Slowly Suffocating

 

          Frolicking about the house, I giggle and look up to see her. She smiles sweetly back at me, and we ready ourselves for a game. “Close your eyes,” I whisper, snickering and searching the room carefully for the best hiding spot I can find for the little copper coin in my palm. Finally satisfied with my penny placement, I murmur consent for her to begin her quest. She overturns all of the dishes, vases, cloths, and pots in sight, and I can’t help but laugh; I am the best penny-hider she’s ever seen, after all! “Grandma, look harder,” I hum over her shoulder in encouragement. Gazing satisfied on her standstill of progress, I sneakily slide out the coin from beneath the chair rungs, and a grin spreads across my face. She laughs along with me as the quest ends in the biggest hug you’ve ever seen. I run off giggling for a moment, and suddenly smoke begins swirling to the ceiling. But I’m not worried; I’m used to it. My grandma was a smoker. I loved my grandma so much while I was growing up, but I lost her to lung cancer when I was young. The financial, physical, and emotional effects of coping with a loved one with a smoking problem can be difficult and exhausting, and everyone involved will be affected.

Firstly, the monetary consequences of smoking can be devastating. Using the Cost of Smoking Calculator from University of Maryland Medical System, I have calculated that smoking just one pack of cigarettes a day can cost between two to three and half thousand dollars each year in the U.S., an astounding amount of money spent on cigarettes alone. Considering the economic situation of the nation at this time, do you really think that such an expensive habit will do you any good by keeping you relaxed or happy? Take up knitting instead; it’s cheaper. In addition, there is also a positive correlation in the percentages of smokers in groups of people by decreasing level of education as well as poverty level, as shown in the CDC fact sheets. The consequences one could experience as a result of one’s bad habits should be considered in the decision to make this long-term commitment. Quitting, too, is often an expensive endeavor, often involving expensive nicotine supplements to substitute the addiction. Smokers that want to quit make commitments to wean themselves, but this is very difficult, as statistics show. The Scoop on Smoking claims that 70 percent of smokers want to quit, 40 percent of smokers attempt to quit, and only 50 percent of those who attempt to quit are successful. The high number of smokers that want to quit indicates that smoking isn’t as it is portrayed, as something one would wish to continue, and the monetary costs of smoking just cannot be worth it. Not only does smoking institute financial hardship, but one related to health as well.

Physically, smoking has much to take as well. In a matter of appearance, smoking often leaves a person looking saggy, sallow, and sickly; not to mention that it causes the clothing to smell of smoke or even have holes burned in the cloth. Shallow interests aside, smoking can also lead to deep internal issues as well, such as tar build up in the lungs, multiple cancers, emphysema, and many more. One out of five deaths each year in the United States is attributed to cigarette smoking, and smokers tend to live 13 to 14 years less than nonsmokers, according to the CDC. The organization also remarks that for each person that dies of a smoking-related illness, 20 more are suffering a smoking-related disease. Surely by changing people’s minds about how we view smoking and drugs habits can shift how many individuals and families have to suffer because of the choices that people may not have known fully what they have gotten into. But knowing someone with a smoking problem can lead to emotional issues as well.

Smoke fills your lungs and dances above your head as you look over at him. Sigh. There isn’t anything you can do. What can you say to change his mind? Absolutely nothing. He likes smoking more than he likes you, no matter how many times you cry and beg at his knees to get him to quit. You can see how he just gets worse and worse, deteriorating. Circulation: shot; breathing: labored –but he doesn’t see it. He has quit more times than you can remember, but he’s gone back on it more times than you can count on two hands. Eventually, you give up and think that maybe one day when you have kids, get married, or graduate he won’t be there, but what can you do? Dad, I love you with all my heart, but it hurts to see you do this. I don’t want any more little girls to think about being without their daddies, so don’t do this to them. Don’t make them worry to death and cry themselves to sleep anymore. It doesn’t have to be this way. The physical effects that a smoker often experiences are emotionally painful for loved ones who are forced to witness the suffering –an experience we hope to bypass. Think about how by smoking you might hurt that little girl, and think again about whether you really want to smoke, knowing the consequences.

Smoking hurts families from economic, physical, and emotional standpoints, so it is important to weigh all of the negative effects of a smoking habit before risking one. Above all, remember to keep it in mind that what you decide to do with your life really can negatively affect the people that rely and depend on you to be a role model. Sometimes I wonder if it was really worth it for the people I knew to have wasted so much by smoking, but I know that after all of those years they wouldn’t have been able to quit. But for anyone who hasn’t started smoking –don’t. One day when the years of smoking destroy your health, it won’t be you who hurts; you chose this, but your friends and family didn’t. They will have to face the pain after you’re sick and gone. Please spare you and your family of the financial, physical, and emotional pain that smoking could introduce into your life.