Female smoking death risk 'has soared'

[nsd_user663_deleted]

bbc.co.uk/news/health-21168516

[nsd_user663_54525]

Scary, but worth reading....kind of put me off having one today!

[nsd_user663_54554]

Yep, thanks for sharing Phil, I saw that in this morning's paper and it really put me off my breakfast. Wooders, looks like you're gonna be ok then?

If I could see the future and knew I'd only lose a year or two I'd take that right now...

Pretty depressing but then that's the point.

[nsd_user663_53202]

Karri - what will you lose if you carry on smoking...........9 years, sounds a lot to me.

[nsd_user663_53202]

If you carry on smoking, you will die 10 years early, and if you stop now you will only die one year early. 10 - 1 = 9.

[nsd_user663_53202]

Fair comment Phil. I believe that "life expectancy" is not a prediction for any one individual, but rather a statement to what happens on average.

[nsd_user663_53202]

Something occurred to me about quitting the other day. If someone carries on smoking until they end up in hospital terminally ill, they will then have to quit! The reason is that you can't smoke in hospital. So, if you are bed-bound, you have no option but to quit.

If you spend several weeks dying horribly of lung cancer, and can't get out of bed, you will be cursing the fact that you are being subjected to an enforced quit. You will also regret that you could have gone through the suffering of a quit earlier in life and maybe avoided lung cancer as a result.......

[nsd_user663_44570]

A choice.

A year may not seem like a lot, but I agree with Lostie - it depends on how you spend your time.

Will you be fretting over whether you will allow yourself to smoke (I'm having a bad day today) and feeling guilty over it till the end of your days? Will you get ill from smoking and have to breathe in oxygen through tubes stuck up your nose to carry on with your shortened life span?

Or will you live the rest of your days free from it, and free from the constant whiny voice in your head that urges you to want to smoke now?

It is a choice. A big one.

And then we still don't know how and when we'll go. Some of us have strong constitutions and withstand everything, even the 4000 plus chemicals that are in tobacco. Some of us don't. You don't know which category you're in so I rather play it safe and stay clean and healthy. That's me personally that is!

Nik

x

[nsd_user663_54940]

Any extra time I get from stopping smoking is a bonus but it's not the reason I'm stopping. I'm stopping because I want to have control over my own life, not have it dictated by cigarettes.

I want to be happy and healthy and I'd rather not die a long drawn out painful death with my kids having to watch.

Even if somebody said "oops we got it all wrong, smoking actually increases your lifespan".... I still wouldn't want to start again.

Life's way better as a non smoker... end of

[nsd_user663_54332]

Have to be honest and say that health wasn't really a factor for me quitting - probably 'cos I'm still young and hadn't noticed any real bad effects of smoking *but* any extra time I get from having given up is a real bonus!!

Did hear on the news a couple of months before i quit (I think) that most of the damage for female smokers went away if you quit before 30 - which I'd planned to do anyway - and at the time that was (really stupid I know) a licence for me to carry on smoking. :rolleyes:

But only for a month or so :cool: