Reading through most of the posts (albeit there are only a handfull related to smoking and CH) it appears that very few of us see a significant relationship between CH and smoking.

It occurred to me that, while flicking through the pictures of the CH.com conventions, many, if not all, pictures showed members "lighting up".

Being a smoker myself (1.5 packs a day for 15 years), I have often asked myself whether smoking is not to blame for the onset of my CH some 8 years ago, although it actually started during a period in which I had managed to temporarily kick the habit for a few years.

Regardless whether some stats imply that 70% of CH sufferers have a nicotine history (which may or may not be exaggerated) and although we probably all agree that quitting smoking after CH has started has no effect on calming the beast, I do tend to believe that smoking is partly to blame for it coming into our lives in the first place.

Being a chronic and therefore having to stay away from booze and being on a low histamine diet means that the thought of also binning cigarettes doesnt fulfill me with joy, but at the same time I am conscious that it would possibly help me make my body stronger, improve my respiratory system, improve oxygen circulation throughout my body and possibly make we more resilient against the beast.

Thoughts anyone?

I am a smoker too and have never thought that my smoking has anything to do with C/H. In fact, I used to find that when I was at the end of an attack, I would light a ciggie and found it helped for me.

Now, if I was having a glass of red, then that would definately bring on an attack.

Interesting. We see it listed as a trigger and in many studies. Always on the list of causes. My Doc always mentions smoking every visit. My CH started after a bout of insomnia which I was only sleeping a few hours a night and I increased my normal smoking amount significantly for about a month. Just an observation. Sure wish there was more definite info about this. Thanks for the thread.
God Bless
Donna Mae

I'm a smoker and while I've seen enough hard evidence to fully agree smoking isn't a healthy habit, I have also lost all patience for what passes as fact in the interest of advancing opinionated causes.

Specific to CH...

Over the years I've come to understand that not all CH sufferers smoke and many have never smoked.        My former Neurologist recommended quitting smoking for general health reasons but made it clear that doing so would not reduce or cure CH.  Notably he was also a medical researcher and unfortunately for me, left general practice to advance a research career.  I don't believe I'll find another open minded Neurologist with pure interest in understanding his patients actual experiences to work with again.

In General...   

Smoking is one variable among many that affect our health but is also the current whipping boy and money maker for the health care industry.  Conveniently overlooked are the effects of repeated and long term exposure to auto/truck/bus emissions, paints/solvents, lawn/home pesticides & herbicides, human waste, industrial chemicals/plant emissions, etc., etc., etc., in the air, water, and ground.

Most reports implicating “first hand”, “second hand”, and most recently “third hand” smoke (smoke that lingers in furniture, on walls, etc., etc.) as plagues on society's  health aren't worth the paper they are written on – let alone the billions of public and private dollars that funded them.  In our current morass, smoking has been implicated as the cause of everything from excessive body hair to pimples on your derriere.  It's a challenge to research a medical condition that doesn't include smoking as a “potential cause”.  Isn't it simple..... ban smoking and society's health issues will vanish, the economy will soar, IQ scores will increase, and the nation's impoverished will be saved.   

In this culture, truth and fact are overshadowed by the B.S.  Credibility is sacrificed in the pursuit of sociopolitical, “anti-something” agendas.    

burnt-toast
(Tom)

Just to chime in with a quick antecdotal bit:

The amount of cigarettes I have smoked during the course of my 30 years so far of CH = zero.

(I did smoke smoke some as a teen, but quit a few years before my first CH attack, when my mom, rest her beautiful soul, gave me $20 if i would quit) 

Tom, I could kiss you.  I could not have said that any better. 

There is no evidence that smoking causes CH or makes it worse.  Nictotine is a vasoconstrictor(Which is what we need during an attac k) and I believe THAT is why so many of us smoke. 

I don't think we are in denial; at all.  Smoking IS bad for us.  No doubt about that, but to blame cigarettes for CH is absurd.

Neuropath,

I sincerely hope you have not recieved the wrong impression here.  While we say it has little to do with CH....that does NOT mean that smoking is good.  It is not. 

Personally I intend to look into the E-cigarettes that Pegg and others here have tried.  It is at the bottom of her posts. The patch, and gum have done nothing for me. 

Not sure everyone got the point I was trying to make.

Am not suggesting that stopping smoking has any positive effect on CH...by the time CH is here the train has already left the station.

My point: just like longterm heavy smoking can cause lung cancer, can longterm heavy smoking be responsible for causing CH in the first place? We all agree that once both conditions are here stopping to smoke will make no difference, but can stopping make you body fitter to make the battle more promising? As Laotze said: The bigger army wins!

I can maybe add a little to this debate. 

I'd been mis-diagnosed for many years.  It wasn't until I'd undergone hypnosis to quit smoking that I got a correct diagnosis.  Here is what my specialist at the time figured was the reason.

I'd been a non-smoker for only a couple weeks, but during that time my attacks were were becomming more frequent.  I was middle of the night sufferer almost exclusively for oh so many years.  Chronic by definition but with an odd pattern,  2 or 3 days of attacks and 3 to 4 days without, and no longer than a couple weeks break when I did get extended time off from hits.

But when I quit smoking cold turkey back in late February 2004, I started getting hit not only at night, but during the day too. 

One thing that is known is that CH also has a connection to serotonin levels, and it's also known that cigarette smoke contains MAIO's.  So in addition to nicotine there are properties that alter the serotonin levels when a person smokes and ultimately quits smoking.

I had started smoking again, but the cold turkey alteration of serotonin levels morphed "MY" beast..well lets just say the damage was done.  Starting smoking again didn't change the new pattern.  (but quitting was the catalyst to a proper diagnosis)

Now it could also be said, that the connection between CH and smoking is the serotonin connection.  Possibly it's a combination between the nicotine vascoconstriction and the MAOI's in tobacco smoke that help keep a more comfortable balance.  If the theory you present is valid, the opposite could be just as valid.

Even if it is true that more CH sufferers are smokers than the general population, smoking must only be a partial factor since about half of the sufferers say they've never smoked.

Ahhh, the chicken/egg debate.

I believe that the same malfunction in the hypo that cause ch also causes us to have addictive personalities and thus be smokers.  Most clusterheads are pretty good drinkers also!  Smoking and ch are both caused by the same thing but have no effect on each other.

Ive been having clusters for nearly a year. But have only been smoking properly for erm... about 3 years? do you think this is the reason i get clusters? even though i have only been smoking for a short while?

SET•ME•FREE wrote on Mar 15^th, 2010 at 12:09pm:
IMHO, this is the hardest reason for quitting.