I do not lay claim to the following article, nor have I had a part in its creation. It is an honest attempt by a non-smoking, non-vaping private citizen to put the commonsense point of view on smoking and not smoking. I commend it for its honesty and its lack of spin (which is more than I can do for the outpourings of the anti-tobacco zealots)! Geoff Cliff.
Views of a non smoker
I am in my mid sixties and have never
smoked. My father was a heavy smoker and my mother a ‘social
smoker’. She occasionally smoked cocktail cigarettes which were in
pastel shades and quite pretty and feminine looking. My grandmother
occasionally smoked Woodbines. So in spite of being in regular
contact with smokers, how come I have never smoked? I tried it once
in my teens thinking I would try one of gran’s Woodbines and I
sneaked one into the bathroom with a box of matches and lit up. It
was awful and I coughed, choked and retched. That was the one and
only time I ever tried smoking.
My best friend at school smoked, as did
all her parents and two sisters. I used to call for her in the
morning on the way to school and I recall the horrible, thick smoky
atmosphere when I went into her house. Also her two elder sisters
liked the perfume Revlon’s Intimate, which they sprayed liberally
on themselves. That smell combined with the dense smoke from four
smokers was enough to put me off smoking (and Intimate perfume) for
life.
My friend and I had quite a long walk
to school and she would be struggling to light a cigarette whilst
gasping for breath to keep up with me. I never felt under any
pressure to ‘have a fag’ as I had made up my own mind not to
smoke.
In my later teens when I had started
work I had quite a long bus journey into Birmingham. On the
occasions when there was no room downstairs and I had to go upstairs
I hated the smell of stale smoke that lingered on the seats and the
thick fug of smoke that clung to my clothes and my hair. Even
opening a window brought no relief from the smell.
My boyfriend at the time was a smoker
and although I hated the lingering smell, at that time smoking was
accepted socially, so I just put up with it. In spite of seeing him
smoke and enjoy his cigarettes I still never wanted to smoke. My
parents and boyfriend would smoke in the house and it was just
accepted. The only time there was a problem was when my boyfriend
fell asleep on the sofa and dropped his cigarette, which burned a
hole in the settee.
We married and had two children and he
continued to smoke in the house. My younger son was born eleven weeks
prematurely and was very ill for a long time. He spent the first six
months of life in hospital and was on a ventilator for ten weeks due
to problems with his lungs. It was at this time that the dangers of
smoking were made apparent by one of his doctors who said that under
no circumstances should the baby be in a situation where he could
breathe in cigarette smoke due to the breathing problems he had
experienced. My husband didn’t like being told this, but for a
while didn’t smoke when the baby was in the room. I hadn’t
really considered the dangers of smoking or even passive smoking
until then. My main objections were the smell that lingered, the
yellowing of the paintwork and wallpaper in the house, and the cost.
We divorced after sixteen years of
marriage, after he had met someone else. Subsequently I met and fell
in love with the man who became my second husband. Unfortunately he
was a smoker too, but in the heady days of new love I didn’t let it
bother me too much. Once we had settled down to married life I did
object to him smoking. He smoked in the house, which I didn’t
like, and, as we had both been through messy divorces and were short
of money, I objected to the cost of smoking and also the possible
effect on his health. He had been a smoker for thirty years or so
since he was a young teenager and, as I knew he was a smoker when I
met him, he would counter any of my objections with this argument.
He had a smoker’s cough and this, coupled with what the doctors had
said when my son was a baby, made me again realise the possible
dangers to health. Also my mum had died aged seventy of secondary
lung cancer although she had given up smoking twenty years before she
died. My dad had given up smoking when mom had been diagnosed with
breast cancer some five years before she died. My dad died from a
heart attack aged eighty-six and up until his early eighties had
always been fit and well.
Neither of my two sons has ever smoked
in spite of being subject to it in the home environment and in pubs
and clubs during their teens and twenties.
My husband and I moved to Cornwall in
our mid fifties to ‘live the dream’. My husband still smoked but
as the cottage we moved into had low ceilings and small rooms, he
would go outside to smoke. I worried about the effect smoking had on
his health. If he was working outside he would frequently have a
cigarette clenched in his teeth while using both hands to build a
wall or mix cement. I hated to see this as it seemed to me he was
doubly inhaling the noxious smoke.
Eighteen months after our move I was
diagnosed with breast cancer. My husband gave up smoking of his own
accord and supported me throughout all my treatment. I really
appreciated this and knew how difficult it must have been for him.
Sadly he started smoking again when he was with his brother (a
smoker) on a long and tiring car journey. His brother smoked
cigarettes in the car and the temptation to have one became too much.
Following this, for a while he smoked less than he had before but in
time it became as many as before.
When we bought a newer car he said he
wouldn’t smoke in the car as it was pristine inside but before long
he did start smoking in the car, which I hated. The car smelt of
stale smoke, ash was dropped on the floor and a couple of cigarette
burns appeared in the upholstery. On occasions when I would kiss or
cuddle our dog after she had been in the car, I could smell stale
smoke on her. I know my husband thought I was a nag and probably I
was, but he smelt of cigarettes most of the time and even when he had
been outside for a smoke when he came back in the lounge I could
smell it on him and his breath.
Last year, with retirement looming and
with reduced income and the constant bad press about smoking, my
husband decided to give electronic cigarettes a try. He bought the
necessary items, which cost probably a tenth of what he had been
spending on cigarettes a month, and initially I was quite impressed.
I must admit I thought it would just be a ‘flash in the pan’, a
short-lived fad, but no, nine months later he is still sticking with
the e-cig. He can use it in the house as there is very little
‘smoke’ or smell apart from the lovely aromas of his chosen
flavour of the day.
Throughout my life I have always been
anti smoking and I was really pleased that my husband had found an
alternative to smoking that is socially acceptable - or so we
thought. Now it seems that Wales
could be the first part of the UK to ban the use of electronic
cigarettes in enclosed public places. Ministers say they are
responding to concern that the devices normalise smoking and so
undermine the smoking ban. Ministers also argue that children could
be tempted to try them, which may then lead them to cigarette
smoking.
For
years now smokers have been told about the dangers of smoking (whilst
the government carry on reaping the tax benefits). Now that a
successful aid to help smokers quit has been found, Welsh ministers
want it banned in enclosed public places. I feel this is a real slap
in the face to smokers who have quit smoking. Rather than implement
this ban, ministers should applaud smokers for giving up smoking and
just let them get on with their smoke free lives.
There
are so many temptations that children are more likely to want to try.
With alcohol, drugs, sex, and processed fast food on
offer, who would want an electronic cigarette?
So leave the vapers alone and let them
enjoy their new cigarette-free existence wherever they choose to use
them. My husband no longer has a ‘smoker’s cough’, nor does he
reek of cigarette smoke. He is much fitter since becoming a vaper
and we can enjoy long walks without him becoming short of breath. He
enjoys his vapes in the same way that I enjoy eating chocolate! (We
have to have some pleasure in this life!) Neither of us are
overweight and are within the normal BMI .
I would suggest to these faceless
ministers who tell us how we should run our lives to back off and let
us choose for ourselves how we live. Smokers have been the outcasts
of society for many years and now that over two million of them are
vapers, leave them to enjoy their smoke free existence.
