Thursday 7 August 2014

Are you a smoker?

Over the past few months the farmer and I have spent quite a lot of time visiting hospital for various things.    It always amazes and horrifies us to find that just outside the entrance there is always, come rain or shine, a cluster of patients in wheel chairs, smoking.  Some of them have terrible coughs, all of them look seriously ill.   And yet they still smoke.

Before anyone castigates me for not understanding how difficult it is to give up smoking once one has started - I do know several folk who have managed it (often with help from their doctor or health centre these days).   And before anyone tells me off saying that it is a personal choice - I agree with that wholeheartedly, but I would reply that if they then get ill with some lung complaint which requires hospitalisation, then they are taking up a bed which could be used for another patient.

My father was a heavy smoker until he was in his late sixties, when he got bronchitis AGAIN and the doctor told him that if he smoked through another Winter the disease would kill him.   He never smoked again and was a great advocate for not smoking, but when he died, in his eighties, he died of emphysema.

I hate it so much - and another thing which really gets to me is that in our little town there are one or two places where the ground is covered with cigarette ends.   One of the pubs, really quite a nice building, with nice tables and chairs outside, has the ground littered with cigarette ends and nobody ever seems to sweep them up.

Even worse, a really good bakers in the town obviously has one or two staff who go into the alley at the side of the shop for a smoke.   They grind their cigarette ends into the pathway and nobody ever bothers to sweep them away.  So the path, which leads through to the Car Park, is littered with them.

Am I being paranoid here?   I hope not, but I really do find it quite upsetting.   If people must smoke - and I repeat, it is their choice - then I would like to suggest that they do so in the open air, and dispose of their ends theselves.  

End of rant.

17 comments:

jinxxxygirl said...

Well you just feel free to keep ranting. :) Hubby and i are the babies in our families and neither one of us has ever smoked...BUT both of our entire families smoked..... Funny huh? Maybe because we had to put up with everybody elses second hand smoke it gave us no desire to smoke...

Lets see....Hubby's mother smoked until she met his stepfather and he said he didn't like the smoke but he would never tell her to stop..she threw the cigarettes away and never looked back...However hubby's sister and two brothers smoke...His sister developed heart problems and she stopped smoking....Hubby's stepfather though he never smoked a day in his life died of lung cancer.....He spend many a day and night playing dominoes and pool where the air was so thick with smoke you could cut it with a knife...so go figure....

My family ... My grandmother smoked even after the doctor told her she needed to stop because it was robbing the oxygen from her blood.... My Father continued to smoke like a freight train even after diagnosed with emphysema...
My mother and both my brothers smoked....sigh.......

Perhaps those that smoke should have seen my father in law who died a slow painful death from lung cancer....I think it would make you think twice before lighting up.....
Hugs! deb

Amy said...

I was a smoker, started when I was 14 and quit 4 years ago - best thing I ever did. Apart from how expensive cigarettes and tobacco are now it's a horrible habit. i work for a dentist and regularly see the effects of long term smoking on peoples teeth, gums and skin. And hospitals are much the same here too, seems strange people are outside standing around smoking when there are signs saying "smoke free area". Anyway I hope for anyone reading this that they quit too.

Heather said...

My husband stopped smoking over 25 years ago for health reasons and when he discovered that bronchitis runs in his family. He is still going fairly strong at 86, albeit with a tendency for chest infections when he gets a cold. I had two cigarettes as a teenager and didn't enjoy them, then in my thirties tried again but decided that I couldn't afford to eat and smoke, so enjoyed eating instead.
I think any kind of littering is horrid and if people are capable of smoking, they are capable of tidying up after themselves.

donna baker said...

My dad died of cancer from smoking even after quitting. My husband smoked and got throat cancer. After months at MD Anderson hospital undergoing treatments, he was cured. Now, 13 years later, he is still paying the price from all the radiation. His throat is so constricted he can't swallow food. One of the things we learned from the hospital is that the most damage done is from the length of time smoking, not the quantity, yet I am sure that results in lots of other diseases. I guess people choose their poison or think it will never happen to them.

Churn Dash said...

I'm always amazed at how many people still smoke.

I saw three people waiting for a bus this morning, two were smoking.

When we walk at the weekend we walk past a fishing pier, there is always a smell of smoke.

Walking around the neighbourhood this morning I didn't see much rubbish - except for three cigarette packets. Who will clean up after them?

You might guess it's one of my pet peeves!

Helen

the veg artist said...

As a child I decided that I would never spend my money on something that just went up in smoke. Perversely though, I do like the smell of a good cigar!

Hilary said...

You are not being unreasonable. I quit smoking 25 years ago....the year I quit I tried to quit 13 times. The 13th was the charm.
I have a friend who is dying, on oxygen, and still smoking.
There is no sense to it, but I think it has to do with how much you love life.
If you don't it apparently doesn't matter to you. I am so grateful that I quit, and like you, I don't have sympathy when someone tells me how hard it is. Yup, it is. It is also worth the effort and the pain.

Helsie said...

My son studied environmental science at uni and always used to say that there was nothing worse for the environment than cigarette ends. The poison in them washes into the soil and stays there for a very long time. Pity the businesses mentioned couldn't provide a container for the butts !!

Cro Magnon said...

I smoked untipped Gauloise fags for nearly 40 years, and gave-up in one day (when I finally realised how stupid it was). I now find even the slightest whiff of cigarette smoke quite disgusting.

Rachel Phillips said...

I don't agree with stopping smoking in pubs and bars. Smokers like to relax with a fag and it doesn't seem uncivilised to me. Now they always have one eye on the door. I like foreign cities where the laws are not vigorously applied, if they exist, and smokers can still have a drink and a smoke and be relaxed and happy and good company instead of all jittery about when to dive out into the street to light up.

Linda Metcalf said...

I quit 27 years ago. It can be done....lay them down and walk away. The real amazement is to see a body with oxygen tank attached to them and a cigarette in their hand!

Frances said...

I am totally with you on what you say. I was so thrilled when smoking was banned indoors. I could go to the pub and not feel like coughing all the time, and my clothes still smelt nice! It really annoys me when people light up just outside a door and the smoke comes in..(our cricket club last weekend), and he was standing just over my tied up pup too. I removed the dog as soon as I realised!

The Weaver of Grass said...

Hm. Mixed comments - in about the proportion I would expect from a survey of the population. We are all entitled to our opinions - but thanks for joining in.

JoAnn ( Scene Through My Eyes) said...

We are fortunate here in the US (at least on the west coast) - smoking is banned in almost all public buildings - no smoking anywhere on hospital properties (except in Kentucky where their main crop is tobacco and it is almost like they are shoving it in your face - we'll smoke if we want to and don't care if we die from it - so there, is sort of their attitude). Restaurants were first to go smoke free and then when they proposed it for bars there was such an uproar. The bars claimed that their business was fall off and they would be forced to close because their patrons couldn't get by without a cigarette for a few minutes at a time. Well, surprise - no bars failed - none closed.

In our city there is no smoking in public parks - also no drinking and no loud music - we live in a most civilized and peaceful city. And no smoking within 20 to 50 feet of doors to any public buildings. It used to appall me when we would be at the hospital and the health care workers would be standing right at the entrance smoking - and each time the doors opened the smoke would rush right into the hospital and spread throughout the building - it is amazing how far and how wide cigarette smoke can spread.

Since our hospital is a huge complex including buildings for doctors' offices and labs and clinics there is a good buffer around it with no smoking allowed - not even in the parking lots. You are not even allowed to smoke in your own car unless you are leaving the property and the windows stay rolled up - I say good for us!!!!! Literally.

Mac n' Janet said...

I started smoking as a teenage, but when I saw my Mother dying slowly and horribly from emphysema I quit, cold turkey and have not smoked since. That was more than 30 years ago.

MorningAJ said...

I'm an ex-smoker. I know that we're the worst when it comes to being anti-smoking. I do hate to see fag ends all over the floor (and always did) and I wish people would clear them up. We have a chip shop at the end of our road and seem to be just the right distance for people to unwrap their hand-held food and drop the wrapper just outside our door. I take great delight in picking them up and putting them through the shop letterbox!

Julie Clay Illustration said...

I have witnessed the smoking outside the hospital thing, it is horrible, some people look so ill puffing away??? Awful to have to walk through them all too. Most of my family smoked, up until it making them ill, I have never smoked, and hate to see folks huddled outside pubs, worshipping the weed. The worst was a dear friend dying of lung cancer, leaving behind 3 daughters, beautiful twins aged 7. I loved my friend, but she wouldn't have it that smoking may have caused it, I think it did, wish she had caught it sooner and may have been saved?