It didn't take long this morning to realize the weird excessive yawning problem has not gone away. Its become incredibly irritating.
I have noticed a mild shortness of breath ever since I started trying to quit. I have read that this is a common symptom of nicotine withdrawal and it should subside eventually. When I noticed I was yawning more than usual yesterday and that I was having a hard time controlling the urge to yawn, I associated it with the shortness of breath. I figured it probably has something to do with coming up on the last few days of "physical withdrawal." As the day progressed, I became more and more irritated with the yawning and the soreness it was causing in my jaw. I felt like I had to fight the urge to yawn just as much as I had to fight the urge to smoke in the first couple days of quitting. That's how bad it was, I had to fight yawning yesterday like I was addicted to it for my entire adult life or something. Even when I gave in and let myself yawn, I could never quite get a full yawn in. It was as if the yawn was cut short, robbing me of any satisfaction. Imagine trying to yawn or even sneeze over and over again and each time being cut short! It was oddly a lot like trying to smoke a cigarette while taking Chantix. Despite my best efforts I just couldn't scratch the itch to yawn! It went on all day like that.
When I noticed this morning that I had the nagging need to yawn again, I decided it was time to google for some answers. Here's what I found out:
It seems excessive yawning is a common side effect with some smoking cessation drugs. But, I haven't taken Chantix for over two weeks now. I'm cold turkey now, so, the connection to Chantix, wouldn't really apply in my case.
I did find a few people who had posted questions on various medical bulletin boards with concerns about yawning who had also mentioned they recently quit smoking. Some described exactly what I have been experiencing. Here's what one poor guy named "Mike" had to say:
"It started when I was driving home from work in Jan 2002. I couldn't seem to get out a full yawn. The feeling of a yawn would come on, I would start to inhale like I was about to yawn, but just when you would expect your body to push out the yawn, it doesn't happen. The yawn is left incomplete, and I am left with the feeling of still having to yawn. (basically it's like taking a deep breath as opposed to a yawn, you know the difference.) On this particular drive home, my cheeks and mouth had sort of a tingling sensation when I got home from trying to complete yawns. I think this was because my mouth was open so wide the whole ride home trying to yawn."
Mike goes on to say he's had an ongoing yawning problem for over 2 years.
Dear God! Imagine being yawn-punked for 2 years! If I don't get the satisfaction of a honest to goodness yawn soon I think I'm gonna kill somebody, and I've only been dealing with this for 2 days!
Mike's comment comes from a website called AskWaltStollMD.com . I'm usually pretty leery of any websites offering medical advice unless they're associated with a well known name in the medical industry, such as the Mayo Clinic. But, since the responses to Mike's post on the bulletin board seem benign or common sense rather, I think its ok to consider some of the suggested tips, like breathing exercises to reduce the urge to yawn.
I didn't get much more than finding similar complaints from others on various bulletin boards from my Google search.
So, Here's what I've determined about my newly acquired and very irritating yawning problem:
A. Its definitely related to quitting smoking.
B. It could be some kind of psychological/mental replacement for wanting a cigarette, which may pass on its own, so maybe I should just avoid thinking about it as much as possible.
C. I need to explore some meditation and breathing techniques.
D. It could be related to a need to reduce my caffeine intake now that I've quit smoking.
What makes me think "D"?
I found this interesting article about nicotine withdrawal from a very good quit smoking website called WhyQuit. I like this website because it has a pro cold turkey philosophy coupled with a one day at a time approach. The page about withdrawal discusses the importance of cutting back the caffeine intake after quitting because your body becomes more sensitive to its effects. I've never heard of this before, but it makes sense. But, what does this have to do with yawning? I drink a lot of coffee. Yesterday, the only way I could get through a torturous section on Probability, Z scores and Confidence Intervals in preparation for a Statistics test was to keep the caffeine a com'in. I mentioned yesterday that I had a heightened sense of overall anxiety. This could have very well been the extra caffeine. In other words, I may be inadvertently exacerbating my withdrawal symptoms with too much caffeine. I haven't got the connection down to the exact science yet, but I bet somehow the out of control yawning fits into all this, too.
Its a fact that a rather common side effect of anti-depressants and anti-anxiety medications is excessive yawning. So, what I gather from this (and I'm just talking out my ass from here because I don't knows nutt'in bout no head doctor'in.) is that yawning has some sort of connection/correlation to whatever chemicals in your brain regulate stress responses.
So what to do now?
Well, I think its time for me to cut back on the caffeine and talk to my buddy Barney (an experienced and knowledgeable yoga instructor) about breathing and meditation techniques.
I think the yawning is my body's way of telling me I'm ready to take the next step on the path to non-smoker enlightenment.
Here's more from the WhyQuit website about the connection between caffeine and nicotine and the need for evaluating your caffeine intake during cessation.
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