Reply #33: Smoking [View All]

[reDEMption]

First, be aware that your body is fighting the craving for nicotine, so it's starting to put thoughts in your head--excuses--that will allow you to give up on stopping smoking.

Second, in my family, the entire generation before me smoked. Of those who have since passed away, ALL of them died from an illness caused by their smoking: lung cancer, emphysema, bladder cancer, throat cancer, chronic bronchitis that led to pneumonia and death--you name it. Yes, we all have to die of SOMETHING. However, I took care of many of my relatives in their last illnesses and, believe me, the amount of suffering they went through was horrific. Even if we had only the next 2 years on earth and then no more, why on earth would you want to put yourself through that? A body can go through an awful lot of suffering in 2 weeks--let alone 2 years.

Third, I was the one who took care of the majority. Instead of sitting down to Thanksgiving dinners with them, I was rubbing cream on Grandma's radiation treatment burns for her lung cancer. I was ordering oxygen for my father who could not walk 10 steps without resting-let alone walk me down the aisle when I got married. I was burying my mother when she was only 56 years old, 3 months before my college graduation that she would never get to see. Any kids I may have would never know their grandparents...

All in all, why would you want a life like that? Which one of your loved ones do you want to leave those memories with after they bury YOU years before your time? Robbing yourself of every dance, wedding, child birth, Thanksgiving dinner, graduation is one thing--who else in your family do you wish to take from? Have you ever thought about the price your loved ones around you would pay?