At this time last year, I was lying in a hospital bed in Boston with a chest tube sucking air and blood out of me, I was squeezing my morphine pump every six minutes, I was peeing in a catheter, and puking my guts out.

I had surgery a year ago today to remove a nodule that looked malignant. I was a 25 year smoker, 43 years old with a 1 year old and a 12 year old.

I was lucky. It was benign. But I will NEVER forget the discomfort from that surgery. I will never forget the feeling of guilt that I could have been dying and leaving my girls.

I quit smoking the night before that surgery, and have not picked one up since. One year and one day.

I pray every day that I never do develop a cancer in my lungs or anywhere else for that matter.

IF YOU SMOKE - PLEASE QUIT TODAY. And for those of you that do have cancer, or a loved one of yours has cancer, I pray for you every day. I know how lucky I am. I know how scared you are.

:wave: Thanks for sharing your wake up call with us. Sorry it had to be such a tough one to get you to stop smoking . But it looks like it worked! It is nice to read a post with a happy ending. Wishing continued good health to you.

Thank you for the nice words! :wave:

MWessells

Thank you for sharing your story. I am so glad that your tumor turned out to be benign.

I just read this story to my husband who is a casual smoker. We also have two children ages 9 and 18 months. I am constantly on him about this terrible habit. I hope that your story will sink in.

I commend you for taking your situation seriously and realizing the loss your children would suffer without you. Congratulations on being smoke free for a year. I encourage you to continue telling your story to as many people that are willing to listen. It is possible that you could prevent lung cancer or other terrible diseases smoking causes, in others by sharing your story. If you save one person your story would have been worth being told.

Best of luck to you and your family.