and engage in them. A soak in the bath, a movie, a walk , face-ime or call friends. Remember when you’re feeling low, talking and thinking about someone else is a good way of putting things in perspective and shifting the focus outwards. Anxiety is all about looking in.

5. Don’t watch the news! On TV or online. They present you with a doom and gloom world that you can’t do anything about. The headlines are designed to grab your attention by stimulating your fear and emotional centre. They are rarely absolute truths in and of themselves.

6. What you fear is diminished by facing it. You can do it all at once or in bite size chunks. This can be relevant for leaving the house, shopping or going back to work. This is because the amygdala, the organ in your brain responsible for anxiety and fear, can only learn not to be fearful of something by re-experiencing it and seeing that you didn’t come to harm. It learns. It changes its programming through emotion and experience. For example, that old story about getting back on the horse immediately after a fall. The fall may trigger a trauma, (an unresolved terror that repeats itself in a time-loop like it was happening in the present moment). You can’t tell the person to get over it as the loop doesn’t understand English. By getting back up on the horse ( which will be terrifying) the amygdala learns again that riding is more or less safe. To definitely cancel out any trauma by going out on the horse every day after the fall would make sure a new loop was written over any possible trauma ones.

7. If you need support seek it! Whether it’s with friends, family or a professional. Being alone in an anxious head without any help to get out of it can be hellish. Don’t let toxic thoughts be your only companion.

8. Be aware of your bodily sensations that occur during anxiety so you aren’t afraid of them. There will be a set of feelings that occur here are some common ones. Having these in an intense flash is known as a panic attack also known as full fight-or-flight.

1. Heart racing/chest pain
2. Shortness of breath and struggle to get breath
3. Shoulder, neck and limb pain
4. Nausea, acid re-flux, heart burn, diarrhea, constipation
5. Sweating, shaking
6. Brain fog/not feeling real or spaced out
7. Insomnia
8. Racing thoughts

9. Health anxiety can develop when the above symptoms are be mistaken for something life threatening due to the symptom being accompanied by the anxious/terror feeling. The brain puts two and two together and gets five. A lot of people end up in A&E believing they are having a heart attack. Or have repeated trips to the doctor believing they may have cancer. Checking the internet to self-diagnose is the absolutely worst thing to do for increasing anxiety

10. Mindful meditation in particular is pretty good for accepting and dealing with anxiety. When you fight a thought or try and control one you just feed them more energy and they get stronger. Mindful meditation accepts they are there and then gently ignores them. They lose their potency and you can begin to feel calm. Similarly, if you fight anxiety you also fuel it.

11. Hypnosis is a great technique for putting the body into rest-and-digest, the opposite to fight-or-flight. Hypnosis helps the body to repair damaged cells, the immune system is boosted, digestion and absorption of nutrients is optimized. This is what happens when we re asleep too. The heart rate slows down as does breathing and blood pressure. We are truly relaxed.

There is, of course, a lot more to anxiety than this. For specific help contact me directly. Each person will have individual anxieties or combinations of anxieties. The above tips might help you stop exacerbating them.

Watch out for my next article on what happens when low mood sets in.

The main point to grasp here is that there is a difference between concern and caution versus panic and anxiety!

Anxiety and panic make you feel like the threat is bigger than it is ….and it is just round the corner…. and it will kill you. This will affect your mental health, sleep, diet, your behaviours’ and mood.

When you are cautious and concerned about a threat you keep things in perspective while being safe and careful. You recognize that if you are in a vulnerable group the risk of more serious harm goes up, however for the vast majority of the population no symptoms, mild symptoms or a few days in bed at worst is a small possibility. This thinking DOES NOT make you complacent or take unnecessary risks. It allows you to carry on your daily business without that terrible fear. It will propel you to follow government guidelines in ALL cases but not isolate, overthink or make yourself ill.

COVID is clearly a nasty virus, as a 50 year old woman with no health problems I do not wish to contract it. However if I do it wont be the end of the world and I will tolerate any discomfort it may bring. I have a 99.999999999% chance of surviving it. I also do not want to pass it on so I will carry on with my life being concerned and cautious. I suggest we all do.

There is a difference between concern and caution versus anxiety and panic. This is my point.

I define self-confidence as not having a fear of negative judgement from significant others. I can personally say I don’t fear what other people think in most situations, however, I would probably have a reasonable level concern if I knew was going embarrass myself. It’s the fear or anxiety element that leads to avoidance behaviours, such as not going to social functions, being unable to speak in 1-2-1’s, small groups or in public. It can also be around fear of failing in front of people. If it amounts to an absolute need to be the best (or one of the best) and it’s therefore not worth even trying if that is not guaranteed then we are most likely looking at perfectionism.

The significant others aspect can be peers, colleagues, bosses, or strangers. It is anyone who you don’t want negatively appraising you. Self -confidence comes on a sliding scale from the psychopaths and narcissists on one side to the socially phobic on the other. It is possible that we all move up and down the scale at various times in our lives.

There’s a difference between not caring what others think (psychopath) and having healthy disregard. I term healthy disregard for what others think as doing and saying what you want as long as you balance  your needs with those of others after you have weigh up the effects on them, an ultimately your relationships. For example,I wouldn’t go into the city centre naked, even if I loved my body and desperately needed to show it off. I would realise that I may offend the majority of people,plus my arrest would affect my family and probably my livelihood. However, if you feel self-conscious enough about messing up a joke in front of a group of friends so don’t bother to tell it then you probably self-conscious. If you have an intense fear of making a fool of yourself or being judged on your appearance than you probably have social anxiety. Especially if you avoid a lot of social situations because of this reason.

People may also fear suddenly being thrown into the spot light or offending someone, but it all boils down to a poor self-worth; not feeling good enough. The reasons for poor self-worth are a huge subject .

The good news is that the intense and even mild anxiety is avoidable. It is the inner-dialogues and beliefs that we hold that causes anxiety. If we tell ourselves that we must never be judged in a way we would hate by those we deem to have  significant opinions and that it would be unbearable; and  that we will be rejected or laughed at; and that it would confirm that we a defective in some way,  then that will clead to anxiety as we anticipate the onslaught of shame.

This is in essence a scary, exaggerated interpretation of the truth. The truth, i.e. reality, is more along the lines of; our friends like us for who we are and are genuinely fond of us, and people we don’t really know aren’t really invested in whether they like us or not. So that if we really do make a fool of ourselves or look strange, they aren’t really going to attach much importance to it ( we assume they do. We are not high on their priority list).  To rigidly demand that you must never make a fool of yourself puts yourself under immense pressure to perform perfectly every move. Telling yourself that it wold be so unbearable and excruciating suggesting you would fail to cope and get through it adds to the anticipated horror as does the suggestion that there will be future knock on situations and effects like social rejection ad ridicule. It all stems from and then leads back to a very poor sense of self worth.

If you don’t think very much of yourself compared to others you will make assumptions like this. It can become a self-fulfilling prophecy because when we are nervous we become tongue-tied and can shake due to our brains being in a state called ” fight or flight”. This then reinforces our beliefs and endorses our fears. We then want to avoid situations which increases anxiety. Only when you face a fear can it be diminished. It can be done slowly and in a managed way. That is how I work with my clients.

I also get them to change the way they think and talk to themselves. To  a way that is based on reality and is in perspective – rational- not based on assumptions and faulty predictions. Changing your thoughts and adopting behaviours that allow you to face what ever it is that you are anxious about will increase confidence. It takes work, there isn’t a magic wand.

In the past we would have been more scared of predators and our enemies. Today our anxieties are usually about our predictions, thoughts, fear of being judged and anticipation about possible futures. We really don’t like uncertainty and that makes us catastrophize which is a way of focusing on the worst possible outcome believing it to be the most likely outcome when it’s not. The churning of these awful outcomes along with the phrases that begin with “what if …”  is called worry. Or I call it whatifery.

How many ways can we feel anxious at the moment, here are some common ones?

• Existing anxieties (financial, OCD, social, health, phobias) are experienced with more intensity
• Worrying about your future job and the effect a depressed economy could have on your earning potential
• Anxiety about losing touch with people, they may not be your friends anymore
• Anxiety about catching the virus or a loved one catching it
• Anxiety about your civil liberties being taken away
• You may feel you can’t live with the people you are locked down with
• You may now just feel you’ve been in the house too long and that outside is generally scary or that interacting with people is too overwhelming
• Worried about what happens after lockdown

Whichever one you are experiencing there are some general principles you can follow.

1. Put things into perspective. Exaggerating possible, but not likely, outcomes does not prevent them from happening, it doesn’t stop or solve anything. How likely is the virus to kill you? If we go back to March the government had us so scared, we were frightened to set foot outside the door. It depends on your age and underlying health conditions. If you are a healthy child, teenager, young adult it’s not likely to affect you anymore than flu or you may even have mild to no symptoms. The older you get the more chance (but not a guarantee) that you may have it more severely. 50- and 60-year olds can also experience no symptoms. Its worth noting that the average age of death from COVID-19 is 82 years of age. The life expectancy in the UK is 81.

If you are in an at-risk group and take all the precautions necessary if you have to go out. Therefore, by using masks, visors, distancing, taking vitamin D and keeping as much of a fit mind and body as possible you are reducing your risks significantly.  Don’t mix often with those that mix a lot. Even then if you get it is not a guaranteed death sentence, though you might be very poorly.

2. If you ask yourself questions that have no answer but that trigger your internal survival alarm like “what if we are locked down forever and the economy crashes and there is anarchy?”. Or “what if I lose my job?” then you will continually feel anxious as there is no answer to something that might not happen in the future from the present point in time such a now. Whatifery whatifery what a load of piffery – this is a silly but useful saying to alert you to your over thinking

3. Don’t try to control things out of your control. Ask yourself “what can I do something about and what can’t I? The economy, government, people who don’t adhere to rules. Remember no matter how loud you shout at the telly they won’t hear you.

4. Do the things that bring you happiness. It may be limited but identify them and engage in them. A soak in the bath, a movie, a walk , face-time or call friends. Remember when you’re feeling low talking and thinking about someone else is a good way of putting things in perspective as well as shifting your focus outwards away from thoughts about you.

5. Don’t watch the news! On TV or online. They present you with a doom and gloom world that you can’t do anything about. The headlines are designed to grab your attention by stimulating your fear and emotional centre. They are rarely absolute truths in and of themselves.

6. What you fear is diminished by facing it. You can do it all at once or in bite size chunks. This can be relevant for leaving the house, shopping or going back to work. This is because the amygdala, the organ in your brain responsible for anxiety and fear, can only learn not to be fearful of something by re-experiencing it and seeing that you didn’t come to harm. It learns. It changes its programming through emotion and experience. For example, that old story about getting back on the horse immediately after a fall. The fall may trigger a trauma, (an unresolved terror that repeats itself in a time-loop like it was happening in the present moment). You can’t tell the person to get over it as the loop doesn’t understand English. By getting back up on the horse ( which will be terrifying) the amygdala learns again that riding is more or less safe. To definitely cancel out any trauma by going out on the horse every day after the fall would make sure a new loop was written over any possible trauma ones.

7. If you need support seek it! Whether it’s with friends, family or a professional. Being alone in an anxious head without any help to get out of it can be hellish. Don’t let toxic thoughts be your only companion.

8. Be aware of your bodily sensations that occur during anxiety so you aren’t afraid of them. There will be a set of feelings that occur here are some common ones. Having these in an intense flash is known as a panic attack also known as full fight-or-flight.

1. Heart racing/chest pain
2. Shortness of breath and struggle to get breath
3. Shoulder, neck and limb pain
4. Nausea, acid re-flux, heart burn, diarrhea, constipation
5. Sweating, shaking
6. Brain fog/not feeling real or spaced out
7. Insomnia
8. Racing thoughts

9. Health anxiety can develop when the above symptoms are be mistaken for something life threatening due to the symptom being accompanied by the anxious/terror feeling. The brain puts two and two together and gets five. A lot of people end up in A&E believing they are having a heart attack. Or have repeated trips to the doctor believing they may have cancer. Checking the internet to self-diagnose is the absolutely worst thing to do for increasing anxiety

10. Mindful meditation in particular is pretty good for accepting and dealing with anxiety. When you fight a thought or try and control one you just feed them more energy and they get stronger. Mindful meditation accepts they are there and then gently ignores them. They lose their potency and you can begin to feel calm. Similarly, if you fight anxiety you also fuel it.

11. Hypnosis is a great technique for putting the body into rest-and-digest, the opposite to fight-or-flight. Hypnosis helps the body to repair damaged cells, the immune system is boosted, digestion and absorption of nutrients is optimized. This is what happens when we re asleep too. The heart rate slows down as does breathing and blood pressure. We are truly relaxed.

There is, of course, a lot more to anxiety than this. For specific help contact me directly. Each person will have individual anxieties or combinations of anxieties. The above tips might help you stop exacerbating them.

Watch out for my next article on what happens when low mood sets in.

There are a number of reasons why people continue to smoke when they have been told of the dangers. The obvious reason is addiction. This entails having a physical, emotional and psychological need. Some people are just caught in a habit and never thought they could quit so never really tried until years later just stop.

The majority of people have an amalgamation of needs for nicotine and the physical habit of smoking.

Like other drugs and alcohol, nicotine produces an effect on the pleasure seeking centres of the brain within around 10 seconds of inhalation. A neurotransmitter called dopamine is released in the brains reward centres, it’s these feelings that its believed causes pleasure. The effects are short lived leaving the smoker seeking to maintain this sense of pleasure and look for the next cigarette.

Smoking, and the resulting rewards experienced in the brain, become associated with certain triggers. Smell, memories, situations such as having a coffee, being on the phone or having an alcohol.

Feeling pleasure can also dampen nerves or anxiety an can be associated with feeling more confident. Preconceived beliefs that smoking makes a person look tough or have more gravitas can play into triggers that cause a feeling of need for a cigarette. Also, a common, yet not widely acknowledged, form of conditioning with smoking is needing a cigarette to work out a problem or to think. This may take the form of leaving the office when stress is experienced.
Or smoking more when dealing with a personal issue.

What ever reason the mind gives for having a cigarette it will be rewarded by a release of dopamine within 10 seconds of having a cigarette reinforcing whatever excuse the smoker has used to have that next cigarette.

The benefits of continuing to smoke, as experienced directly by the smoker, become much more appealing than the standard experiences of irritability, increase in appetite, feelings of anxiety and craving, low mood and even insomnia when quitting.

Part 2 will explain how hypnosis and cognitive behaviour therapy make quitting possible.