Actually I don't smoke, but I'm sick and tired of the bully tactics used by the anti-smoking brigade to brow beat people with their absurd "smoking kills" propaganda.
I'll give you an example or two. I don't smoke (as I said) and I don't drink and I don't use any drugs and I have been in and out of hospital all my life, lost my right kidney, etc, etc
My sister on the other hand smokes mediumly heavily, she drinks and she has never been to hospital except to give birth to two healthy boys.
Another example...
My father who smokes outlived my mother who does not smoke, by ten years.
I am NOT advocating smoking, and while there is some merit to the anti-smoking lobby, I feel their propaganda is very lob-sided and does not give us the true picture.
I am looking for stories of people who smoke and who nonetheless lead healthy and long lives. I think their side of the story should be told too!
Do any of you have stories like that?

Did he smoke in the house & expose her to his second hand smoke?

My Aunt died recently at 85ish, smoker all her life. Same with my ex mom inlaw. Both had oxygen tanks, but were sneakin' smokes because of their addiction.

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Smoking doesn't just give you cancer, it depletes the vitamins in your blood on a daily basis. In particular vitamin C, and some B vitamins, especially folic acid (B9).

If these vitamins are not replaced daily, it is only a matter of time before some serious health issue arises...So the answer to your question relates to diet and lifestyle of the smoker.

I often hear of non-smokers who die from lung cancer, which is the most popular cancer, and for a long time could not figure out how this could be possible. However, once I understood how free radical damage causes disease, I realized that most of these people got lung cancer from constantly inhaling fumes from cooking oils, margerine, etc., while not taking antioxidants to offset this free radical damage.

On a final note, I smoked for about 25 years before I quit (16 years ago) and can honestly say that quitting was a difficult process. I was at the point that I could not even walk up one flight of stairs without being winded. At that point I was smoking about 50 cigs per day. I had no energy, my clothes stunk from the smoke as did my breath. My fingers were yellow with nicotine, and it was quite an expensive habit as well.

I'm glad I was able to quit because I know some people who can't, even after numerous tries. Its a filthy habit, and the bottom line is that you cannot be healthy if you smoke. people who are long term smokers and say they are completely healthy are not telling the truth because smoking sucks the energy from your body, and it gets worse from there.

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Let Food Be Your Medicine And Medicine Be Your Food.(Hippocrates)

I lost my sister who was a smoker to lung cancer that spread throughout her body in her early 40's. I used to smoke myself, but was smart enough to quit.

It doesn't take a genius to know how much smoking damages your health, even if it doesn't kill you. Some people's bodies take abuse better than others. I don't preach to anyone about quitting, they can pick their own poison.

Smoke a pack+ a day for even 5 years, then tell me that you "love smoking". https://www.natmedtalk.com/blog.php?bt=353

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I had a great-uncle who smoked early in life then chewed tobacco the rest. He always carried an empty coffee can around with him to use as a spittoon when he couldn't just spit on the ground. Ugh! He died in his early 90s. Don't know why. Probably senility with no one taking care of him. He drove a Victorian A model Ford. The kind that you stand in front of to crank to start the motor. He drove it until he was 88, when he sold it to a couple of con artists for $100 in the 1960s. Dang, dang, dang. I was in high school and would have totally loved to have that car.

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- Jim
"The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation � a force for construction and destruction.� (Jonathan Haidt)

Thanks guys
again...I don't smoke, but I have close associations with people who do, and I'll say this: it is not as clear cut as the anti-smoking brigade make out. The anti-smoking vigilantes are (in my opinion) guilty of not telling the truth. Quitting is NOT necessarily the best option.
Take my sister again...perfect health all her life no shortness of breath or anything...she could do anything I could do and then...
She bought into the anti-smoking hype and quit. Now she is a MESS. She has ballooned out to more than twice her normal weight, she struggles to walk, etc, etc...in her case quitting was the single worst thing she could have done.
On top of this the QUIT SMOKING PROPAGANDA is downright harmful...most people simply cannot quit, and now they suffer from guilt as well. If the smoke does not kill them, the guilt surely will!
I'm looking for stories of people who smoke and feel healthy well into old age...I know they are out there!

My mother smoked for 64 years and was the picture of health. Now she walks around with an oxygen tank following her.

I had bronchitis yearly until I moved out of the house where she smoked. I haven't had it since. Funny thing.

Oh, and when my corn allergy was raging if I caught the faintest hint of cigarette smoke (cigars and pipes are fine), I was down with a severe migraine for 4 days and possibly the ER. So I didn't leave the house, lest I walk into a store where someone was smoking outside.

So...thank you for smoking.






Not.

OK, Gnomen says, "my mother smoked for 64 years and was the picture of health. Now she walks around with an oxygen tank following her."

Does that prove that smoking is the culprit? There may be a myriad of other factors that contributed. Say for example the pollution in the air, the pollution in the water, the pollution in the food...I could go on...

And I'll give you a story of my own...A friend of the family did NOT smoke, did NOT drink, did NOT stress out. His face was as unlined at 50, as the day he was born. He was also a "picture of health". He worked for my dad, servicing motor cars. He dropped dead at 50 from a heart attack while servicing a motor car

Does that mean servicing motor cars "kills"? Should servicing cars be banned?

As for Gnomen's problems with cigarette smoke, that sounds VERY much like an allergy to smoke...like some people have an allergy to bread, eggs, milk, etc...does that mean bread, eggs and milk should be banned?

Hey guys, I'm not advocating smoking...I'm just saying if we wish to victimise smokers and smoking, let's at least be absolute precise and accurate with our condemnations.

Also what I'm saying is that quitting is an option for some, but not an option for the vast majority, and we have to find effective ways to cope for those who simply cannot (or should not - like my sister) quit

Cancer does not happen overnight, it takes years if not decades to progress, and the same can be said about your family friend.

He may have appeared to be a "picture of health", but he wasn't...at least not on the inside. Anyone who dies from "natural" causes, dies from a nutrient deficiency. A heart attack is a symptom, not a cause.

He may have been deficient in vitamin D, as heart attacks are common in the winter, (especially from shovelling snow) however, if he died during one of the other seasons, he most likely was deficient in selenium (if he died from cardiomyopathy heart attack) or was deficient in copper (if he died from aortic aneurysm)

Of course this is just an educated guess, and only the coroner would know for certain, and an autopsy would have had to be done to determine exact cause of death, since something "caused" the heart attack.

We do know one thing for sure... smoking did not kill him..

And it could be evil spirits too.

Look, the link between COPD and smoking cigarettes is so beyond proven it's not worth the effort for me to even link you to anything.

HOWEVER...I have no idea why I didn't think of this before *slaps head* but while I was amazingly reactive to normal cigarettes in the past (now they merely stink like the dickens), I had a gardening client where one of the partners smoked, and I had no problem going into their house.

Why? Turns out the partner smoked organic cigarettes. They're just tobacco without all the toxic chemicals added to them. So if you really like smoking, you might do better with those on several counts. Just a thought.

And I'd guess no one's done any research on the effects of organic cigarettes and health, since most smokers don't use them. Too bad, really.

But I think it's not much of a stretch to believe that maybe smoking cigarettes that aren't laced with things like formaldehye and dioxins might be less damaging that then usual ones that are laced with such toxic stuff.

If it were an allergy to smoke then cigars and pipe tobacco would give me the same reactions. They didn't.

I already said part of it was a corn allergy. Oh, and several volatile chemicals like toluene and...things they lace conventional cigarettes with. You're not just smoking tobacco.

But by all means explain -- do I have to be a hermit because you happen to choose a habit that you can't practice in public without inflicting it on others?

Does your "right" to smoke your poisonous cigarettes trump my right to have a life at all?

Is that really your moral stance here or have I misunderstood you?

What you do in your own home is truly your business. I'm not part of the ban-smoking-everywhere crowd anyway. I'm far too much of a realist to take such a view.

Actually I'm not advocating victimizing anyone. I don't see how that even helps anyway.

But I do think it's rather laughable for someone who harms me to claim that they're the victim if I merely suggest perhaps they should stop harming me, since smoking is hardly a necessity of life.

A parallel argument would be that people who drink should be able to drive when they're impaired because...they like drinking. The impact on others be damned, I guess?

Actually quitting is an option for the vast majority. The problem is access to the means and programs to do so. Those who do have access (through insurance and businesses who help employess) have a much higher success rate than those who are pretty much on their own.

Despite knowing where my mother's smoking habit would lead her, because there's a large extended family and the pattern of who ends up with an oxygen tank and who doesn't is painfully obvious, I also realize that nicotine is more addictive than heroin (thank you Surg. Gen. Koop for that) and quitting is hardly an easy thing. I didn't toss blame at her all the years she was smoking, nor have I gone into "I told you so" mode now. What would be the point? Everyone gets to make choices and we all make some that are not so good. *shrug*

Also claiming "you just lack willpower" is somewhere between ridiculous, wrong, and downright unhelpful, so I don't do that.

However, denying well-done science is not an appropriate response, nor especially helpful, so don't expect me to play ball with you trying to pretend smoking is just peachy keen any more than I will join anyone in equally unscientific views such as the Universe was created in six 24-four hour periods or that there are multiple human "races."

Even though i've wanted to quit smoking (alcohol no problem) on many occasions and have cut down on smoking considerably i still do smoke...

I roll my own cigarettes, normal filters.

The paper i use is a roll basically and its unbleached and chlorine free...

The tobacco i use is 100% leaf tobacco produced without additives...fine cut...

I know this is still a very unhealthy habit, but im hoping that this is the ''best'' way to smoke that has the least chemicals for me to inhale so lowering the dangers from most other options with added chemicals and flavours and whatnot...But many people have smelled the tobacco usually when i give to others to roll and i can honestly say that 1 in 5 people tell me they like it, and 4 in 5 tell me they dont like it, just by smelling it...i love it

there is one more brand around here without additives but its much heavier on the throat, with the same ''light'' rolling papers, and even though i like heavy cigarettes that one is too much...

I agree with you to a point, there are many illnesses blamed on smoking when the cause is often elsewhere, but for weight gain after quitting, smoking is definately responsible

a lot of people who smoke are slim and energetic because the nicotine stimulates the thyroid and their metabolism is sped up they are essentially in a slight/moderate hyperthyroid state

when the smoker gives up smoking the thyroid is no longer getting the stimulus from the nicotine and there is a backlash, the thyroid becomes hypothyroid (metabolism slows down) this is the reason people gain weight and feel worse after quitting

some peoples thyroid recovers eventually and finds it's equilibrium
and they lose the gained weight but most remain slightly/moderately hypothyroid
there is only so much punishment the thyroid can take

your sister should have her thyroid checked out to see where it's at

This will clear up some questions about the negative health impact of smoking and why it harms some so terribly but seemingly not others

https://naturaltreatmentsforcancer.bl...krebiozen.html

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https://holy-lance.blogspot.com

I don't care what others do in the privacy of their own home or car, BUT, I do object strenuously to smokers who pollute MY air, leave their filthy butts lying about, and leave MY hair and clothes stinking, ruins my meal at a restaurant, not to mention the health problems of headaches, etc. So, smokers, the anti-smoking brigade may not care what YOU do to your health, but we do care that your smoke isn't confined to your little corner of the world.

Lazi,

My husband has smoked since highschool and he is 63 now. He goes in for a yearly exam and they say his lungs are in perfect health. He has also excelled in cardiac stress tests. He is building our house at the present, doing most of the work himself.
He can hike at high altitude without difficulty.

When we got married he agreed not to smoke in the house and he has stuck to that so I and the kids have not been exposed.

But when I was a kid both of my parents smoked and I remember riding in the car with the air so thick of smoke you could hardly see out the windows..

My lungs have been fine until I worked in a facility where I developed sensitivity to the chemicals they used on the carpet to cleaning... so I have mild reactive airway disease... a type of asthma that I keep under control with homeopathics.

My mom smoked starting at the age of 14 and she died at 79 from complications from copd. She had no symptoms until age 75. I dont know if smoking caused this or not. Likely it did. But until then she had barely had a sick day in her entire life.

I agree with you. I think the propaganda is out of hand. I do not think that it causes all of the diseases that they claim... but I also think that some people will be more vulnerable to it than others.

Recently my husband gave up regular cigarettes and he only smokes roll your own organic tobacco from Native Spirit that he special orders from the grocery store. It is also less expensive that regular cigarettes.

Both of us also supplement with vitamin c and other antioxidants and have been doing so for about 8 to 10 years.

I would much rather see chemicals that are added to food regulated along with GM foods and pesticides etc, with the zeal that smoking is...

As a nurse I have seen many people die from lung cancer, most of which never smoked a day in their lives. It is one of the leading causes of cancer these days. I suspect that radiaiton might have something to do with it.

Always remember... Statistics lie and that statistics are slanted to reflect the political or economic interests of those who pay for the studies.

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