Let me preface this post by stating that I am a former 2 pack a day smoker. I’ve blogged about this a few times before.
Yes, I used to smoke but I quit years ago. I quit for selfish reasons. I quit because I was repulsed by the fact that I sounded exactly like my mother during my morning hack-up-a-lung ritual. I was in my twenties and yet I sounded like some chain-smoking old lady. I quit because I wanted to be around for a very long time to watch my children grow up. I also quit because I could not justify exposing a child (unborn or born) to the effects of smoking. The second-hand smoke exposure is a gimme but did you know that people around a smoker breathe in the cancer -causing chemicals that cling to the clothing and hair of a smoker for up to thirty minutes AFTER a smoker has inhaled deeply? A smoker also exhales the same second-hand smoke for up to thirty minutes after extinguishing a cigarette. So even smoking away from the children could subject them to the effects of smoking and I just couldn’t do that to them. I won’t say that it was easy-peasy to quit because it never is. Being nauseous during early pregnancy certainly helped but it didn’t take away that intense jonesing for a nicotine fix. See, I know it’s hard. But I still did it and I am glad that I did.
Still I am surrounded by an extended family of smokers. I’ve learned that I can’t express my concern for them even as I watch their bodies deteriorate like the burning ash on a cigarette because the defensive walls only grow higher and higher as they light up yet another cigarette in a defiant “shut the F&@k up” stance. Breaking free of their addiction is brutally hard but watching people continue to smoke in spite of the ill effects they live with is just as brutally hard. I wonder how much longer before the day comes that they share news like my father in law shared two years and eight months ago. Still I am forced to remain silent to keep the family peace. Discussing my worry and concern about the smoking is worse than discussing this year’s Presidential campaign or the Iraq War. Of course that doesn’t change the fact that their addiction is ravaging their bodies and, for some, slowly killing them.
While in St Louis I found that I was not alone in my genuine worry and fear for one of my loved ones. Six friends of Bill came alongside me during the convention on six separate occasions to express their genuine concern for his health and his smoking. Okay, so I’m not the only one who has seen the toll it has rapidly taken on him. I guess he is also a little more aware of it all as he agreed when I was emboldened by his friends’ concerns to nag after one of his frequent gasping-coughing jags that he needed to make an appointment to see his doctor as soon as we got back from St. Louis. He even followed through seeing his doctor Monday afternoon.
The news was no surprise to me but all the same not so good.
Bill is in the beginning stages of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease or COPD. His doctor has started him on a medication regimen which hopefully will help to make breathing a little easier for now. It won’t make him better because COPD gets worse over time. You can’t undo the damage to your lungs. I saw this coming a long time ago and yet I stayed quiet…well, okay, I stayed quiet most of the time. I stayed quiet to keep peace under the Big Top. But today and yesterday and the day before that and the day before that I have been angry, frustrated, worried and a little scared and did I say that I was angry…especially every time he or my daughter Holly goes out back by the trash cans to have yet another cigarette. I’m spending a lot of my time breathing in and out oh so very slowly right now.
Don’t defend them or tell me how hard it is for them or any other smoker out there, seriously, because I just might hyperventilate. And if you feel just have to do it because I just don’t understand then I suggest you go back to the top of the page and re-read that first sentence over and over and over again. In the meantime I will continue to breath in…and breathe out…and cry…and pray.
My dad quit when I was 11 (too bad they didn’t know back then the REAL reason for my childhood asthma and chronic bronchial infections that all magically went away about a year after he quit). It may have been soon enough to avoid serious issues with his lungs, but not the serious issues with his heart. He’s got a defib device implanted in his chest now. Not to mention the 3 strokes he’s had because of his damaged heart.
We lost my father-in-law to complications from COPD. He survived prostate cancer and lymphoma only to suffer a heart attack because his lungs weren’t strong enough to fight back from a chest cold. So senseless and stupid. He never got to meet his grand-sons.
I give these examples not to increase your worry (you have every reason to worry as it is) but rather as ammunition to beat your husband and daughter over the head with.
You also didn’t mention the toxic and carcinogenic chemicals that linger on the clothes of smokers and get transfered to their kids through normal contact.
I’m a former smoker too. I smoked from age 16 until I was 21. I didn’t quit for my health and there was no children to worry about. I was just too broke to afford my smokes. Thank God for the craptastic pay scale of the average college student. Cigs cost $1.50 a pack back then. I’d probably choke at the expense of them now.
I am a former smoker as well. Quitting was the single most hardest thing I have ever done.
But, I can’t even imagine how hard this diagnosis is for you. I’ll be thinking of you….
(((HugHugHug)))
I absolutely understand. My father has had multiple heart attacks since he was 38. He’s tried – but hasn’t’ quit. Even after having his chest cracked open. It’s painful knowing he’s still smoking. Still love him – still accept him — still hate he hasn’t quit — still hurts. However, I’ve had no choice but to accept it.
I quit in 2000 because of his health issues and knowing I’m genetically following down the same path of early problems.
My heart goes to you – such a painful thing to process.
*hugz*
The one good thing my mom always told us kids was “Starting smoking was the most stupid thing I’ve ever done. Please don’t be stupid like me.” And luckily none of her kids ever started smoking.
Unfortunately my mom’s stupidity has caught up with her. She has COPD, Viral Pneumonia, Osteoporosis & Arthritis. Her Arthritis meds suppressed her immunity making her pneumonia go undiagnosed for about 6 months…it took her having to go to the ER because she couldn’t breathe for them to figure it out. She spent a week in the hospital and almost died. She’s now on oxygen. She’s on permanet disability and of course can’t work or walk any great distances.
and yet…she hasn’t stopped smoking! She barely has the money to pay her bills…but my brother & I won’t send her money because we know she’ll buy cigarettes with it.
and folks wonder why I’m so stubborn…
That sucks!! I hope that he can get a handle on his health for your and your kid’s sake.
I smoked over a pack a day for over a decade. I quit almost 18 years ago. My experience quitting was instructive to me. I spent years telling myself I was going to quit, only to realise, later that day, that I had a cigarette in my mouth, and a fresh pack – that I did not even remember buying – in my pocket. Then, one day, out of the blue, I took a cigarette out of my pack, looked at it, and realised that I didn’t really want to smoke it. I threw a half a pack into the garbage, and haven’t had one since. (Well, OK, one, but that’s a sad, sordid story of drunken depravity that I won’t go into here.)
What I realised was that, no matter how many times I told myself I needed to quit – no matter how intellectually I understood just how bad for me smoking was – I didn’t really want to quit…until I did. And I was never going to be successful quitting until I wanted – truly wanted – to quit. And no one else around me will ever quit because I want them to. They have to want to – really want to – or else they will never be successful. And so, no matter how hard it was, I had to bite my tongue, and let those around me go on killing themselves as long as they would.
I’ve been lucky. None of my close relatives or friends still smoke today (although I lost several Grandparents to Lung Cancer). I can only wish for you the same luck. I hope Bill and Holly, and everyone else closes to you come upon their own moment of realisation and say, “hey, I really don’t want to do this anymore.”
hey, this blog is truly inspirational.
you give me strength on my quest to also quit smoking.
hope to read more of your stories.
I am so, so sorry for you and your family and I completely empathize with your feelings… I am an ex-smoker myself and live with a man who smokes – my husband. He is finally taking stopping seriously after being put on blood pressure medication last week.
I am so tired of worrying about his health and feeling enraged that he exposes my preemie’s delicate lungs to lingering smoke residues. I am also tired of my fear of ending up alone with two small children…
And give that I know first hand how hard it is to quit smoking – I totally get not wanting to hear justifications or platitudes about why smoking is OK…
Sorry to rant on your blog, but this post really really got to me.
There is definitely hope for them both! My parents both smoked for most of my life. My mom for almost 25 years and my dad about 43 years. Up until Feb. 2005 they both smoked; my mom was smoking about 3 packs a day by that time and it took a major scare for them both to finally quit.
You’d be hard pressed to find someone who was so against quitting as my Mom; she did not want the topic even being mentioned and regardless of what could happen to them or what effects it could have on those around them, she would go nuts defending her reasons for smoking and did not want to hear a word about quitting. (I totally get what you were explaining about you trying to talk to your family about it!)
My dad started to become concerned about his health as he got older and had an inkling to quit but never did. Then, in February 05 my mom went from being fine to have a severe case of pneumonia within 2 days. We took her to the hospital at 2 am because she couldn’t walk from one room to another without gasping for breath. She was hospitalized and had one kind doctor that encouraged her to use the time in the hospital as a starting point to quit smoking. Needless to say, when I went home that afternoon, my dad threw out all of the ashtrays and almost a full carton of each of their cigarettes and neither of them have smoked since then.
I can’t believe the complete 360 they both did (she even complains about how much it stinks now lol). Feb will be 4 years and their health has hugely improved. No more wheezing, morning coughing fits…my dads blood pressure returned to normal. I just wanted to share this like everyone else in the hopes that it can encourage your family in some way, but also to show that even 25 and 43 year smokers can quit. Just keep praying for them both because it will happen!!
my mom was a heavy smoker for years (3 packs a day) we hated going to her house for visits because we stunk. it was so bad even our teachers commented on it many of times. we asked our mom to quit, begged. no use until she figured out that she could buy a baby grand piano with all the money she spent on cigs. she didn’t care about the health of her kids, the death of her father (lung cancer), us begging. no, a baby grand piano is what it took to get her to quit. i’m not even sure how i feel about this. i hope your friend will feel a little better and sometimes it’s better not to keep the peace.