Smoking and the gap

The symptoms first started creeping in about a year ago, and then about six months back,
I was officially diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. Naturally, dealing with all that over
the winter sent me spiraling into a pretty heavy depression—you know, being totally antisocial, just losing interest in everything,
even though I managed to pull through my first semester at college without much trouble 🤣 . About two or three
months ago, I actually went to psychotherapy, which helped quite a bit. Now
I’m social again, feeling brighter, blah blah... if I'm being honest, things feel okay,
not perfect, but getting there since I've been working 😉

The real issue is how it hits my body. Since the start, I've dealt with all sorts of
physical symptoms that my doctors basically brushed off as just part of the anxiety disorder.
All my tests came back perfectly fine too. Everything looks "normal" on paper.

So, looking back at the cigarettes and how my body reacts...
Back in May of last year, during those crazy graduation weeks, I think I
really went overboard with the smoking and drinking. Ever since then, there's been this gap
where the generalized anxiety kicked in along with these physical sensations.
(Basically, I spent two days straight hitting the beer and going through about six packs of cigarettes without sleeping)
For someone who only weighs about 130 pounds, that was way too much.

I kept smoking for a little while longer, but it felt terrible, so I quit.
I stayed clean for six months, but then I picked it up again once I was feeling
pretty good. But eventually, the symptoms started creeping back. Every time I light up,
I get this weird brain fog, like I'm confused or disoriented or something similar 🤷

Is it possible this is just an automatic physical reaction to the nicotine? Like, maybe the smoking just
triggered the anxiety to surface faster, or is there some other response happening here,
maybe something purely physical?

If anyone knows anything about this or has gone through something similar, please let me know.
I can try to guess my way through it myself, but 👍

Patrick White said::

Is this just some automatic physical reaction to cigarettes? Maybe
they triggered my anxiety faster, or is there
some other response happening here—something purely somatic??

I’m looking for answers from anyone who actually knows or has dealt with this before.
I can just make stuff up myself 👍

Honestly, do you really think getting a technical answer to this matters?
Isn't it obvious enough from your own experience that your body is flat-out rejecting cigarettes? They're clearly hurting you. Whether it's a somatic response or not doesn't change the bottom line: are you going to need medical treatment just so you can smoke without discomfort, only to end up treating a different smoking-related illness down the road?🤷

Look, man, I don't think you have a problem😉.
Just embrace a healthy lifestyle and be glad you have a built-in defense mechanism preventing you from even lighting up. Most people don't have that luxury; they just get stuck in a permanent vacuum of addiction for life.

Look, I don't smoke 😁 But honestly, once in a while just out of pure curiosity, I’ll light one up
Just to see how my body actually reacts... man, I guess I'm just restless like that, always searching
For an answer, even if it's hard to find. There's gotta be a specific reason
Why the body responds the way it does—probably some chemical in the cigarette,
And I really want to figure out which one it is and what exactly it's reacting with inside me 🙂

There are over 4,000 toxic compounds floating around in cigarette smoke, and they call it "poison" for a very good reason. I’m honestly worried you’re going to have a hard time pinning down just one single culprit here.
To me, the culprits seem pretty obvious—take the CO2 and carbon monoxide produced by the combustion that you’re inhaling. That stuff hits your bloodstream and reaches your brain in seconds, effectively starving it of the oxygen it desperately needs just to function properly.