Smoking!!!! Nah Nah

Smoking is injurious to health. Everyone knows this fact. But still they do. Why? Most of the people say that smoking relieves tensions and stress. Is that?

Some days back I wrote an article in mouthshut.com regarding this. Just thot.. will post that in my blog too.

Here you go...

Let me start by telling the advantages of smoking if one has it:

1. No thief dares to enter smoker’s house to rob. Since he will be coughing all the night it may mislead him to think that someone is awake in the house
2. Worrying about your body and visiting so many health centers for weight reduction treatment. But still no use?? Don’t worry. Start smoking guys. Your weight can be reduced sooner as you will be losing your lungs.
3. These people don’t need to worry about malaria. No mosquito bites them, as they will be always surrounded by smoke net, which sounds like mosquito net.
4. These people will never become old. Feel like saying Wow…….. Wait. Before that know the reason. Because these people die very soon. Frightening!!!!

Most smokers believe they exhale the majority of smoke they inhale into their lungs. But, most of the smoke remains in the lungs. A very small percent actually comes out (about 10%). Also, remember that the smoker is not only going to smoke that one cigarette. He will prolly smoke another within a half-hour. Then another after that. In fact, he will probably smoke 20, 40, 60 or even more cigarettes by the end of the day. And tomorrow will be the same. Smokers enjoy a very small percentage of the cigarettes they smoke. In fact, they are really unaware of most of the cigarettes they smoke. Some smoke out of simple habit, but most smoke in order to alleviate withdrawal symptoms experienced by all smokers whose nicotine levels have fallen below minimal requirements. The cigarette may taste horrible, but the smoker has to smoke it. And because the majority of smokers are such addicts, they must smoke many such cigarettes every single day in order to maintain a constant blood nicotine level. Wondering what is this!!! When a person smokes then nicotine is directly injected into blood and after certain time that level goes down for which again he lights another cigar.

Once just to visualize the effects, scientists collected the tar from 2000 cigarettes and diluted it in a bottle. And the collected tar is painted on the skin of mice, 60% of the animals developed cancer of the skin within a year. Consider this when watching people smoking and exhaling only 10% of the tars they actually take in. Not only are these chemicals being painted into the lung, but smokers are also constantly painting them up on their lips, tongue, and larynx, swallowing some and thus painting it in the esophagus and throughout the digestive tract. Smokers have increased incidents of cancer in all of these exposed sites.

A normal lung will have black specks throughout indicative of carbon deposits from pollution. Just think of how the smoker’s lung will be blackened because of both pollution and the tars he paint into his lungs with every puff he take.

Now that you know what it looks like on a large scale and feels like, lets take a look at the microscopic level of things that happen in the lung from smoking. The most well known disease is emphysema. This is another one of those diseases that primarily happen to smokers. Over 90% of the cases are smoking induced. There are cases in some families where there does seem to be a genetic predisposition, where non-smokers get it too. This is from a rare condition, a lack of a blood enzyme called alpha1antitrypsin. This again is rare, but if you do have family members who never smoked a day in their life get emphysema there may be a genetic tendency. But again, over 90% of emphysema cases are simply caused by smoking. Eradicate smoking and you eradicate the risk of the disease.

To get a sense of what it feels like to breathe with emphysema take a deep breath and hold it. Without letting out any air, take another deep breath. Hold that one too. One more time, take one more breath. Okay let it all out. That second or third breath is what it feels like to breathe when you have advanced emphysema. Emphysema is a disease where you cannot exhale air. Everyone thinks that it is a disease where you cannot inhale but in fact it is the opposite. When you smoke you destroy the lungs elasticity by destroying the tissue that pulls your lung back together after using muscles that allow us to inhale air. So when it comes time to take your next breath it is that much more difficult, for your lungs could not get back to their original shape.

Imagine going through life having to struggle to breathe like those last two breaths I had you take. Unfortunately, millions of people don't have to imagine it, they live it daily. It is a miserable way to live and a slow painful way to die.

Do you know what makes people to cough?

Lungs will be having bronchus layer on which we find cilia. Cilia are helpful to sweep the mucous produced. But as people begin to smoke the functionality of cilia gets reduced as many chemicals in tobacco are toxic to cilia first slowing them down and soon paralyzing them all together and then destroying them. As the cilia actions being diminishes mucous starts to build up in the small airways making it harder for the smoker to breathe and causing the characteristic smokers cough in order to clear out the airways.

If a smoker quits before cancer actually starts, even if the cells are in a precancerous state, the process is highly reversible. Cilia regeneration starts in about 3 days and within 6 months the normal cilia function will be returned once smoking stops. But if a smoker waits too long and cancer starts, it may be too late to save his or her life. Unfortunately, if a smoker waits until a malignancy has started, the outlook is grim. The overall 5 year survival rate for lung cancer is only 14%. Lung cancer is a disease that while once uncommon, is now the leading cancer killer in both sexes.

For quitting smoking one had to have strong determination. Ex-smokers are often tempted when watching others smoke. Spending time with a specific friend and watching them smoke may be a trigger especially if it was the most time you had spend with the friend since you quit smoking. The natural tendency is for the ex-smoker to start to fantasize about how good a cigarette will be at that given moment and how good it must taste and make him feel. It is true he may be enjoying that particular cigarette, but the odds are he is not. Be far from those guys while they smoke until you feel confident.

Don't fantasize about cigarettes. Always keep a clear, objective perspective of what it would once again be like to be an addicted smoker. There is no doubt at all that if you relapse to smoking you will be under the control of a very powerful addiction. You will be spending hundreds of dollars a year for thousands of cigarettes. You will smell like cigarettes and be viewed as socially unacceptable in many circles. You will be inhaling thousands of poisons with every puff. These poisons will rob you of your endurance and your health. One day they may eventually rob you of your life.

Consider all these consequences of smoking. Then, when you watch a smoker you will feel pity for them, not envy. Consider the life he or she is living compared to the simpler, happier, and healthier life you have had since you broke free from your addiction. Hopefully when you breathe normally today you are not in pain and you are not on oxygen. If you don't smoke you will continue to give yourself the ability to breathe longer and feel better. Never lose sight of this fact. To keep your ability to breathe better for the rest of your life always remember to - NEVER TAKE ANOTHER PUFF!