Quit smoking

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Tar doesn't go away on its own; Once it clogs up the tubes aka bronchioli, it sticks there. Check out the stuff we drive on every day. I wish I'd never smoked, but the tubes will always be partially clogged.

I'm very familiar with asthma, which I've had since long before I kmew knew what a cigarette was, and with cancer among very close family members and friends, none of which was associated with smoking.

I've known folks with throat cancer and lung cancer, both caused by smoking. Not pretty, but they weren't enough to make me quit. The more folks nagged, the more I smoked.

Who said anything about the tobacco execs?

I did, twice. The addiction never goes away, which is a big part of what this discussion is about.
 
Like Wendy, I've heard it both ways if lungs heal and repair themselves.  The bottom line remains the simple fact of being better off without smoking.  I know that. 

Continuing with Tom's last post...
I have very little extended family left.  Except for a few cousins and a sister, all are gone.  Back in the day, a bunch of smokers.  But none passed due to smoking related issues except one.  One grandfather passed of emphysema. 
Diabetes, cancer, kidney failure, pulmonary fibrosis (due to extended use of Pacerone), MS, and just plain old age took the rest of them.  Some had quit smoking somewhere along the line, others didn't.  I know of only a couple of others (non-family) that passed away due to smoking over the years.  It's probably one of the reasons I started smoking in the first place, along with peer pressure.  Myself?  I probably cough a bit more than I should.  DUH!
And, I am a bit prone to Bronchitis.  Usually when the weather changes in early Spring and Winter.

All that said, I am still trying to gear myself up to quit.  I'm still shooting for a New Years Day start date of becoming smoke free.  And believe me, I have read and re-read every post on this thread trying to get myself ready for this.  This is the first time I have ever made a public inquiry about putting the damn Cancer Sticks down.  I am SO hoping that reading all your support is what I need to do it and not look back.  I really am working on it! 
 
Tom said:
I did, twice. The addiction never goes away, which is a big part of what this discussion is about.

Not disagreeing and maybe I'm just lucky, but either I was never physically addicted or my withdrawal symptoms were almost non existent.  I quit three times in my life.  Once for a year.  Once for 7 years and this last time, for almost 30.  Each time, it was pretty easy.  Took about 3 days and most of the craving was gone.  But for me, it was totally psychological.  Cigarettes were a crutch.  I was not a casual smoker and usually smoked 2, and on some days 3 packs. 

Once when I quit, I poured water into a half smoked pack of cigarettes and left them in the medicine cabinet.  After a few days the water was getting pretty nasty.  If you need a visual to help with your habit, give that a try.  :)
 
If you need a visual to help with your habit, give that a try.

It's been 34 years, and I'm not about to buy a pack in order to try that; It would be too easy to get on the slippery slope with the other half pack  :eek:  But, it might help someone who is having difficulty kicking the habit addiction.
 
I've heard it both ways if lungs heal and repair themselves.

Unless a tobacco quitter has taken to inhaling a solvent, the only thing passing through the small tubes is air. If the flow of air could remove tar, our roads would turn to gravel after a few wind storms. If you get the opportunity, ask a pipe smoker to let you watch as s/he cleans the pipe.

Irrespective of any other healing going on, tar stays in the bronchioli forever, and restricts the amount of "fresh air" that can be inhaled. It's quite evident if one takes a pulmonary test aka a 'lung capacity test'; It's a bit of a misnomer, because it measures several factors, including inhale, exhale and residual capacity. Reduced diameter pipes (due to tar attached to the walls), mean you have to work harder to inhale and exhale a given volume of air.

One caveat - I'm not a pulmonologist.
 
In case I'm being misunderstood, I'm in no way saying a smoker won't 'feel better' and be in better overall health as a result of quitting. But, as the pulmonologist told me, you can't undo the damage of long term cigarette (tobacco) smoking; You will, however, avoid exacerbating the situation.
 
I smoked from the time I was born.  My father was a heavy smoker and the house and car were always smoke filled.  When I was 15, a nurse accused me of being a smoker.
No way Jose.  I'm only 15 and I've never smoked.  That was in the 1950's and I don't think the effects of second hand smoke were well understood.  When I turned 18 I decided to actually try smoking on my own.  It's not that the air I breathed wasn't doing it's job.  It was and I had the bronchial infections most of my life to prove it.  When I moved to California those bronchial infections seemed to disappear.  Now I'm good unless I'm breathing cold air.  That's when my lungs rebel and remind me that they're still quite sensitive. 
 
When I moved to California those bronchial infections seemed to disappear.

Strange you should say that. I've had asthma for as long as I can remember, and was always told it was triggered by allergies. When we came to California, it disappeared for 15 years, only to return later (and it's still here). I put it down to geographical location and local irritants and allergies. Although still in CA, we moved to a different area with a different climate and plenty of irritants.

... unless I'm breathing cold air.  That's when my lungs rebel and remind me that they're still quite sensitive. 

Mine too! But they've been that way since long before I smoked.
 
BTW one of the body's defensive (?) measures tries to expel the tar/mucus by coughing. When I started work sans car, I used to watch these "old" guys who were heavy smokers 'cough their guts up' every morning while waiting for the bus.

Here's one explanation of the above, but I have no clue as to its authenticity or accuracy.
 
Well.... I must say, after only 9mos I do feel so much better, quality of life in my opinion has changed for the better, so I'll just stay with the side of the fence that I'll be able to live longer with this change.  I'm going to continue to believe that my lungs will be healing (heck the cells in the body heal from all kinds of issues) without the smoking. I remember years ago my skin became extremely allergic to the metal in a watch I had.  Took quite a while for me (and my doctor) to figure it out, however after dumping the watch, my skin healed and there is no sign of the really ugly and nasty infection that was there..... I'm sticking to the healing with removing the cause theory (makes me feel better anyway!) others can believe what suits them.

Tens of millions of Americans have quit smoking cigarettes. The benefits of quitting ? no matter what your age ? are prodigious. Risks of heart disease and stroke plummet. So does the risk of lung cancer, along with cancers of the mouth, throat, bladder, cervix and pancreas. But can the damage from smoking ever be completely undone? Norman Edelman, chief medical officer of the American Lung Association, explains.

Q: Does your body fully heal after quitting smoking?

A: When you quit smoking, the inflammation in the airways goes down. The little hair-like projections in the airways that we call cilia ? which are paralyzed by smoke ? begin to work again. So the lungs will get better in weeks to months. Breathing will get better. Exercise capacity will get better. Paradoxically, people find that they cough a little more right after they stop smoking, but that's natural. That's the lungs cleaning themselves out.

But if you've been smoking a long time and have developed COPD [(or, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease)], which includes chronic bronchitis or emphysema, the lungs never totally heal. Chronic bronchitis is an inflammation of the airway. Some of that inflammation can be reversed. But if the inflammation has led to scarring of the walls of the airway, some of that cannot. Emphysema is a disease in which the walls of the fine air sacs of the lung ? the place where the lung does its business of exchanging oxygen for carbon dioxide ? break down. So tiny little air sacs become bigger ones ? and they're less efficient in transporting oxygen. The lung can't grow new walls for these air sacs. The lung loses tiny blood vessels and can't grow new ones. So that's permanent.

[When it comes to cancer], we calculate that the risk for lung cancer probably returns to that of a nonsmoker somewhere between 10 and 15 years after smoking cessation. (We have less data on the [other smoking-related cancers].) But the risk that people have for smoking-related diseases is directly related to the total number of cigarettes they've smoked in their life. We measure that with something we call "pack-years": that's the average number of packs per day multiplied by the number of years they've smoked. The greater the pack-years, the greater the risk. When you're getting up around 50 pack-years and beyond, that's a lot. If people have a lot of pack-years, the risk of, say, lung cancer never goes back down to [the risk of a non-smoker].

There is a famous study that shows that if you quit smoking by age 30, scientists can't show a statistically significant difference in mortality ? [that is, when you'll die]. But those data are just mortality statistics. It doesn't mean the lungs are completely normal. Somebody who smoked a lot, even if they quit by 30, probably will have some impairment in lung function, and their exercise capacity might be reduced. Their lungs will always be a little bit more susceptible to other insults, to pneumonia infection for example.

Of course, the way people react to cigarette smoke varies enormously. Everybody has a 90-year-old uncle who smoked all his life and feels fine. And everybody's got a 45-year-old cousin who's dying of emphysema. These two people have reacted to cigarette smoke differently. It's an important scientific question to understand what the differences are, and we're beginning to work on it. Genetics seem to play a role.

 
 
Congratulations Margi on your 12 years.

I'm 15 weeks since a double lung transplant. Debate over lungs healing themselves may be determined by what disease if any the patient has. Fibrosis and emphysema are not something to be healed or cured, tar build up can be helped by quitting.

I quit 12 years ago and with my new lungs at about %60 or more, and getting better.  Today I breathe better than I did 25 years ago.  It sneaks up on you, you may think you are feeling the effects of old age when instead it could be the lack of oxygen bringing your whole body down. It works against everything, never believed it myself until now that I have lived it.

Live long and Prosper
 
It sneaks up on you, you may think you are feeling the effects of old age when instead it could be the lack of oxygen bringing your whole body down.

You nailed it!  Jerry's mom got to the point where she couldn't walk through the grocery store.  She would sit down at the front of the store while his dad did the shopping.  The doctors explained that her arteries were so clogged that the oxygen wasn't getting to her brain and extremities, thereby making her extremely tired.  Then her kidneys failed (same reason) and she had to go on dialysis.  The wierd thing is that her death certificate listed the cause of death as complications from a fall.  The doctor said in reality it was smoking which caused so many other issues that she couldn't even stand up, thereby falling.

By the way, after she died we found several suitcases full of cartons of cigarettes.  She smoked Herbert Taryingtons which weren't all that common so she hoarded them to avoid running out.  :(

ArdraF
 
garyb1st said:
Now I'm good unless I'm breathing cold air.  That's when my lungs rebel and remind me that they're still quite sensitive.

I'm curious.  How does the cold air effect you?  I find that if I get a bout of Bronchitis, or a just a nasty chest cold in the late Fall/early Winter, I feel better breathing in the cold air.  I stop coughing and breath easier.  The neighbors love it when I get sick in the Winter because I snowblow their driveways just to stay outside!  Just wondering why the difference.
 
ArdraF said:
By the way, after she died we found several suitcases full of cartons of cigarettes.  She smoked Herbert Taryingtons which weren't all that common so she hoarded them to avoid running out.  :(

ArdraF

Ardra, my father smoked those.  That was more than 50 years ago. 
 
[quote author=denmarc]How does the cold air effect you?[/quote]

Here's one explanation: http://www.achooallergy.com/winter-asthma.asp
 
Ardra, my father smoked those.  That was more than 50 years ago.

Yep.  That's probably what she started smoking as a teenager and she was still smoking them when she died in 1993.

ArdraF
 
catblaster said:
I started on Pall Mall before they had the filters, sneakin smokes in the tool shed during FFA class  (Vocational Agriculture) 1965

Will, I was about ten years ahead of you (class of '56), but did exactly the same.  I had to switch to non-filter Camels just so my dad couldn't tell my butts from his.  I dropped out of FFA after moving to town.  Raising a garden wasn't quite the same as living on a working farm.

Funny - I never kept any of my old Navy memorabilia, but I still have my old FFA jacket.  I'm sure it was the most expensive article of clothing I ever had in High School.  My eleven dollar football cleats were a close second. :D 
 

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