You needn't tell me about the cruel and nasty deaths that smoking can cause. My mother died of cancer (though, she didn't have cancer of the lungs...ironically...but nearly everything else) and my father had emphysema (which he was hospitalized for...and in the hospital they found a blockage of his arteries and operated and he bled to death).

The part no one seems to understand (and I don't know if you've ever smoked jseal...so I'm directing this to everyone) is that when I (we...smokers collectively) started smoking, we didn't envision our parents, or anyone for that matter, with lung cancer or any other disease caused by smoking. I was just hanging out and fitting in and gagging and puking and making myself like this shit so I could look cool! It may have been boredom from living in a town with nothing much to do. It may have been peer pressure. It may be that I saw both my parents do it and it looked fun and cool. It may have been any and/or all of that...but it happened. I started smoking and now I can't stop! I don't want cancer! I don't want emphysema! I've seen the horrors FIRST HAND! I'm not a stupid person. I know what smoking is doing to me...and yet I can't quit. I could quit eating easier than I could quit smoking. I don't have any other vices to quit...but if I drank coffee, I could quit it. If I smoked pot, I could quit. If I took narcotics, I could quit (and I did...a prescription for pain that I stopped on my own cause I hated the addiction). Think of anything and I bet I could quit it. But I can't quit this and I've tried so much it'd make your head spin! The need is ALWAYS there...and I don't want that need anymore!

To be totally open and honest here, I'll divulge something that I've never said here at Pixies. I've been smoking since I was 7 years old (started at 6 and started inhaling at 7)...I will be 47 in one month...and the longest I've gone without a cigarette in all that time is 2 months and 3 days. I've quit a total of 32 times in my smoking carreer and I've never made it past 2 months and 3 days. It's tremendously upsetting to fail at something so many times! I don't take failure (for myself) very well at all. This has been one...no...make that THE...hardest thing I've ever tried and failed at in my life!

If words and advice and warnings and tsk tsk's from those in the know could make me/help me quit...don't you think I would??????? I don't want to die like that...and I surely don't want to lay it all on my family to see me die like that!

Give me the antidote!

Damn...this is a touchy subject...eh?

*hugs to (((everyone)))...smoking or not*

My mom was a pack a day smoker from age 18 to 35. She quit right around the time the patches and gum came out. She said it was the hardest thing she ever had to do, and at 10 years later, she still wants them. I'd advise you to NOT start back, silentsoul. You're just causing problems for yourself later on.

((((((lixy))))))

silentsoul,

I do hope these recollections and confessions help steer you away from smoking again. It has been 19 years now since I kicked the habit, and I too had a very difficult time doing so. As you can read here, the combination of the short term physiological and the long term psychological habituation to smoking cigarettes can be almost insuperable. As LixyChick has commented, the final problems are not worth the initial values.

When you read these posts, I think you’ll find none in support of resuming smoking. Good luck.

(((Lixy)))

I'm glad for myself that I was just a drunk "fashionable" smoker... actually inhale... are you kidding me? I would have puked on the spot. My dad was a heavy smoker... he went in for surgery one day, came out of recovery and was wheeled past a smoking lounge in the hospital ( yes, in the early 80's they still has them IN the hospitals ), he puked all over himself and hasn't touched one since. He gets an upset stomach even from the smell. Of course I've been thankful that he was able to kick the habit.

I know what you mean lixy.I quit the drugs, the pot, the alcohol, but this one is a bitch.:(
My first cig was down the alley behind the school when I was 13 and just to be cool. But I liked that first cigarette.

(((osuche))) (((Sharni))) (((jseal))) (((CGT)))

You guys are terrific! TY for "getting it" and for passing the message along to silentsoul!

Sharni? I hear ya g/f! *hugs* for being able to stay quit! Here's to it happening for me someday soon! P.S. There are very few times in a calender year when I actually enjoy a cig! Blahhhhh!

It drives me wild to see a young person smoking now-a-days! The warnings are right in your face on the side of the packs. In my day (OMG...now I sound like my mother...arrrrgggg!) the side of a cig pack said, and I quote, "Caution, cigarette smoking may be hazardous to your health". Today it says stuff like, "Smoking can kill" and Cigarette smoking is addicitve". I've actually seen harsher warnings on packs of cigs from Germany. The U.S. could get a bit more specific, in my opinion. But the point is, the cigarette companies have been obliged (through law suits) to make the warnings more specific...and they have. To see someone so young, like you silentsoul, smoking a cig....well, my heart aches for you!

For once, especially in this instance, I wish the younger generation would take advice from us old folks and believe we are saying it for their own good instead of trying to control them.

I hope all of this soapbox action is helping you ss!

Luther Terry
 

Here’s an interesting piece of trivia; Luther Terry (1911-1985) was the Surgeon General here in the States from 1961 to 1965. His claim to fame is for sending out the first official warning that tobacco is a health hazard.

This warning was issued on January 11, 1964.

I quit using the Nicorette but when it was in clinical trials (they were deciding on how much Nicotine was needed/safe and everyone had dif amounts in their gum packets). The entire inside of my mouth broke out in blisters and I could not eat, drink, or smoke. Best thing that ever happened to me :D The nurse running the trial said they had already pegged me as being unable to stop because all indicators suggested I was highly addicted (duh!). Fate working in my favor for once I suppose

Jan 11 1964 (exactly 41 years ago)
The US Surgeon General warns against smoking for the first time.

Thought that might be interesting to some of you since that is today.

I gave up smoking when the price increased to 85 cents a pack. It was taking too much of a bite out of my allowance. :p

But think about it. That was 25 years ago. Imagine how much money I would've spent on smokes? Don't get me wrong...I've obviously found something else to spend it on because there's no gigantic pile of money in my basement, but still. That's some serious change.

Damnit...where's PF? He's great at these things! :D

I was 4 years old I couldn't read then. :p

I wasn't even BORN then :p hehe

I've been doing some serious thinking since I first started smoking again. The first cig was nasty but that nicotene buzz hit me for the first time and ever since then it's been hard to see enough of a reason not to smoke. Basically I forgot how bad it is for you. Since that first smoke, I've bought 3 packs. First pack I smoked like 5-6 and threw the rest away but then a couple days later I wanted a cig. Finally I broke down and got another pack and did the same thing. Same thing all over, I wanted some so I got some and then I threw them away.

First thing I did today was smoke a cig. I started to smoke one a while ago and I was just disgusted at myself so I put it out. I'm really REALLY hoping that it was my last one.