Tobacco: Cigarette and Best Friends Home

Have you ever heard the saying “Long life or cigarettes? You choose.” Studies from http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/health_effects/effects_cig_smoking/ show that the adverse health effects from cigarette smoking account for more than 440,000 deaths, or nearly one of every five deaths, each year in the United States. There are more fatalities caused each year by tobacco use than by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), illegal drug use, alcohol use, automobile accidents, suicides, and murders combined. Tobacco products cause cancer, effects and damages your overall health, and can ultimately kill you with a variety of unique diseases and sicknesses. When I was roughly fourteen or fifteen I remember spending a lot of time with my mother as my parents were divorced. I specifically remember traveling often back and forth from my mothers to her best friends home. Her best friend Toni and her husband Ron had been high school sweethearts and happily married for the last twenty-five years. Something that stood out to me back then was how frequent they would smoke cigarettes or her husband Ron would chew. You couldn’t walk into the house without passing through a thick white cloud of smoke or catching Ron throwing a big fat dip in his bottom lip. This was a routine pattern they’d been doing since high school. She would chain smoke and he would chew all day. Months later on a bright sunny afternoon my mom was picking me up from school when she received a phone call. “Hello.” she answered… “Oh my goodness, i’ll be right over” she replied
After all those years of dipping and chewing Ron had gone to the doctor to get a bump on his throat evaluated only to find that it was actually a common form of throat cancer. He has multiple surgeries to remove and repair his throat, but to this day he doesn’t eat, breath, or even speak the same way he used to. Years later after having seen the negative impact of tobacco products I, myself, was determined to quit smoking. It had only been a year since I started, but I noticed my health slowly declining. It became very clear to me as I researched online, noting there are over 4000 chemical compounds in a cigarette that of which 400 are toxic, and read an array of informative books on health effects that your body can easily be damaged from smoking. Physically I felt used up and exhausted. I couldn’t run as long as I used to before becoming short of breath, my blood pressure shot up, and my immune system was weakened as I became sick much easier and more regularly. I also found things I disliked about it including the smell, the expense, how it was destroying the enamel of my pearly whites and the simple fact I was wrecking my lungs. The end all was a picture I found of a smokers lung, compared to a non-smokers lung and at that point in time I knew I was only damaging these vital organs that I will need to be in tip top shape many years down the road. My health has been quietly affected from the harmful toxins in tobacco products, however I was lucky enough to have never experienced a disease or illness that is capable of taking one's life. Five years ago my family was in Chicago at my grandma’s house celebrating Thanksgiving as we did every year. The air was filled with the scent of roasted turkey, sweet potatoes, and gravy. The women slaved over a hot stove preparing the celebratory feast and the men kicked out the recliners on the Laz-e-boys, shared jokes, and watched football. Without any warning my grandpa Eugene, sitting in the living room with us, collapsed. Earlier in the day he had been complaining about a pain his leg that bared resemblance that of a charlie horse. My mother called 911 and he was rushed by ambulance to MacNeal Hospital. Fearing the worst my family piled up in our cars and headed straight to the hospital waiting room where we anxiously awaited a diagnoses. After an hour or nervously pacing back and forth a middle aged doctor faintly walked towards us, pulling off his latex gloves. The doc looked at my mother and grandmother and said,
“I’m sorry” he said. “There is nothing more we could do to save him. You’re father died from deep vein thrombosis (DVT) which is linked to the harmful effects of tobacco related products. This most commonly occurs when a blood clot forms in a deep-lying vein, usually in the legs. Such a clot is dangerous because the clot may break loose, travel through your bloodstream, and block arteries in your lungs, causing permanent damage or death. Again, I’m truly sorry for your loss” he pronounced. Tobacco is the single greatest cause of preventable death globally. Although the effects depend on the when the person starting smoking and how often they smoke, the consistent use of tobacco products is proven to dramatically deteriorate ones health physically over long periods of time. Whether its as simple as bronchitis or as complex as a form of cancer tobacco products are affecting the lives of people in the U.S. by the millions. Whether you choose to use them or not, is up to you.