If you smoke.....**UPDATED**

 Shes Gone. Please consider quitting.

 

I am going to get up on my soap box here. Please listen up. Smoking Kills. Its ugly and painful and breaks the hearts of the people who love you. If you come near me with a cigerette in your hand or mouth I will do my best to take it away from you. Quit now, before you make your family feel like their world is coming to an end.  I am watching my mother in law fade away to nothing. She was the most vibrant, energetic loving person. She is the whole families rock. She is love personified. She is peace and joy. She is warm hugs, laughter you can feel in your soul and the ear you need when the world is trying to drag you under. I never knew that peice of my heart was missing until she filled it. And shes going to leave us soon.  Our hearts are breaking.

Within five years of quitting smoking there is a proven 13% reduction in the risk of death from all causes, a 47% risk reduction in heart disease-related deaths, and a 27% reduction in the risk of death from stroke.

Within 20 years of quitting, the risk of dying among former smokers was similar to that of lifetime nonsmokers for most causes of death, with the exception of lung cancer.

People who quit smoking have a lower risk of lung cancer than if they had continued to smoke.

I am 6 years, 5 months and 16 days smoke free. I know its hard. But watching someone you love so much they feel like an extention of your being slowly and painfully die is much much much harder. Don't be that person to someone else. Please quit.

**Added** I am sorry people feel like I am telling you what to do. I am heartbroken. I don't want to see anyone else suffer and if that means sounding like a quit smoking nazi then so be it. I am going to bed. Its been a long few days and its going to be a long few weeks... 6 weeks is what they estimate.  Please, for your loved ones, atleast consider quitting.

**To Clarify*** I would never snatch a smoke out of the hands of a stranger but if I might try to talk to them about quitting. Especially if they are smoking near me. At the very least I would ask them to either put it out or smoke elsewhere and explain why. My hope is that they will consider my words and the reason behind them and my tears of grief and make a good choice.  I only have a few people who are close to me who smoke and all of them have been in this room with my mother in law and have vowed to quit.

I am saddened by how many people are not concerned by what they are going to put their family through at the end. Ultimately its your choice, but if I could transfer my pain to you for just a minute so you can feel what I feel right now.... you wouldn't want to bring it on anyone you love. 

[want10more]

i am a smoker. A PROUD smoker as it's my right. heh ok maybe not. it's my right still but oh how i hate it, ohhhhh how i've struggled. i don't know if i'll ever win my fight, which means i'll die from slowly strangulating, or lung cancer. if i don't win my fight my little children will see mommy die, from something SHE decided to do. it's more than yellow teeth and nails. it's more than the morning hack. it means i love my kids but not as much as my cigarettes, and i'd rather die and leave you than leave them. that hurts like hell.

[armywife009]

I lost my grandmother to a heart attack after she had battled lung cancer for years and then my aunt was dx'ed with emphysema. I still smoke. Preach all day long, I know the risks. I'm an adult and will continue to do what I like. 

[Anonymous]

Yes actually there is... Smokers, period. At least she realized it wasn't healthy or economical or a good use of time. You are literally paying to slowly kill yourself.

Quoting Anonymous:

There's nothing worse than reformed smokers.

[Anonymous]

I hope that you never cross my path while I'm smoking a cigarette. Physically trying to take a cigarette away from a stranger is a good way to get punched in the face.

[Fields456]

Amen to that

Quoting Anonymous:

There's nothing worse than reformed smokers.

[want10more]

i don't like reformed smokers, they are like holier than thou. but damn skippy they ain't wrong. i do NOT like to hear it, but but i hurt my kids, my hubby n myself by being a  smoker. i HATE being a smoker, i just am not stong nuff to stop yet. hopefully i can soon. it's not just being smelly the yellow teeth the yellow nails. its the lung cancer, the FACT that i am doing something WILLINGLY that will take me away from my kids before i need to go. they should not have to see mommy fight to breathe, die from cancer. it is not just my body i am hurting,  i am hurting my whole family, becuz of a weakness and i hate that weakness. and the reason i don't like hearing it is becuz it hits too close to home. smoking equals death. period. and oh, i so don't want to go down that way, God willing i'd beat it before then.

[ninjakids]

 Former smokers preach more than anyone.

Congrats that you were able to quit for so long - but seriously you're beating a dead horse.

[Anonymous]

You think we don't know it kills? It isn't like we don't see all the commercials on TV, or hear it from EVERY. DAMN. PERSON. who doesn't smoke. Good for you, that you were able to stop smoking. Not everyone is as lucky. And as long as there is more pressure from advertisements, doctors and those "who mean well", it only makes it that much harder for some of us to stop. So... STOP meaning well. Get off your soapbox, mourn the loss of your loved one, and leave the rest of us alone.

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

I stopped smoking years ago, I can't stand to be in peoples house who smoke, I wish everyone would stop.... but that said..... nothing anyone says will make someone stop, you are either ready or our not.  

And just so you know, while you may not like that other people smoke, if I was with someone who did smoke and you walked up and yanked their cigarette out of their mouth and  tried to crush their cigarette or pack, I'd jump in a beat your ass.. It's not against the law to smoke. Just cause you don't like it, doesn't mean you can assault someone else like that , and it is assault. ( and the people there with have the right to defend them from assault ) It's no different than me walking up and ripping an ear- ring out of your ear because it offends me that children are dying in the sweat shops that make them.