Is smoking tea dangerous?

[threebob]

BIL has mental health issues and this is his latest bizarre idea, indulged completely by MIL.

I think it can't be good for you, but am prepared to be told I'm wrong.

tea?? thats a bit odd! surely it can't be good for you???
Well if they mix the tea with tobacco then no it can't be....if they smoke just the leaves...um well...no idea!

But surely it's not the tobacco thats good or bad for you it's the smoke, so smoking anything mustn't be great for you.

So as a way to cut down on the smokes it's hardly sensible?

has he actually tried it? I can remember doing it when I was 14 and firstly it's impossible to roll into a decent fag (too dry); secondly it tastes like crap. Obviously the mental health thing is a factor and I know nothing about it - but I wouldn't be supised if this is one of those ideas that dies a quick and painless death. (in answer to the question, I'm sure it is bad for you, but probably not as bad a tobacco)

Appears to be quite popular among a certain sort of hippie, as a way to get high

smoking tea

just occured to me - a friend of mine smoked herbal cigarettes when she was giving up - they taste awful and are a poor substitute - they replace the hand fiddling thing and nothing else - but they're nowhere near as bad for you as normal fags - maybe worth suggesting.

I think there are 2 other factors at play:

1. Him trying to prove what a switched on together guy he is by incorporating some lateral thinking into his giving up smoking.

2. He is notoriously tight with money.

He has been witnessed smoking said fag.

Anythink smoked, or burned has the potential to contain cancer causing compounds. I don't know how many are produced in tea.

One thing that will be exactly the same as smoking normal cigarettes is the damage to the tiny hair like projections on the cells that line the airways.

The heat of a cigarette.....or anything else smoked and inhalled, stops these tiny cillia from beating. Normaly they move mucus up and out of the lungs taking with it, dust, dirt and germs. If you smoke you stop this working, so the crap stayes in your lungs, leading to increased chest infections, bronchitis, and eventually to emphysema and a slow painful death

I quit smoking with herbal cigarettes. I don't see why this is much diffrent. I think they should only be used short term though as it just really to get you off the nicotine. Its the tar that kills you after all.

The tar is the thing that gives you the cancers.

But the heat from the cigarette causes the damage that can lead to emphysema, and from that to Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, which is another major killer of smokers.

My uncle died of COPD, it was cruel to watch

I will admit to trying this as a student when strapped for cash (the idea of just stopping was beyond me!) We tried drying and scraping banana skins, various mixed dried herbs, tetley tea, you name it. As soon as the grant came back in we went straight back to normal fags with a big sigh of relief ( no longer smoke, thank goodness).

I'm with paulapp - smoking tea as a transitional phase in giving up could be useful - it isn't good to inhale any smoke obviously, but this would wean him off nicotine, then once that addiction is gone or under control he can cut down and quit smoking altogether.

Tell him to read Allan Carr 'Easy way to stop smoking book' Its very good I stopped after reading it and know many others who did too.

It's not good to substitute cigarettes for anything. It gives an illusion that your giving something up, as if its a sacrifies.Which makes you continue to think cigarettes are enjoyable. Trust me it makes it very hard to stop. Most of the addiction is mental. You dont actually get a physical feeling that you need a cigarette your mind tells you, you want one. Obviously there is a slight physical addiction there, but its no greater 10hours after having a ciggarette than it is 1hour after having one. So why does the need for one get greater and greater? Because it's a mental addiction. Which is why its so hard to kick.
You'll have to read the book to fully understand it. But if you can understand why you smoke it makes it very easy to stop.
The nature of any addiction is to want more and more not less and less, thats why cutting down rarely works. The smoker just ends up making each cigartette more sacred, thinking of them as a treat rather than seeing them for what they really are. Discusting and unenjoyable.

I think you have to find the way of giving up that suits you and everyone is different Biglilbubu. Substituting tobacco cigarettes does work for some people. But whatever way someone chooses it is only going to work if they truly want to give up as a final goal.

I agree aDadonmumsnet that obviously people have stopped smoking using substitutes and various other tools or using willpower alone.
My point is that 95% of people who read Allen Carrs book or go to his clinic stop smoking. There isnt any other way to stop with such a good success rate.
If you want to stop for good and without gaining loads of weight or getting addicted to something else, it makes alot of sense to read the book. Its by far the easiest way to stop imo.

Am ROFL at the response on that link Franny..

''Although the Revolutionary Rastafarian Bob Marley once said, "Dem wanna smoke it, let 'em smoke it. Dem wanna boil it in tea, let 'em boil it in tea," I don't think that he was talking about actual Camellia Sinensis (tea plant). Although both are "groovy" in their individual ways, tea has none of the same depressant effects. In other words, Mary Jane and Camellia will never wear the same dress to the prom.

Although it probably wouldn't cause any bodily harm, it would be a waste of perfectly good tea and therefore isn't recommended. ''

We shouldn't joke about it though as these modern blends of tea are up to ten times more potent than the tea we got back in the seventies. You see these kids whacked out on the latest super-earl grey strain or the infamous 'assam annihilator' , and you realise it's no laughing matter.

And once you start on the 'green' tea, you are done for!

man, I hear ya. Why, one weekend in the 90s, I spent 48 hours smoking Lapsang Souchong and I don't know what happened (friends remain tight-lipped) but I've never been able to look at a fondant fancy since

Lemontart, I remember trying the scraped dried banana skin! It was meant to get you high. I think I willed myself to believe in its powers.

sorry but i can just imagine someone hunched over a PG tip trying to coax it into a rizla.

and people seriously do this??

lol pointydog- where did the banana skin myth start anyway? I'd be interested to know because it's something that everybody had heard of, but quite clearly was never going to get anyone high! (not calling you gullibe or anything )

So smoking hot stuff = bad, but tea no worse than tobacco. Apparently he seems more alert but my MIL wants to see that.

Why they continue to indulge these mad ideas is beyond me (well, it's because they are his parents - but it doesn't help him).

If he wants to give up then talking to his support worker or GP would probably be more use. Anyroad - these weird ideas invariably end up in a trip to the hospital about a week later, and the patients in the mental health unit smoke like chimneys as there is nothing else to do (apparently).

threebob - it is a fact that people with mental health problems are far more likely to smoke than people without...(not just in hospital, I mean generally)

Sorry for going off on a flippant tangent on your OP. I guess the crux is, although tea isn't going to be full of the hideous chemicals that tobacco has, smoke inhalation is not good for your lungs. And although, again, tea isn't going to be be addictive like nicotene, it is the fact that smokers are addicted to the physical act of smoking far after the effects of nicotene has worn off. So in the long, he's going to be back on fags before you can say ''have you got a light?''

What sort of mentsal health issues are we talking about BTW? I'm presuming, not just depression...