smoking

[Snowpaw]

Ok sorry if my typing is bad. I am on a psp, any way I just stopped smoking yesterday. How long before the nicotine stops fighting the hrt? Also will my skin get better? Smoking damages skin this much I know.

[Asfsd4214]

Nicotine doesn't fight HRT. It can reduce endogenous estrogen levels by inhibiting enzymes responsible for synthesizing estrogen, but since the bulk of your estrogen is exogenous it shouldn't matter.


Having said that, congrats on your attempt to quit, you'll always be better off not smoking than smoking. Nicotine has various effects on skin, most of which I suspect would cease and slowly begin to improve over a period of months to years after you quit.


Your skin likely will improve.


Nicotine will be pretty much out of your system in a few days and completely gone within a month. The effects of dependence will largely subside in a few weeks. The effects of your addiction to it however is much harder to say.


I wish you well.

[Snowpaw]

Thank you for the wonderful answer It was more me going off that other thread when the person said it blocks 80% of what hrt does. It scared the crap out of me because the hrt I get is kinda a godsend when I can barely afford it. Stopping smoking was more a scale thing, what's worth more to me :x Then reading her response scared me away from smokes  I honestly thank you for the timely response And it's only going to be harder from here so I just want to be strong about it :x

[Asfsd4214]

Thank you for the wonderful answer It was more me going off that other thread when the person said it blocks 80% of what hrt does. It scared the crap out of me because the hrt I get is kinda a godsend when I can barely afford it. Stopping smoking was more a scale thing, what's worth more to me :x Then reading her response scared me away from smokes  I honestly thank you for the timely response And it's only going to be harder from here so I just want to be strong about it :x

No problem.


It's certainly true as we all know that smoking is bad for you and your health, but as far as blocking HRT, I don't see much scientific basis for that claim.


I hope you keep trying to quit, but I'm a smoker and I know how hard it is, and only you can make your life choices.

[Snowpaw]

No problem.


It's certainly true as we all know that smoking is bad for you and your health, but as far as blocking HRT, I don't see much scientific basis for that claim.


I hope you keep trying to quit, but I'm a smoker and I know how hard it is, and only you can make your life choices.

It's the single hardest thing I have ever tried to do in this life. Well except skateboarding. I don't know what I was thinking.. my friend wanted me to and well I busted my butt more times than I could count. :/


Oh well thank ya I'm gonna go chill now ^_^

[Jamie D]

Ok sorry if my typing is bad. I am on a psp, any way I just stopped smoking yesterday. How long before the nicotine stops fighting the hrt? Also will my skin get better? Smoking damages skin this much I know.

Congratulations on quitting smoking.  If you have ever seen anyone die a slow, lingering, painful death from the effects of smoking (like I have), you would have never started.

Every aspect of your health will improve.

[Felix]

Good luck. I have always read that female smokers require more vitamin C and water than male smokers, but I'm not sure what aspect of femaleness (hormonal or whatever) relates to that. For sure though your skin and EVERYTHING else will improve when you quit.


I've quit a hundred times but didn't stay quit until I started my own HRT in december. I think it was more the happiness and right-ness than the hormones themselves though. Now I smoke occasionally, but I've only bought one pack since last year. The need seems to be gone.


It is worth every ounce of strength you have in you to break the addiction. Go for it.

[A]

Congratulations. I hope you can persist.

What I -think- I remember from school is that most reversible effects of smoking go away within 6-12 months; that should include the skin. But the greatest part of your health should be restored within less than a month, surprisingly.

[UCBerkeleyPostop]

Nicotine doesn't fight HRT. It can reduce endogenous estrogen levels by inhibiting enzymes responsible for synthesizing estrogen, but since the bulk of your estrogen is exogenous it shouldn't matter.


Having said that, congrats on your attempt to quit, you'll always be better off not smoking than smoking. Nicotine has various effects on skin, most of which I suspect would cease and slowly begin to improve over a period of months to years after you quit.


Your skin likely will improve.


Nicotine will be pretty much out of your system in a few days and completely gone within a month. The effects of dependence will largely subside in a few weeks. The effects of your addiction to it however is much harder to say.


I wish you well.

Although tobacco use may not affect HRT directly, I would submit that the better overall health one has, the better the body has the ability to build new cells. Not only that, but since surgeries will be a fact of future life for most successful transitioners, optimal health is absolutely essential...and even discounting that the risk factors for cancer can be greatly diminished by maintaining optimal health. Refraining from alcohol, drugs, tobacco, and even processed foods, meat and dairy and working out regularly is my prescription for a healthy and successful transition.

According to the CDC, benefits of cessation vary depending on how long you smoked and at what age you quit (and I would assume other factors such as diet, exercise and overall health.) 

cdc.gov

[PrettySoldier]

I too had the same worries as I was a smoker before starting HRT & it wasn't until I started a few months ago that I stopped. It's still soooo hard cause it seriously feels like I lost a best friend or something, haha. I slip up sometimes & will bum a smoke off someone. The gum is awesome & it's works really well. You'll get to save so much money too, I save like $100 a month now that I plan to put towards laser soon.

[MayoiNeko]

If its mainly a general health based thing, then what about only nicotine?

For example, people who are on patches or gum to try and quit, or even the electronic cigarettes that are out nowadays.. No tobacco or any of the other typical stuff, just nicotine.

[Seyranna]

Although tobacco use does not affect HRT directly

The US national library of medecine begs to differ...

"it has been proven that, depending on the type, duration and intensity of nicotine consumption, smoking can reduce or completely cancel the efficacy of orally administered estrogens. Not only does smoking diminish the otherwise well-established beneficial effects of estrogen on hot flashes and urogenital symptoms and its positive effects on lipid metabolism, i.e. by reducing cholesterol, but smoking also specifically reduces estrogen's ability to prevent osteoporosis. The reduction or loss of therapeutic efficacy is mainly caused by dose-dependent elevated hepatic clearance, partially in conjunction with lower estrogen levels, and has been demonstrated only with oral estrogen applications. This failure of therapeutic action should not be compensated for by increasing the dose in smokers as this might result in the production of toxic, even potentially mutagenic estrogen metabolites--compounds recently associated with a higher risk of breast cancer. The favorable effects of estrogens are not lost in smokers when they are applied transdermally. This route enables low dosage and also avoids the formation of unphysiological metabolites by bypassing the liver. Women who continue to smoke despite all warnings should therefore only be treated via the transdermal route. Oral contraceptives, but not HRT, are contraindicated in elderly smokers. However, the principal conclusion of the WHI study was that the lowest dose possible should be chosen, especially in patients with an increased cardiovascular risk, as is the case in smokers."

[UCBerkeleyPostop]

Thanks for digging up that evidence, seyranna, I meant to say that I didn't have any evidence on hand that tobacco use affects HRT directly. My point was that it affects HRT at least indirectly.

[Asfsd4214]

Thanks for digging up that evidence, seyranna, I meant to say that I didn't have any evidence on hand that tobacco use affects HRT directly. My point was that it affects HRT at least indirectly.

And you're correct.


Nicotine effects HRT, along with most any other drug, in various complex ways. It speeds up metabolism and hepatic clearance. And some of its direct effects counteract some of the indications of HRT like osteoporosis, as well as reducing endogenous estrogen.


The question is however, if your blood results show your estradiol level is in a correct range, does nicotine exhibit any inhibiting effect on estradiols bioactive effects one past firstpass effect. The weight of evidence I have seen suggests that it does not.


If nicotine inhibited the function of serum estradiol, then nicotine would cause very significant and obvious menstrual and fertility side effects in women. Which it does not to the extent it would have to to indicate that it makes HRT useless in that sense.


So then the question instead is if nicotine inhibits or interacts with the absorption of estradiol tablets or their speed of clearance. As Seyranna's source indicates, it does. Which is why it's important to check if your serum levels are steady and sufficient. If you are doing that and they are, then smoking or no, you shouldn't be at much greater risk in terms of hormonal side effects than any other women.


In short, it won't make HRT useless. The weight of evidence I have seen indicates it may make it harder for you to establish good serum levels, but once you have those levels, it won't make much of a difference in that sense.


The other question is interaction in the form of cardiovascular and other side effects. The weight of the most current evidence would suggest that your risk factors are increased, I am not convinced that the evidence shows that it is increased in any much higher than the sum of both risk factors though.

[Snowpaw]

Thank you all for the information. I was aware there was another thread up but I didn't want to thread jack it :s I also slipped up today and grabbed a cig butt and emptied it into my pipe. :s I was just freaking out. :x

[Jamie D]

I quit smoking for about ten months 8 years ago. It made a big difference in how old I looked and I gained some weight finally. But then I fell off the wagon due to stress and having to be around an inconsiderate smoker a lot.  I want to quit again for good, but I suppose I haven't truly made up my mind to do so yet. And apparently not even watching my grandmother and my dad die from smoking related cancer didn't sink in well enough as to what's going to happen to me if I don't quit, although since I've smoked now for about 38 years with only the one ten month break, I imagine I'm likely going to get cancer anyway sooner or later, but I think I'd prefer much later.

No, it is not inevitable you are going to get cancer, but the sooner you stop, or at least begin to cut back, the healthier you will be.

[Cindy]

Smoking increases the chance of developing cancer and of heart disease and of other diseases. The risks are multi-factorial. That means by itself it may not be the reason, but it interacts with other aspects of your genetics and life style to cause an increase in the chance of developing disease. One of the reasons you read stories of 99yr old people who smoke and have few incidence of smoking related disease, they don't have the other factors.


It also means that by giving up smoking you decrease those risks quite quickly.


Nicotine addiction is no joke, it is probably as, if not more addictive than heroin. It is also probably more harmful (ignoring lifestyle etc with heroin addiction), but you can give up. I did. I went cold turkey 30 years ago. I didn't in fact give up, I just told myself I would delay having the next cig. I have. Beneficial effects occur within weeks, personal pleasant affects occur within days.


Sounds silly but he might be the most gorgeous guy in the world, but if he smokes, no way will I kiss him, I've been there and it is foul.


may as well kiss dog poo

[sandrauk]

Jaime, try again you might surprise yourself. I gave up after forty years after I went on a thirteen hour flight.


I thought I was really going to enjoy that first cigarette after landing but nothing. I realised that I'd become sort of immmune to nicotine and did what Cindy did just put off the next cigarette. No withdrawal, nothing. However I wish I could say I felt health benefits, no coughing, sure but the only difference I can feel is I can smell everything including a lot of things I'd rather not

[UCBerkeleyPostop]

Cancer seems to run in my family. Even my great grandmother who didn't smoke died of cancer. But I figure I've still got about 20-30 years left regardless.

You can greatly reduce the risk by NOT smoking while exercising and eating a healthy diet that eliminates or minimizes processed foods, meat and dairy and includes lots of vegetables and fruits.

Also, it is quite possible your relatives developed cancer due to shared environmental factors and NOT genetics.  But regardless, you can greatly reduce the risk while improving your quality of life. Also, I believe that more people die of smoking related heart disease than lung cancer.

[Bexi]

I used to smoke during my rebellious early teens but seeing the effects of a lifetime of smoking that was slowly killing my granddad gave me the compunction to quit straight away.

Sounds silly but he might be the most gorgeous guy in the world, but if he smokes, no way will I kiss him, I've been there and it is foul.

The smell makes me nauseous these days. People think its 'cool' but the fact is its unhealthy and makes you, your clothes, your house and everything around you stink.

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