But there probably aren't too many habits in the world that do as much damage as smoking tobacco. When I was a kid, some 50 years ago nearly half the people in the United States smoked cigarettes or some other form of tobacco. Today the percentage is a lot lower; reports are from the government are that only about 17% of people smoke cigarettes.
I myself smoked at one time and I remember the exact day I quit. It was July 25, 1984, at 9 AM, at 110 N. Broad Street, in Globe, Arizona. And the reason that I remember it so well is because it was one of the most difficult things that I'd done in my life. I have withdrawn from heroin at least 15 times during my addiction, but quitting cigarettes was more difficult than any withdrawal from heroin or other kinds of opiates.
On top of that I had seven aunts and uncles who smoked. And they all died from the effects of smoking, either emphysema, COPD, or lung cancer. And I had a cousin who died when she was 35 from emphysema because she was such a heavy smoker. All in all, smoking had a heavier impact on my life than nearly anything else in terms of losing loved ones and family members.
And I write this today because someone I cared very much about spent much of this year attempting to quit smoking. She went to treatment, and lasted nearly over four months before she relapsed and went back to smoking. It was the longest period she'd been without cigarettes in her many decades of smoking.
I'd been in a many-year relationship with her but her smoking relapse made me terminate it. I knew it was hopeless and I knew that she didn't have the strength to quit and never would. Oh, I'm sure she had rationalizations about why she "slipped." But when a person is sober for over four months I don't believe their is any such thing as a "slip." It's a conscious choice.
I think it's a conscious choice to get that high from using again. And screw the effect it has on anyone else's life.
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