Quit Smoking Now
Townhall,
by
Derek Hunter
Original Article
Posted By: Pluperfect,
2/4/2020 4:45:10 AM
It’s always a good time, but it’s never the “right time” to quit when you’re a smoker. You can always find a “reason” to keep doing it – “I still have a few left in this pack,” “I have a stressful week coming up,” etc. But the news of Rush Limbaugh’s diagnosis with advance lung cancer is as good a time as any to quit. If you smoke, call it a day. If you know someone who does, get on their case. It’s a cliché, but it’s also true: never quit quitting.
Limbaugh’s shocking announcement Monday left fans stunned, wondering how to react to the announcement that a man
Reply 1 - Posted by:
franq 2/4/2020 5:53:00 AM (No. 306692)
Good advice. I've seen the ravages of it in my family, too.
23 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
WhamDBambam 2/4/2020 5:54:07 AM (No. 306694)
While this is certainly good advice, lung cancer can strike out of the blue. My late little sister, a never smoker, was diagnosed with stage-four lung cancer and her only symptom before that diagnosis was shortness of breath. Genetic treatment kept her alive and with good quality of life until the money ran out. Of course, I'm sick about Rush.
56 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
StormCnter 2/4/2020 6:31:55 AM (No. 306709)
Why would anyone abuse lungs and long-term general health with tobacco? It's like playing Russian Roulette.
18 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
BeatleJeff 2/4/2020 6:40:37 AM (No. 306718)
It helps to never start..Glad that was a habit I never picked up.
21 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
SabraJet 2/4/2020 7:09:34 AM (No. 306750)
My Mom was of that generation growing up in the 1930's where it was cool to smoke. She started at 14 and gave it up at 40, when pregnant with her last child. My Grandmother told her that if she wanted to live to see this child grow up she had better stop smoking,.She did. And this was in the early 1960's and yes, we all KNEW it caused cancer. Mom died at age 66, not of lung cancer but pancreatic. Still years of smoking had to have knocked down her immune system and set her up for cancer. I say this because her sisters, who never smoked, all lived to 95, 96, as did her Mom. No one in my family, close or extended smokes.
And Rush, have listen to him since 1991-seems like an old friend-so praying for him.
24 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
Rather Read 2/4/2020 7:20:51 AM (No. 306755)
My father was 90 when he died. He had 5 siblings and they all lived to be 90 or over with the exception of one brother. He died at 73 of lung cancer. He was the only one who smoked. My mother smoked, but quit and from being around her, I learned to loathe cigarettes. They stink. My mother said quitting was the hardest thing she ever did in her life, but she was glad she did. She lived to be 90.
13 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
udanja99 2/4/2020 7:23:53 AM (No. 306757)
I watched my mother in law die of lung cancer in 2002. She had smoked for more than 50 years but had quit 17 years before her diagnosis, when her daughter refused to let her be around her grandchild as long as she kept smoking. When diagnosed she told the doctor that she had quit so many years before but he replied that she hadn’t quit soon enough.
Even though Rush quit cigarettes decades ago, he still smoked cigars and did it in his broadcast booth. Even if he didn’t intentionally inhale, he was still breathing the smoke which was floating around in that tiny room.
Rush has been my companion for 28 years and I can’t imagine life without him. Pray for him, everyone. Pray hard!
53 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
ARKfamily 2/4/2020 7:28:06 AM (No. 306762)
I try not to give a lot of advice especially because now is a time that Rush can turn to God. If I was given an opportunity to say something to Rush, it would be as follows. Rush, I have been down your road but there are two things that I kept in mind. 1. Cancer is a word not a sentence and 2. Our bodies are wonderfully made by our Creator and healing can be wonderfully made by our Creator. As difficult as some days can be, I want to be guided by Him. He is the best doctor!
54 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
Hermoine 2/4/2020 7:32:14 AM (No. 306765)
There is a HUGE difference between cigarette smoking and CIGAR smoking. With the latter, you don't inhale. I had grandfathers who kept a cigar in their hands and both lived past the age of 85 -- with no lung problems -- ever. I've also known several people who were non-smokers that developed lung cancer.
22 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
envirodude 2/4/2020 7:33:12 AM (No. 306768)
My mother died from early cancer related to smoking. It moved to her kidney, so it was removed. For 5 years she had dialysis and was in and out of hospitals. Because of the lost kidney, she wasn’t able to go through chemotherapy when cancer came back. The last six weeks of her life were on morphine.
I hope RL can overcome it, but I don’t have a good feeling about it.
9 people like this.
My beloved husband died from kidney cancer the doctors said was caused from his smoking when he was young. He quit smoking in his late 40's and died in his late 70's.
6 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
GoodDeal 2/4/2020 8:22:52 AM (No. 306814)
My best friend died of lung cancer at the age of 59. He smoked cigarettes and cigars. I told him so many times that he should quit because it’s bad for your health but he just laughed it off saying he liked it too much to quit. It was like telling an alcoholic they need to quit drinking. I’m praying for Rush.
11 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
LadyHen 2/4/2020 8:33:26 AM (No. 306822)
Lost a loved one to the complications of this disease. And yes, he smoked. When your lungs are damaged and you can't get enough O2 into your body, life isn't good and every part of you suffers. His death was very hard. His wife quit smoking cigarettes via normal vaping and her health has improved. So proud of her. They both had smoked since he joined the Army right out of college back in the 60s and everyone in their set smoked. It was just what folks did. I'm glad I never started.
5 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
Artful Codger 2/4/2020 8:34:00 AM (No. 306825)
Anyone that needs to quit should get their hands on Allen Carr’s book EASY WAY TO STOP SMOKING. As unbelievable as it sounds, it can be easy and enjoyable to quit smoking. You might need to search for an older copy however because newer ones published after his death may not work as well.
6 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
lana720 2/4/2020 8:34:02 AM (No. 306826)
I cried when I heard this, then I started to pray. Add Rush to your prayer list and engage your friends and parishioners to do the same.
God is still in the miracle business. What are we to learn from this? Maybe because Rush is so beloved by half the country, this can be a lesson to those who are unbelievers.
That a man whose voice has stirred a nation to what is right In so many areas of American thought, to be short of breath, is just not right. God bless you and Kathryn, Rush. We love you. You are In our prayers and we ask God to burn this cancer from you and speed your recovery.
37 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
fayebeck 2/4/2020 8:55:51 AM (No. 306860)
So, even conservatives bought into the smoking cancer bs. Probably doesn't help should a smoker be diagnosed with it. Same tripe will be said by most Americans about climate change in the coming years.
9 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
Dodge Boy 2/4/2020 8:56:14 AM (No. 306862)
My in-laws both smoked like chimneys. Salem Menthols. I'll never forget how the inside walls of the house looked whenever they removed wall hangings to re-paint. The paint behind each picture was a bright white while the rest of the wall around it was an awful yellow.
My mother-in-law died of emphysema and my father-in-law died of squamous-cell lung cancer. Their daughter (my sister-in-law) forced herself to start smoking at age 17 (now is 63) and was diagnosed with small-cell lung cancer last August and is now in treatment. My brother-in-law, 70, a long-time smoker has the advanced stages of emphysema and has heart disease. He might last another year. I am thankful that my wife of 45 years from this family never smoked. I just hope neither of us falls victim ourselves from the countless hours of second-hand smoke exposure during the many hours we spent with the family.
7 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
fayebeck 2/4/2020 8:57:58 AM (No. 306870)
I also think that Derek Hunter is way off base writing his bs at a very sad time. A man does not need chastising by a nobody when he is facing very tough times.
14 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
Strike3 2/4/2020 9:17:05 AM (No. 306909)
Most people who smoke verbally dismiss the risks but are smart enough to know the possible consequences. The excuses are many and angrily defensive. Addiction is a strong motivator in anything you do that is harmful and denial is the most common weapon. Good luck with playing the odds. Anything you breathe that is not clean air has the potential to damage the lungs.
5 people like this.
Reply 20 - Posted by:
Lawsy0 2/4/2020 9:17:18 AM (No. 306912)
I quit back in 1971 and haven't stopped bragging yet.
11 people like this.
Reply 21 - Posted by:
Lesthanzero 2/4/2020 9:31:49 AM (No. 306925)
Everyone, including Derek Hunter, "knows" nothing, even though many here also have first-hand experiences of someone who smoked and became ill or others who got cancer and never smoked; all of it is anecdotal, and the emotional component is substituted for the scientific one. Churchill literally smoked a ton of cigars and lived to age 90. Hunter’s assertion that “tobacco is tobacco” is false, and about as axiomatic as saying “people are people” with total disregard for genetic variations.
Cigar smoke is different from cigarette smoke because of the tobacco itself. Myriad substances are added to cigarettes and chewing tobacco, while premium cigars have none. Refined raw nicotine used to be available in tins like sterno. At my first job I had to light them at night in a closed greenhouse to produce an aerosol fog that killed insects that attacked the tomatoes (tomatoes and other plants produce their own nicotine, but in infinitesimal amounts). There were plenty of skull-and-crossbones POISON! warnings all over those tins, but conventional bug spray was also poisonous and more widely used, albeit far less efficiently.
Scientifically, there is still no definitive, incontrovertible link between lung cancer and secondhand smoke, nor a provable causation between cigars and lung cancer, because sensitivity varies with the individual. If any study HAD proven such a link, tobacco would be regulated like cyanide. Though links to other diseases like bronchitis and emphysema are not so evasive, cancers of all types still stymie researchers. We all have our hunches, however, and lay odds against our individual resistance to tobacco's varying effects on us, not to mention the pleasure some of us derive from the habit.
13 people like this.
And why is smoking marijuana acceptable in our society while tobacco is definitely not? Why is that?
31 people like this.
Reply 23 - Posted by:
udanja99 2/4/2020 9:52:15 AM (No. 306957)
“If any study HAD proven such a link, tobacco would be regulated like cyanide.”
Post #22.
No, it wouldn’t. The government makes gazillions in taxes on tobacco and they’re not about to give that up.
15 people like this.
Reply 24 - Posted by:
kdsils60 2/4/2020 10:08:44 AM (No. 306983)
My mother died at the tender age of 57... why? Smoking! Emphasema... the doc told her if she quit 6 years earlier, she would live to be an old lady, but she didn't and it (from smoking) killed her! Don't give me any garbage that smoking doesn't kill - my mother has been dead 30 year from it! STOP SMOKING!
6 people like this.
Reply 25 - Posted by:
starboard 2/4/2020 10:15:41 AM (No. 306997)
My daughter is a respiratory therapist. She says most of the people in the hospital she administers to are in ICU and are and on ventilator because of COPD another rapidly growing respiratory affliction caused by smoking. It's not a cancer but it's a serious disease that can lead to many other health problems. Btw, of all the cancers, lung cancer has become the most prominent in the country.
4 people like this.
Reply 26 - Posted by:
GardenGal 2/4/2020 10:48:13 AM (No. 307045)
Don't smoke anything and get your place of residence checked for radon, Non abated radon housing is the biggest reason non smokers get lung cancer. A friend of mine just died from advanced lung cancer where she succumbed within a few weeks and most likely due to radon since our area is full of it. We had testing done before we bought our house and then we had radon abatement be a condition for closing.
As to causes- yes, smoking can cause cancer, emphysema, COPD,etc. Does it always- no, of course not. Just like when someone close to you has the flu or sinus infection- you may or may not get it. Your body's immune system is a big part of it. But then you do not want to have too strong of an immune system like I and so many others do because you end up with autoimmune diseases- like I have. I have RA, lupus, asthma, ankolysing spondylosis, Sjogren's, etc.
2 people like this.
Reply 27 - Posted by:
Enoch Powell 2/4/2020 11:38:20 AM (No. 307109)
When my grandfather died, my Dad asked the doctor what killed him. His answer was to the effect, 'well, if he hadn't smoked two packs of unfiltered Camels a day and drunk 2 bottles of Grand Marnier he could have lived ten more years' (instead of dying at the untimely age of 85. Genetics.
6 people like this.
Reply 28 - Posted by:
Skeptical1 2/4/2020 12:06:57 PM (No. 307145)
What annoys me is when people say (in essence) "Well, he brought it on himself". What Rush did is what all of us do, which is to live our lives, taking some pleasure, and doing what needs to be done, while making judgment calls about the risks involved. Whatever you are diagnosed with, there will be those who say it's because you drank alcohol, ate red meat, carried too much weight, spent time in the sun, sprayed Roundup in your garden, etc. etc. These claims tend to be based on preachy group-think rather than sound science, and where the science is sound, it usually shows a statistically small effect.
Having said that, the science on cigarette smoking is sound and points to a very large statistical effect. As I recall, a 30-year smoker is 30 times more likely to develop lung cancer. And of course, direct experience makes it pretty clear that smoking can't be good for you. Cigars may be different, but if you are a non-smoker and smoke one, it may be enjoyable but it sure doesn't feel like you've done your body a favor.
So Rush did what everyone does, and made some judgement calls on risk. Only God knows if his decision really "caused" his illness. I think he probably made a bad call, but I wouldn't blame him for it.
5 people like this.
Reply 29 - Posted by:
LC Chihuahua 2/4/2020 12:27:45 PM (No. 307173)
The irony is there will be more restrictions and regulations on cigarette use, but marijuana will become legalized.
4 people like this.
Reply 30 - Posted by:
Chuzzles 2/4/2020 12:28:13 PM (No. 307176)
Yes, lung cancer can strike anyone at anytime. Christopher Reeves widow died from that disease and she was not a smoker either. However, drawing almost a thousand toxic poisons into your lungs where it does build up over time is not a good idea for anyone. As to those who say that second hand smoke is nothing to worry about, I disagree. Those toxins are in the air for the nonsmoker to breathe as well. Just look at how they are finding that some incidents of ear problems and asthma in kids in smoker homes are caused by the parents smoking. I myself am horribly allergic to the smoke.
Quit smoking folks and save yourself the misery of going through a dread disease, or forcing your relatives to watch you go through it.
2 people like this.
Reply 31 - Posted by:
Timber Queen 2/4/2020 12:50:53 PM (No. 307209)
Is a long life better than a short life? Does every year of our life somehow add extra points to our scorecard? What does a high score mean?
A lady in our parish will "celebrate" her 112th birthday tomorrow. Edie was born in this town and lived most of her life here, only away 20 years while raising her children in a bigger town a hundred miles south. She never smoked, drank in moderation and danced every Saturday night at the Senior Center until she was 102. She buried three dance partners, along with three husbands and her two children, both childless. Her closest family now are grand nieces and nephews. A grand niece of 80 is her guardian. For the past six years I have brought her Holy Communion at an assisted living home. Her days are spent in a recliner chair, bundled up in lap robes watching game shows on TV. She is waiting for her parents to come and take her home. It is wondrous when I tell her that I have brought Jesus for her and its time for Holy Communion. I need only start the sign of the cross and her eyes clear and she prays the Our Father with purpose and conviction. Words cannot describe her peace when she consumes Eucharist. After the final sign of the cross she asks me if I've been in town long.
Over the last seventeen years of my home Eucharistic Minister ministry I have brought Christ to seven people reaching 100 and over. Their great sadness is having no one left but distant relatives. There are none who share their memories and life experiences. They deal with the discomfort of aging for decades; battling and overcoming the many diseases and disorders to which our frail bodies are prone as they wait to be called home. One lady once asked me if Jesus had forgotten her. That was a heart breaker.
TK and I both smoke. I have "COPD" and see it as an opportunity rather than a risk. (BTW, "COPD" is not new and is only on the rise because they lumped together the lung diseases they used to tally separately.) Frankly, I don't want to live to be 80, 90 or 100 but its not in my power anyway. This life is just boot camp for our eternal life. I can't wait to get there and be reunited with all those who have passed before me and will anxiously await those who follow me. It is not what we put into our bodies that corrupts us, it is what comes out of our mouths. I'm ready to die, are you?
12 people like this.
I quit about 18 months ago due to an extended hospital stay. Sometimes I miss having a cigarette just to have something to do, but if I smell cigarette smoke, it gags me. I just chalk it up to being not so bright for 50 years. If I develop lung cancer later on, I'll apologize for making choices that might have caused an early demise and upsetting my loved ones. Our ticket on this ride disclams the promise of happiness, comfort, longevity, or good fortune. A mountain climber falls to his death ''doing what he loved' There is no talk of him being stupid for all those years cheating death. No cries of ''Stay off da damn mountains, ya morons!'' Everything we do (short of being in a coma) has consequences on either ourselves or those around us. I choose not to be judgemental, but sympathetic to those who may have encountered an unwelcome reaction to past behaviors. I'll pray for Rush and remind him that he didn't become a statistic in the opiod deaths and he can use that willpower to fight this latest battle.
8 people like this.
Reply 33 - Posted by:
stevendm 2/4/2020 1:01:31 PM (No. 307222)
I don't understand why people say that cigar smoking is ok since you "don't inhale". Where do you think all of that smoke goes when you breathe it out? It goes in the air. What does your next breath suck in? The air that you have just breathed out. It is as not as concentrated, but it still has a relatively high concentration of bad particles.
0 people like this.
Reply 34 - Posted by:
RayLRiv 2/4/2020 3:05:42 PM (No. 307343)
I was the only non-smoker in a family of smokers. I pleaded with my late Mom, Dad and brother to quit. Dad quit while I was still in HS but he continued living w my Mom and brother (both smoked 4-5 packs A DAY. HEAVY dependence on cigarettes and coffee due to them both being diagnosed schizophrenics.) Mom passed away from complications with emphysema in '05, Dad passed suddenly in '07 (totally unrelated from the effects of smoking) and my younger brother died from a lung tumor in '13. Running scared as I'm aging cause I don't know what effect second-hand smoke has had on me (though after I left for college I never lived with my parents again...)
2 people like this.
Reply 35 - Posted by:
Heraclitus 2/4/2020 7:02:55 PM (No. 307537)
#6, regarding women who started smoking in the '30s: check out Eduard Bernays, the "father of modern propaganda" aka advertising. He is credited with promoting the bacon-and-eggs breakfast, a piano in every parlor, and women smoking.
He was hired by a tobacco company (I forget which one) to expand their market. Bernays --evil genius that he was-- saw the large group of potential cigarette smokers among the early women's lib. They had video clips of women defiantly marching down the street smoking their "Torches of Freedom" or showing the pack of cigs in their garters under their skirts.
Incidentally, his uncle was Siggie Freud
1 person likes this.
Reply 36 - Posted by:
DVC 2/5/2020 6:35:39 PM (No. 308794)
I never have smoked, and always worried about Rush and his cigars.
1 person likes this.