Smoking and asthma - Asthma Message Board

Shauna_M · 01-14-2001, 01:22 AM

What is the REAL story?

I've been told to quit smoking. I know that I should and plan to. What is the real connection?

Shauna

[This message has been edited by Shauna_M (edited 01-14-2001).]

joy · 01-14-2001, 06:06 PM

It can be damaging to your lungs even many years after quitting, if you started very young. I now have asthma and I believe COPD. which came on gradually over the last 8 or 9 years. I have not smoked in 18 years, but did from 12 to 37. It's not worth the risk.

arbed · 01-20-2001, 02:47 PM

Smoking is bad for your whether you have asthma or not. However, it is worse if you do have asthma. It takes a long time to clear out your lungs once you do stop smoking. If you don't stop, you can also get cancer or other lung disorders which will shorten your life! There are a lot of websites out on the internet that discuss this more in detail.

JustTellMe · 02-01-2001, 01:33 PM

I smoked for many years, then quit for 5. Then, I started it up again, and smoked for another 5, but now I'm a nonsmoker again. I have asthma. Asthma that I would NEVER have gotten if I had never smoked.

Yes, I miss smoking, always will. I loved it. I have an addictive personality, and smoking was something I really enjoyed.

However, for me, the time of denial is OVER. If anyone believes they can smoke without harming themselves, especially in the long run, they are fooling themselves, or they have a death wish. If you already have asthma, and you're continuing to smoke, you're not only choosing DEATH, you're choosing a horrible, lingering, suffering way to die. All of which can be greatly allieviated NOW by quitting smoking NOW.

My mother literally suffocated to death, because her lungs were so damaged by years and years of smoking. I'm not going that way, and I don't want ANYONE else to, either. Not from self-infliction, anyway.

Think of where you want to be in 10 years, or 5, or even next year. Do you want to be on oxygen, sucking on a nebulizer 4 times a day, always having an emergency inhaler nearby, on so many steroids you don't recognize your own swollen, puffy face in the mirror?

Set a quit date, plan for it, and smoke all you want until then--enjoy the hell out of it. Then, when you STOP, enjoy just BREATHING...

SHER300 · 02-03-2001, 06:35 PM

I smoked since I was probably 17 (quit for both pregnancies, but started up again after). When I was about 37, the smoking caught up with me. I would wake up in the middle of the night wheezing, I could only lay on one side and try to get to sleep. But when I woke up in the morning, I would light that cigarette again because I felt better after being up. But I no longer had the stamina I used to have. I always told myself I would quit..someday. Well, when I was 38-39 I got a cold in the fall and I couldn't breathe, just walking to the phone to answer it left me terribly breathless. After suffering a day and a half not being able to breathe, I finally went to the doctor because I couldn't take it anymore. He immediately admitted me to the hospital. I ended up there for 2 days. He diagnosed me with asthma and told me I had better quit smoking. Well, I did, and even though I do have allergies and they bother me w/my asthma, I no longer wheeze and my stamina is much better. I don't if I got the asthma from smoking, but it definitely triggered it. No one in my family ever had asthma. Now my daughter has asthma (maybe because I smoked and she got the second-hand?).

Sorry for the long post, but my point is QUIT! You'll be glad you did! I am. (And I was addicted!!!)