Quit smoking a year ago - sick ever since!

Did you ever get to the bottom of it? I’ve got an endoscopy on Monday as i’m convinced it’s stomach related. I didn’t drink alcohol in Jan, had a few glasses of wine on Thurs and lo and behold the pins and needles and numbness got worse the following day.

My Friend, just still strong and have faith in God that he will make everything right!
I'm on month15 month, and I still have pain, but it getting better slowly. God Bless you all

I was 46 years old. I had 40 cigarettes a day for 30 years. I quit smoking 1.5 years ago. But I have very bad days. I have heavy anxiety and depression.

I used Lexapro for 6 months and it stopped working. After 3 months I used cymbalta, it made me worse. I have been using zoloft for the last 3 months and it has no effect. I am still fighting with anxiety and depression.  Sometimes I want to start cigarette smoking again.

When will this persecution finish

.Please  help

I quit 1 year & 8 months ago and have been through horrible problems but FINALLY have seen big improvements just in the last month. I used caffeine pills to help w/ the depression & anxiety. Start w/ a SMALL dose (like 50mg) or it will worsen anxiety. I fought the feeling of "Why did I do this to myself" constantly. I am just now starting to think/feel that MAYBE I am better off now than when I smoked. It is still not over and I never dreamed it would take this long, but I am hoping that I am at a point of more good than bad. Hope this helps. Best of luck.

I've given up for about 5 1/2 months now and am feeling much better except for some lingering anxiety with some random anxiety attacks now and again. I feel like I have a couple of things going on, which may be relevant and helpful to you?

1. I think I was using cigarettes as a coping mechanism for anxiety, even now if I get anxious my automatic response is to reach for my cigs (which aren't there anymore). If I'm at home and the anxiety gets the better of me, I just wrap myself in a blanket, get some tea and biscuits, watch some cartoons and ride it! (I'm 50 years old and had been smoking for 34 years before giving up). After a while it subsides, but at the peak I'm shaking with terrible fear. But... it's fear about nothing at all, which leads me onto point 2...

2. It's quite possible this anxiety is just your chemistry sorting itself out (yes, even after all this time, you have been smoking for 30 years...). I've found 'normal' anxiety is in the pit of my stomach (worrying about loved ones, money, the future, death etc) but this giving up smoking anxiety primarily resides under my rib cage. It hangs around coming and going, but not very intense, but if it hits me full on, the underneath of my ribs feels like it's having spasms. BUT! it does go, it doesn't last and there is light at the end of the tunnel!

I'm 1 year and 2 months smoke free, my chest hurt sometime and my sinus bothering me daily and I gain 50 pounds. But I love being smoke free I just can't wait until my chest and sinus get better .

Brandon again, im about to come to the end of my first year. 14 years pack a day. mid febuary is my year mark. after quitting I became hyper sensitive to all the other issues my body has with or without the smoking. The symptoms and issues the smoking masked, and the ones I had before, but now my mind has made them serious issues. I have spent the last six months training myself to stop making things worse than they are. and just taking it a day at a time. I find now my biggest issues are horrible posture. I work at a computer but I catch myself slouching sooo bad. and holding my shoulder up all day. Then even worse yet, I catch myself holding my breath, and then feeling out of breath, but its MY fault. Working now on correcting both of these. Even to this day, I don't THINK I feel much stress. im sure I do, but ive always had rough times in my life, so things never seemed to bother me much. even now I don't notice, but im sure its harder on me than before. I don't miss it anymore, sometimes I wish I could do it, just to do it, but I don't crave, the smell is aweful when im close to a smoker. I feel better in general, and I definitely get more done now :)

Hi, please can you tell me what happened? I am in hell right now

I want to punch through my face and rip my penis off. On day 12 of quitting.

Hi All,

I came here to bring some good news, which are that all of this will pass, I promise.

It was a year since I quit this January, after smoking for 12+ years about half a pack to a pack per day. I just like the rest of you was convinced that I was pretty much dying at about 4 months into quitting. My body decided to do its own thing and fall apart, every day I woke up with new body parts hurting, and then the anxiety hell started. I ended up in ER with my first ever anxiety attack and for about 5 months I lived in constant panic mode. The nights were the worst, I went to sleep each night convinced that I would die tonight, either from a heart attack or lung cancer, or stroke. My pulse and blood pressure were through the roof on daily basis... It was pure hell.

It all went away last september, not overnight but pretty quickly. Today, I no longer have that stupid anxiety, my blood pressure and pulse are in the ideal range, I have no crazings and finally starting to lose the weight I gained after I Quit.

My advice to all of you going throught it:
1. Dont try to run away from your anxiety - embrace it. Dont blindly start popping pills in hope it goes away, after you quit your brain chemistry is all over the place from the removal of nicotine, and you start introducing other chemicals and it gets worse. Find a therapist, learn breathing exercises, embrace your fears. Your anxiety WILL go away, but if you start fixating on it, it will consume you.
2. Review your eating habits and coffee drinking habits. Smoking sped up your metabolism and masked a lot of other health issues. Try doign a Whole30 or any other very healthy eating plan for a month to see how your body reacts. A lot of my issues were coming from the foods I was eating that my body had no issues digesting with nicotine, but refused to do so without it.
3. Be active, on daily basis. Cant stress this enough.
4. Occupy your mind, FULLY. This is the time to start a new hobby, learn a new language, swithc jobs and in general have no free time to waste.
5. Learn how to cope with stress. Many of us started smoking before our minds fully matured (around the age of 25), and we never learned a healthy way of dealing with stress. When you quit smoking you take away the only way you know how to deal with it. So start experimenting with how to decompress.
6. Create new healthy routines. For all of us, smoking is a habit that is surrounded by other habits. Morning coffee and cigratte, or afternoon one while driving how, or etc. If you take ONLY the smoking out of that routine, it wont work. Your brain will always feel like something is missing, so create brand new routines.

And just know, it is all worth it. It sucks, it is the hardest thing I have done, but now that the worst have passed and I feel great, it is the best decision I have made. Just be patient and strong.

Brandon Again! Ive done it, today is my 1 year anniversary!!!!!!!!!!!! Ironically, the above post is almost IDENTICAL in every way to my smoking and quitting experience. Its actually freaky. ive spent the first 8 months of my quit looking for ^that post, and on my update post for 1 year, there it is! Coming to these message boards has been pivotal in my quit! Have to come back here to remind ourselves that this is a real phenomenon, not BS like the docs will tell you. It always comforted me to read peoples stories, and to hear people were feeling the same way, a real community feeling. I still have the occasional anxious moments, and a touch of acid reflux. I gained about 15 pounds from the normal, and I think that's why my reflux picked up. now that I am ok, I can focus on dialing my body back in. To anyone starting their quit, it is all true, the longer you go the better you WILL feel. I guarantee it. a year has been about the magical number ive seen. most people a year deep are doing fine. some go longer, I think in another 4 months or so, it will feel like I never smoked in the first place! God speed to all of you, hang tough, kick this in the ass. We are all here for you!

Thank You for giving me hope.The repost helped It’s been 14 months since I quit but I still have some issues. Mostly to do with anxiety.

I just stumbled upon this thread. Its been over 6 months since you postedyour question. How are you doing now?

I posted an update 21 days ago as "Kathy L". Much better. Still dealing with it but each day gets better. I still have occasional days that I wonder if I would be better off smoking but use caffeine pills and it stops. Also use the nicotine replacement mints occasional when I need to stop thinking that. It has now been close to 1 year 9 months and most days I am glad I quit but still don't have that "WOW, I feel so much better feeling" that everyone talks about eventually happening. I am thinking the 2 year mark, I will be over this nightmare. I don't think it would take this long for most people who don't have health problems. Best wishes to all who are trying to survive "QUITTING SMOKING".

Quit for 7 month and having the same problem as u.. Anxiety and Panic.. Recently i feel numbness especially on my left hand and leg. Discomfort on my chest but not pain..Always worried about my health.. Did ECG, stress test, Xray etc and result always normal.. Even though i have these problems but i can still jog 5km anytime without any problem..