Ciggyfree Blog & Gov Alert

…are doomed to repeat it.

I’ve been on my high horse today about Big Tobacco trying to squirm out of facing responsibility for killing people. I do recognize my own responsibility of making the initial choice to try a sickarette. But I also feel it’s appropriate for BT to accept its role in making sure people stay “life long customers”.

So I looked something up on Answers.com about Big Tobacco and it’s interesting reading. Thought I would share it with you. There’s a lot of history preceeding this clip, mostly telling about how American and European cigarette manufacturing grew and eventually a monopoly of sorts was formed and subsequently broken up.

Then… (emphasis added below are my own)…

In 1913 the newly independent R.J. Reynolds launched Camels, the “first modern cigarette.” Camels were quickly imitated by American’s Lucky Strike and Liggett and Myers’ revamped Chesterfield cigarettes.  All three brands stressed their mildness and catered their appeal to men and women alike.  The 1920s saw the “conversion” of many tobacco consumers to the cigarette in the Unites States, United Kingdom, Europe, China, and Japan. Between 1920 and 1930, U.S. cigarette consumption doubled to 1,370 cigarettes per capita.

The article goes on to talk about how marketing played a vital role. I remember cigarette ads talking about how doctors preferred this over that brand, and how much better for you one cigarette was than another. I can’t tell you how strong an influence these clever ploys had over what was and wasn’t accepted.

The article continues:

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If there is a chain to be broken, then there must be links or ties that hold that chain together. My last two days in Texas with my daughter, I had a startling revelation. It’ll seem so simple to you, as you sit here and read it. But it was a “No DUH!” moment for me and I don’t mind showing how blind a person can be when they’re emotionally invested in helping somebody quit.

I had taken each of my daughters individually to my hotel during my visit and showed them the Barb Tarbox video in hopes to get them to see what smoking can and will do to their lives. I then showed them a pic of Barb in the last few days of her life, and encouraged them to read more by searching the internet for information on her widower and daughter.

My youngest quit immediately, and has been smoke-free for three weeks now. My middle girl, who just gave birth to another daughter, told us something exciting two nights before I flew home. She said she’s going to quit — she wants to quit — and here’s the part that opened my eyes… she ended with “…but I’m scared!”

I told you it wouldn’t sound like much. But to me, it was a real wake up call. I smoked for 30 years. 25 of those years or more, I wanted to quit… but I was scared to. Well, if I’d been scared enough to continue smoking for a quarter of a century, what makes me think anybody else would be any different? LOL!

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This has been the hardest document I have ever been asked to do.
To introduce myself to you all I am a 51-year-old programmer who has smoked now for 30 years. I would have to say that the last 10 years I have smoked two packs a day. Why did I decide to quit, the million-dollar question we all ask.
Two reasons
1) I promised a friend.
2) I looked at why I smoked.
Let’s look at #2 first
30 years is a long time to have fun with a friend. In addition, those who are reading this know what I mean by a friend.
Someone asked me to look at why I smoked, not just how much, but WHY again I say WHY, and WHEN.
Therefore, I did, and I was very confused.

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…be unbroken…

Oh how I pray it will be broken!

To understand my meaning, you need to know a little about me. Who I am, where I am, why I am here. I’m a 50-something grandmother who finally found a way to overcome this addiction a year and 8 weeks ago. Growing up, it wasn’t a question of if you would start smoking, but when. The same was true for my mom. I have a picture of her when she was maybe 15 or 16 eating an apple and smoking a sickarette.

She smoked when she was pregnant with me. So when I took my first puff of a sickarette, even though it didn’t taste good and I had to make my body accept the smoke into my lungs… it felt like home. It had been part of my experience before I ever had a choice in what kinds of things I wanted to experience. My mom smoked around us kids all the time we were growing up, as did our dad and step dad and just about every “cool” person in our world.

Mom died when I was 10-ish. She’d been in the hospital for 3 and a half years, and weighed in at about 82 lbs when the cancer finally ended her suffering and claimed her life…

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http://health.howstuffworks.com/lung.htm

You breathe in and out anywhere from 15 to 25 times per minute without
even thinking about it. When you exercise, your breathing rate goes up
– again, without you thinking about it. You breathe so regularly that
it is easy to take your lungs for granted. You can’t even stop yourself
from breathing if you try!

Smoker’s Lung Pathology Photo Essay
http://www.medicinenet.com/smokers_lung_pathology_photo_essay/article…

This photo essay will focus on smoker’s lung. The term “smoker’s lung”
refers to the structural and functional abnormalities (diseases) in the
lung caused by cigarette smoking. First, the normal structure and
function of the lung will be described and illustrated. Then, the
structural and functional abnormalities caused by smoking. will be
described and illustrated.

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There are over 60 known cancer-causing chemicals in tobacco smoke. While nicotine itself isn’t thought to be carcinogenic, the highly addictive drug is toxic and potentially lethal in large doses. Apartfrom its use in tobacco products, nicotine is a scheduled poison underthe Therapeutic Goods Act.

Along with nicotine, smokers also inhale about 4,000 other chemicals. Many of these compounds are chemically active and trigger profound and damaging changes in the body. Smoking harms nearly every organ in thebody, causing many diseases and reducing health in general.

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http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_entertainment/189793.html

This professor has smoked approximately 21,098 packs of cigarettes up to age seventy. That is approximately one pack per day for fifty-eight years.

Lungs can recover SOME of the previous healthy appearance and normal function, depending upon how long and how much the person has smoked.  Of course, the more one smokes, the lower the chances are for recovery.  Medical Professionals base the smoker’s chances for improvement on several factors, but one of the more important factors is known as “Pack Years”(P-Y).

If you multiply the number of packs of cigarettes smoked each day by the number of years the person has been smoking, the result is the “Pack Years”.  For example: Mr “C” is 37 years old and smoked two pack of cigarettes for 19 years.  Therefore, Mr “C” has a 38 PackYear smoking istory.  This is not good at all! When the “P-Y” number is more than the age of the person, the more likely there is to be damage to the lungs.

~Richard Mondak, Staff, Physician Assistant, PA Provider Services

Well, I made it to eleven months now. When I first started this quit, eleven months seemed like an unreachable goal. But when you just keep going one day at a time, the days add up. Keeping your focus on the short term - sometimes the right now - you can be successful.

That was one of my stumbling blocks in previous quits. I would contemplate the thousands of days in the future that I would not be able to smoke, and it would intimidate me. It was too much to expect. And it also showed that I was still deluded that I liked smoking. So my determination would be overwhelmed.

By now I have quit just for today so many times that I no longer really want to go back to smoking. I can think of not smoking ten years from now without any panic.

I still get urges to smoke - some quite strong. But I can deal with them. And that’s all you can really expect at this stage of the game. Vigilance is still required - but I can beat this damned addiction.

Zzyzx

I have been so busy that if I had not checked my e-mail (thanks Rosie for reminding me.) I probably would have slid right past the three-year mark with barely a whisper! You are perhaps wondering how I arrived at this precious milestone? It took time, research, dedication, stubbornness, and a strong desire to succeed.

I never really had a strong human support system nor did any forum really do anything to help me maintain my quit. Though I once belonged to a group called The Leapers, there was not a whole lot of support there either. I did have people along the way (Rosie, Maddie, and GoddessXena) who took the time to be supportive when they could.

The bulk of my support arrived via my own research and putting my heart and soul into the creation of Ciggyfree.com. To be perfectly frank, I was my own best cheerleader. I had to learn to support my own quit and never expect another person to pick me up if I fell down.

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